This week, Members of Congress were largely focused on the election of a new House Speaker and the Israel-Palestine conflict. Little action could occur to address support for Israel because of the situation in the House, and all other bills are stalled as well. The Senate was also on recess this week but will return next week with a long “to do” list, including funding or other policy to support Israel, as well as the FY 24 appropriations bills. Read more news and updates below:

• GOP’s Steve Scalise Drops Out of House Speaker Race: Republican lawmaker Steve Scalise (R-LA) announced that he was dropping out of the election to become the new Speaker of the House after he failed to get enough support from within the party. Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) is now the current nominee, but also lacks full support. Currently, a vote is tentatively scheduled for Tuesday, October 17, but it is unclear how the next few days will unfold.

• White House Launches Initiative to Catalyze Workforce Development for Advanced Manufacturing Jobs and Careers: The Biden-Harris Administration held a White House Convening to officially kick off its efforts on an Advanced Manufacturing Workforce Sprint, an initiative to build a diverse, skilled pipeline of workers for “good jobs,” including union jobs in the advanced manufacturing sector. The initiative brings together employers, unions, education and training providers, community-based organizations, and state and local governments, among others, to strategize on how to help more Americans train for and succeed in the growing field.

• Department of Education Announces Technical Assistance Centers Funding to Support Student Academic Achievement: ED has announced a round of funding of more than $24 million for technical assistance centers across the nation aimed at supporting and enhancing student well-being, academic success and school safety. The initiative will complement the Department’s mission of accelerating learning, meeting student mental health needs and expanding opportunity and success both inside and outside the classroom.

The Community College Research Center (CCRC) recently published a series of reports to accompany its Dual Enrollment Equity Pathways (DEEP) framework, a new initiative that aims to rethink dual enrollment (DE) as an equitable ramp to postsecondary programs that can lead to good-paying, family- and self-sustaining careers for learners who might not have otherwise pursued education after high school. The framework centers around the following four areas of practice:

• Outreach to underserved students and schools
• Alignment to college degrees and careers in fields of interest
• Early career and academic exploration, advising and planning
• High-quality college instruction and academic support

Redesigning Dual Enrollment as a Purposeful Pathway to College and Career Opportunity: The initial report of the series presents the DEEP model and draws on the authors’ conclusions from institutions that were early adopters of whole-college guided pathways (GP) reforms. Researchers identified that approximately one in five school districts nationwide have closed the racial equity access gap to DE, indicating the importance of scaling and sharing program strategies happening at the local level.

The following list spells out key strategies that leaders can use to implement the DEEP framework in their DE programs:

• Engage in outreach to low-income students and students of color beginning in middle school to make learners aware of DE opportunities when they reach high school.
• “Backward map” all programs to ensure that they lead to a good job, an associate degree or a bachelor’s degree.
• Provide separate advising and planning assistance to DE students to better assist them and reduce the work of overburdened high school advisors.
• Expose learners to postsecondary instructional methods that help them improve academic performance and assimilate to college norms and expectations.

Rethinking Dual Enrollment as an Equitable On-ramp to a Career-path College Degree Program After High School: The second report presents findings that researchers gained through field research at six community college-K-12 partnerships across Florida and Texas that have achieved positive results in expanding postsecondary access to underrepresented learners and economically disadvantaged individuals through the reforming and extension of GP practices and DE offerings. Researchers found that more than 1.5 million high school students take DE courses each year, but the majority of these courses are à la carte with no opportunity for specializing.

The following list contains strategies and recommendations that community college-K-12 partnerships can use to implement GP reforms and increase participation opportunities for underserved individuals:

• Embed program-specific DE coursework into high school CTE programs to market DE to learners, building on existing career-focused academies and programs.
• Create more efficient and streamlined pathways to teaching careers for high school students by aligning DE with teacher education pathway programs.
• Set high expectations across the board and provide essential supports such as tutoring, advising and purposeful pathways to ensure learner success.
• Frame DE pathways as a route to facilitating upward mobility and creating productive citizens when marketing to underserved communities.

Researchers also shared a key recommendation gleaned from the partnerships that they engaged with: Using current academy and DE students as ambassadors to describe DE opportunities to elementary and middle school students and families.

