Us Congress House Bill HB6951 Introduced / Bill

                    I 
118THCONGRESS 
2
DSESSION H. R. 6951 
To lower the cost of postsecondary education for students and families. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JANUARY11, 2024 
Ms. F
OXX(for herself, Mr. OWENS, Mr. GROTHMAN, Mr. ALLEN, Mr. 
S
MUCKER, Mrs. MCCLAIN, Mrs. STEEL, and Mr. WILLIAMSof New York) 
introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on 
Education and the Workforce 
A BILL 
To lower the cost of postsecondary education for students 
and families. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE; TABLE OF CONTENTS. 3
(a) S
HORTTITLE.—This Act may be cited as the 4
‘‘College Cost Reduction Act’’. 5
(b) T
ABLE OFCONTENTS.—The table of contents for 6
this Act is as follows: 7
Sec. 1. Short title; table of contents. 
Sec. 2. References. 
TITLE I—TRANSPARENCY 
P
ARTA—DEFINITIONS 
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Sec. 101. Definitions. 
P
ARTB—COLLEGECOSTS ANDFINANCIALVALUE 
Sec. 111. Financial aid offers. 
Sec. 112. College scorecard website. 
Sec. 113. Postsecondary student data system. 
Sec. 114. Database of student information prohibited. 
TITLE II—ACCESS AND AFFORDABILITY 
P
ARTA—FINANCIALNEED 
Sec. 201. Amount of need; cost of attendance; median cost of college. 
P
ARTB—FINANCIALAID 
SUBPART 1—GRANTS 
Sec. 211. Federal Pell Grant program. 
Sec. 212. Campus-based aid programs. 
SUBPART 2—LOANS 
Sec. 221. Loan limits. 
Sec. 222. Loan repayment. 
Sec. 223. Loan rehabilitation. 
Sec. 224. Interest capitalization. 
Sec. 225. Origination fees. 
TITLE III—ACCOUNTABILITY AND STUDENT SUCCESS 
P
ARTA—ACCOUNTABILITY 
SUBPART 1—DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 
Sec. 301. Agreements with institutions. 
Sec. 302. Regulatory relief. 
Sec. 303. Limitation on authority of Secretary to propose or issue regulations 
and executive actions. 
Sec. 304. Office of Federal Student Aid. 
SUBPART 2—ACCREDITORS 
Sec. 311. Accrediting agency recognition. 
Sec. 312. National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity 
(NACIQI). 
Sec. 313. Alternative quality assurance experimental site initiative. 
P
ARTB—STUDENTSUCCESS 
Sec. 321. Postsecondary student success grants. 
Sec. 322. Reverse Transfer Efficiency Act. 
Sec. 323. Transparent and fair transfer of credit policies. 
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SEC. 2. REFERENCES. 1
Except as otherwise expressly provided, whenever in 2
this Act an amendment or repeal is expressed in terms 3
of an amendment to, or repeal of, a section or other provi-4
sion, the reference shall be considered to be made to a 5
section or other provision of the Higher Education Act of 6
1965 (20 U.S.C. 1001 et seq.). 7
TITLE I—TRANSPARENCY 8
PART A—DEFINITIONS 9
SEC. 101. DEFINITIONS. 10
(a) D
EFINITIONS.—Section 103 of the Higher Edu-11
cation Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1003) is amended by add-12
ing at the end the following: 13
‘‘(25) CIP 
CODE.—The term ‘CIP code’ means 14
the six-digit taxonomic identification code assigned 15
by an institution of higher education to a specific 16
program of study at the institution, determined by 17
the institution in accordance with the Classification 18
of Instructional Programs published by the National 19
Center for Education Statistics. 20
‘‘(26) C
REDENTIAL LEVEL.— 21
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—The term ‘credential 22
level’ means the level of the degree or other cre-23
dential awarded by an institution of higher edu-24
cation to students who complete a program of 25
study of the institution. Each degree or other 26
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credential awarded by an institution shall be 1
categorized by the institution as either under-2
graduate credential level or graduate credential 3
level. 4
‘‘(B) U
NDERGRADUATE CREDENTIAL .— 5
When used with respect to a credential or cre-6
dential level, the term ‘undergraduate creden-7
tial’ includes credentials such as an under-8
graduate certificate, an associate degree, a 9
bachelor’s degree, and a post-baccalaureate cer-10
tificate. 11
‘‘(C) G
RADUATE CREDENTIAL .—When 12
used with respect to a credential or credential 13
level, the term ‘graduate credential’ includes 14
credentials such as a master’s degree, a doc-15
toral degree, a professional degree, and a post-16
graduate certificate. 17
‘‘(27) P
ROGRAM OF STUDY .—The term ‘pro-18
gram of study’ means an academic program of study 19
offered to students by an institution of higher edu-20
cation that— 21
‘‘(A) upon completion of the program, re-22
sults in the award of a credential to a student, 23
including a degree, diploma, or certificate, for 24
one credential level; 25
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‘‘(B) is certified as a program of study in 1
the institution’s program participation agree-2
ment under section 487; and 3
‘‘(C) is classified by a combination of— 4
‘‘(i) a CIP code; and 5
‘‘(ii) one credential level, determined 6
by the credential awarded upon completion 7
of the program. 8
‘‘(28) P
ROGRAM LENGTH .—The term ‘program 9
length’ means the minimum amount of time in 10
weeks, months, or years that is specified in the cata-11
log, marketing materials, or other official publica-12
tions of an institution of higher education for a full- 13
time student to complete the requirements for a spe-14
cific program of study and to obtain the degree or 15
credential awarded by such program. 16
‘‘(29) T
IME TO CREDENTIAL .—The term ‘time 17
to credential’ means, with respect to a student, the 18
actual amount of time in weeks, months, or years it 19
takes the student to complete the requirements for 20
a specific program of study and to obtain the degree 21
or credential awarded by such program. 22
‘‘(30) V
ALUE-ADDED EARNINGS.— 23
‘‘(A) C
ALCULATION.—With respect to a 24
student who received Federal financial aid 25
