Debt Ceiling Package
COVID-19 and hurricanes have intensified the push for SNAP coverage for Puerto Rico…
Although federal spending on domestic programs will be flat in the upcoming fiscal year, higher education advocates say there’s still a chance to secure more money to increase the maximum Pell Grant award and to fund the Office of Federal Student Aid, among other priorities…
California
Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library reading program is expanding in California. Five-year-olds across the state will be able to receive a free book in the mail each month, and California will be the first state to offer bilingual book options…
Since the year before the pandemic shutdown schools, the number of California kids being homeschooled has skyrocketed by 70 percent — and despite a return to in-person learning, many are not going back…
More than 100,000 California tenants whose applications for COVID-era rental assistance were denied or delayed by the state’s housing department will get another shot at relief, thanks to a new legal settlement between the state and a coalition of anti-poverty and tenant rights groups…
President and Administration
White House Office of National Drug Control Policy Director Rahul Gupta warned that 165,000 lives could be lost a year to the opioid crisis by 2025 if the government doesn’t intervene — a 55,000 increase in the number of overdose deaths last year…
President Biden has vetoed a measure that would have overturned his student debt relief plan, leaving the fate of the program before the Supreme Court…
The Supreme Court is set to announce major decisions affecting education in the coming weeks…
After more than three years, the federal government’s pandemic-related suspension of student loan payments and interest is officially coming to an end…
About 20 percent of student loan borrowers “have risk factors that suggest they could struggle when scheduled payments resume,” according to a new analysis of student loan borrowers released last week by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau…
On Thursday, 6/8, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy voiced support for adding a warning on social media platforms for the danger they pose to children — much like the existing labels on cigarettes…
The National Working Group on Advanced Education, a group convened by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, released a new report examining equity concerns in gifted education programs…
Congress
The payment pause for federal student loans will end in late August, after almost three and a half years…
Republicans and Democrats have launched an effort to reauthorize a five-year-old law that marked a bipartisan commitment to combat the opioid addiction crisis…
House Republican tax writers will take up bills tomorrow that would expand the standard deduction, pare back tax reporting for contractors and gig workers and revive expired incentives for businesses in the party's first major tax markup since taking back control of the chamber…
Appropriations
The House Appropriations Committee will mark up the first two of its 12 annual bills -- the Military Construction-VA and Agriculture bills…
Senators are moving slower than the House and don’t have markups scheduled yet, but key members said they expect to start committee work soon…
Education
Amid a crush of late-breaking business in Austin, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s proposal to grant education savings accounts (ESAs) to every family in Texas ran out of steam before the May 30 deadline…
Special education is notoriously fraught in many school systems, but the magnitude of the problem in the nation’s largest district, New York City, boggles…
According to a new report from EAB, one in five high school students who say they won’t enroll in college cite their doubts about its value, up from eight percent in 2019…