After a busy weekend where both the House and Senate managed to pass a continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government open until Nov. 17, the Senate had very little activity this week, and is now recessed until October 16. The House, however, saw unprecedent events unfold as former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) was voted out of his role. The House is now beginning the process of electing a new speaker, but it is uncertain how long this may take. In the meantime, House activity is at a standstill, potentially impacting numerous pieces of legislation awaiting consideration. Read further news and notes below:

• Appropriations Update: With a new CR in place until November 17, Congress now needs to return to the process of considering appropriations bills. Currently, the House has passed four of its 12 funding bills, all on a partisan basis, while the Senate is still working to pass its first set of three bills. The Senate plans to return to votes on these bills when they return, but the situation in the House is likely to slow further appropriations consideration there. Both sides remain far apart in terms of total spending levels. As this process continues to advance, it is critical that you continue to let your Members of Congress know you prefer the reasonable investments in the Senate bill.
• Department of Education Appoints New Members to National Assessment Governing Board: ED has announced the appointment of 11 education leaders (seven new members and four reappointed members) to the National Assessment Governing Board, the organization that oversees the Nation’s Report Card. These new members are set to be sworn in at the governing board’s quarterly meeting in November. The full governing board members list is linked here.

• Department of Education Announces an Additional Student Debt Relief Measure: ED and the Biden-Harris Administration have announced an additional $9 billion in student debt relief for more than 125,000 Americans through fixes that the Department has made to income-driven repayment (IDR) and the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program. The new measure also grants automatic loan cancellation to borrowers with total and permanent disabilities.

• Department of Labor Announces Funding for Continued Temporary Employment and Workforce Training Support After Hurricane Ian: DOL has announced an incremental award of $7.5 million in funding to support the efforts of disaster-relief employment and workforce development and training for eligible residents in the state of Florida as the area continues to recover from the effects left behind by Hurricane Ian. The funds will be available for the Florida Department of Commerce to provide residents with relief services including support for career and training programs.

State of CTE Funding: Advance CTE recently published the 2023 State of CTE report, which provides an overview of secondary CTE funding models across all 50 states and the District of Columbia. It also serves as a resource for those interested in conducting side-by-side state comparisons of funding models and related factors. One of the report’s key findings is that CTE funding models are deeply varied and complex due to the reliance on a mix of federal, state and local policies to provide funds for secondary CTE.

More findings from the report below:

• The categorical student-based funding approach, which distributes funds relative to the number of CTE learners enrolled, is the most common model used by states (23).
• States have increased their CTE funding over the past 10 years, with an average state increase of over $180 million, reflecting the growing focus and attention on CTE by policymakers.
• Secondary CTE programs of study used state funds to support equitable access (65%), program of study completion (56%) and the purchase of equipment and resources (54%).
• Maine was the state with the highest amount of CTE funds per FTE in FY 2022 with a range of $7,500-7,999.

The report recommends that CTE leaders actively look for opportunities for continuous improvement to better their models in areas such as ongoing policy and practice, formula design and innovation and incentives.

Lessons in how to build students’ social capital through career-connected learning: The Christensen Institute recently published a report that offers field-tested strategies for building learners’ social capital through existing CTE pathways by increased networking opportunities and personal and professional relationships. After an 18-month pilot initiative conducted with partner organizations like Education Strategy Group, researchers developed 10 crucial social capital building lessons for school leaders.

The following list highlights some of these lesson topics. Leaders can implement these lessons to help learners expand their networks and engage in more networking opportunities:

• Embed social capital into your infrastructure. Hiring the right staff can help foster change but embedding practices into curricula, roles and data systems helps maintain it.
• Prioritize building curricula and allocate time and resources for social capital training instead of purchasing poorly fit off-the-shelf products.
• Adapt practices to cultural norms. Social capital requires cooperation between students and staff. Tailor your strategies to align with learner backgrounds.
• Take a show-not-tell approach to teaching about social capital. Rather than adapting it as a subject matter, immerse students in experiences that build their understanding.

Increasing Equitable Postsecondary Value: A report recently published by the Institute for Higher Education Policy tackles the issue of equitable value in postsecondary education by exploring policy interventions that aim to break down barriers and assess the economic value of postsecondary credentials through publicly available data that estimates a minimum economic return to students. Researchers discovered that approximately 88% of public two-year or less-than-two-year institutions provide students with at least a minimum economic return on their investment.

