[Washington]- Today, House Republicans unveiled their proposal to reform America’s higher education system. Despite record levels of student debt, increasing attainment gaps along racial and socioeconomic lines, and a pressing need for more accountability and transparency, the GOP proposal is not promising for students and loan borrowers. Initial impressions of the bill based on the recently released text and an earlier article from the Wall Street Journal indicate that the proposal, taken as a whole, makes a struggling system worse.
Reid Setzer, Young Invincibles’ Government Affairs Director, released the following statement:
The PROSPER Act puts forward several proposals that will make it harder, not easier, for students to access affordable higher education. First, it does nothing to meaningfully address the cost of college, like increasing the value of the Pell Grant or incentivizing states to invest more in their public higher education systems. On top of that, it severely limits debt relief for student loan borrowers.
The few changes this bill makes to support students, like reforming the Federal Work Study program, simplifying the FAFSA, and a few limited provisions around improving student-level information, fall woefully short of the structural changes and greater investment students and families have been waiting for from their representatives for far too long.”
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Allie Aguilera, [email protected], 202.734.6529