To go beyond the threshold of minimum return, school leaders, administrators and policymakers must address the shortcomings and inequities that underserved learner groups face nationwide. Researchers made the following recommendations to help institutions address these issues and strive further toward equitable value:

• Invest in first-dollar free college programs to increase affordability value by maximizing aid for high-need students.
• Assist low-income background students with non-tuition expenses to reduce affordability barriers and facilitate completion.
• Make financial aid more feasible for low-income students by avoiding restrictions on part-time status, enrollment age, state background and transfer status.
• Advocate for changes in federal and state law to decrease time-to-degree and increase completion rates.

The U.S. Department of Education recently published a report on increasing student diversity, equity and inclusion, which aims to serve as a resource to postsecondary institutions and states in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. University of North Carolina et al.

The report describes research demonstrating the effectiveness of pathway programs for increasing diversity and encouraging more low-income and minority students to apply to postsecondary institutions. The authors also note that, despite the resource-intensive nature of pathway programs, in the long run they lead to positive effects on postsecondary application and enrollment rates for underrepresented learners.

The report also highlights dual enrollment as a strategy to boost diversity for postsecondary institutions. However, dual enrollment courses are not equally accessible to low-income students and students of color, who are more likely to attend schools that do not offer this option. Even when it is available to them, barriers such as insufficient advising and financial hardships can disincentivize these learners’ participation.

To increase access, the report highlights examples from states across the country that have developed innovative pathway and dual enrollment approaches. For instance, Georgia is attempting to expand dual enrollment opportunities to underrepresented students by including these courses in its statewide accountability system. New Mexico is building its Four Corners College and Career Pathways Partnership, which aims to help secondary students in rural areas earn 12-30 hours of early college credit. The credits will seamlessly transition to an aligned certificate, a degree program or an apprenticeship program.

In addition, the authors recommended the following strategies that institutions can apply to reach a more diverse pool of student talent:

• Prioritize targeted outreach in communities with higher levels of low-income learners and learners of color.
• Establish partnerships with K-12 educators, counselors, college access groups and other community-based organizations to deliver clear information about postsecondary options to students and their families.
• Establish partnerships between community colleges and four-year institutions to smooth transfer pathways.
• Support visits to college campuses and assign higher numbers of admissions recruiters to high schools with few prior recruitments.
• Provide opportunities to explore career interests and identify the education options that will help students meet their career goals.

Last weekend, Congress temporarily averted a government shutdown by passing a continuing resolution (CR) to keep federal programs operating at current funding levels until November 17. However,  there is still much more work to be done to complete the FY 24 appropriations process, and Congress has just over six weeks to complete this work or face another potential shutdown  

Before the August recess, the Senate Appropriations Committee considered and approved its Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill on a bipartisan basis, which contains a $40 million increase to the Perkins Basic State Grant program and provides significantly more resources to education and workforce development programs than the House version of the bill does. As negotiations on how to move these bills forward continue, we must continue to emphasize to Members of Congress that we support the Senate bill and its higher funding levels! Wrapping up the FY 24 appropriations process will be quite contentious, and your advocacy is critical to elevate the message that the Senate bill is preferable.    

ACTION NEEDED: CLICK HERE to urge your Members of Congress to support the Senate’s $40 million increase for Perkins and overall higher funding levels!     

You can send a message directly using the ACTE Action Center. You can also call or email directly any personal contacts that you have in your Members’ offices, such as from a meeting at NPS, or call the U.S. Capitol switchboard at (202) 224-3121, and an operator will connect you to your Member of Congress.

Over the weekend, Congress passed a stopgap funding bill to avert a government shutdown. The Continuing Resolution (CR), which President Joe Biden signed late Saturday evening, will keep the federal government funded at current levels until November 17. 

After several failed attempts at a more partisan approach that would have significantly cut funding, Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) made the proposal early on Saturday, and it eventually passed the House on a 335-91 vote. The Senate took up the CR a few house later and passed the measure 88-9.  

The CR keeps funding levels at Fiscal Year (FY) 2023 levels, a significant victory given some of the other proposals over the past week. The package also includes $16 billion in federal disaster assistance, which meets the president’s full request. However, it does not include any aid to Ukraine, which was a top priority for President Biden and many Members of Congress from both parties. Additional aid is expected to be considered in separate bills.  

Over the next several weeks, Congressional leaders will use this additional time to continue trying to pass additional FY 24 appropriations bills. Leaders in both the House and the Senate will need to come to an agreement, and we will continue advocating for the highest funding level possible for CTE!