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under title IV and who completed a program of 1
study offered by an institution of higher edu-2
cation, the term ‘value-added earnings’ 3
means— 4
‘‘(i) the annual earnings of such stu-5
dent measured during the applicable earn-6
ings measurement period for such program 7
(as determined under subparagraph (C)); 8
minus 9
‘‘(ii) in the case of a student who 10
completed a program of study that 11
awards— 12
‘‘(I) an undergraduate credential, 13
150 percent of the poverty line appli-14
cable to a single individual as deter-15
mined under section 673(2) of the 16
Community Services Block Grant Act 17
(42 U.S.C. 9902(2)) for such year; or 18
‘‘(II) a graduate credential, 300 19
percent of the poverty line applicable 20
to a single individual as determined 21
under section 673(2) of the Commu-22
nity Services Block Grant Act (42 23
U.S.C. 9902(2)) for such year. 24
‘‘(B) G
EOGRAPHIC ADJUSTMENT .— 25
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‘‘(i) IN GENERAL.—Except as pro-1
vided in clause (ii), the Secretary shall use 2
the geographic location of the institution at 3
which a student completed a program of 4
study to adjust the value-added earnings of 5
the student calculated under subclause (A) 6
by dividing— 7
‘‘(I) the difference between sub-8
clauses (I) and (II) of such subpara-9
graph; by 10
‘‘(II) the most recent regional 11
price parity index of the Bureau of 12
Economics Analysis for the State or, 13
as applicable, metropolitan area in 14
which such institution is located. 15
‘‘(ii) E
XCEPTION.—The value-added 16
earnings of a student calculated under sub-17
paragraph (A) shall not be adjusted based 18
on geographic location in accordance with 19
clause (i) if such student attended prin-20
cipally through distance education. 21
‘‘(C) E
ARNINGS MEASUREMENT PERIOD .— 22
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—For the purpose 23
of calculating the value-added earnings of 24
a student, except as provided in clause (ii), 25
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the annual earnings of a student shall be 1
measured— 2
‘‘(I) in the case of a program of 3
study that awards an undergraduate 4
certificate, post baccalaureate certifi-5
cate, or graduate certificate, one year 6
after the student completes such pro-7
gram; 8
‘‘(II) in the case of a program of 9
study that awards an associate’s de-10
gree or master’s degree, 2 years after 11
the student completes such program; 12
and 13
‘‘(III) in the case of a program of 14
study that awards a bachelor’s degree, 15
doctoral degree, or professional de-16
gree, 4 years after the student com-17
pletes such program. 18
‘‘(ii) E
XCEPTION.—The Secretary 19
may, as the Secretary determines appro-20
priate based on the characteristics of a 21
program of study, extend an earnings 22
measurement period described in clause (i) 23
for a program of study that— 24
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‘‘(I) requires completion of an 1
additional educational program after 2
completion of the program of study in 3
order to obtain a licensure associated 4
with the credential awarded for such 5
program of study; and 6
‘‘(II) when combined with the 7
program length of such additional 8
educational program for licensure, has 9
a total program length that exceeds 10
the relevant earnings measurement 11
period prescribed for such program of 12
study under clause (i), 13
except that in no case shall the annual 14
earnings of a student be measured more 15
than 5 years after the student completes a 16
program of study.’’. 17
PART B—COLLEGE COSTS AND FINANCIAL 18
VALUE 19
SEC. 111. FINANCIAL AID OFFERS. 20
(a) I
NSTITUTIONFINANCIALAIDOFFER.—Section 21
484 of the Higher Education Opportunity Act (20 U.S.C. 22
1092 note) is amended to read as follows: 23
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‘‘SEC. 484. INSTITUTION FINANCIAL AID OFFER FORM. 1
‘‘(a) S
TANDARDFORM AND TERMINOLOGY.—The 2
Secretary of Education, in consultation with the heads of 3
relevant Federal agencies, shall develop standard termi-4
nology and a standard form for financial aid offers based 5
on recommendations from representatives of students, vet-6
erans, servicemembers, families of students, institutions of 7
higher education (including community colleges, for-profit 8
institutions, four-year public institutions, and four-year 9
private nonprofit institutions), financial aid experts, sec-10
ondary school and postsecondary counselors, college access 11
professionals, nonprofit organizations, and consumer 12
groups. 13
‘‘(b) K
EYREQUIREDCONTENTS FORAIDOFFER.— 14
The standard form developed pursuant to subsection (a) 15
shall be titled ‘Financial Aid Offer’ and shall include the 16
following items in a consumer-friendly manner that is sim-17
ple and understandable, with costs listed first, followed by 18
grants and scholarships, clearly separated from each other 19
with separate headings: 20
‘‘(1) C
OST INFORMATION.— 21
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—Information on the 22
student’s estimated cost of attendance, includ-23
ing the following: 24
‘‘(i) D
IRECT COSTS.—The total cost of 25
all items described in section 472 of the 26
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Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1
1087ll) that are billed to the student by 2
the institution or otherwise required by the 3
institution for enrollment, including such 4
total cost disaggregated by the cost of each 5
such item, including, as determined under 6
such section— 7
‘‘(I) tuition and fees (and other 8
required expenses); and 9
‘‘(II) housing and food for a stu-10
dent electing institutionally owned or 11
operated food services or institution-12
ally owned or operated housing. 13
‘‘(ii) I
NDIRECT COSTS.—The total cost 14
(including such total cost disaggregated by 15
the cost of each item) as determined under 16
section 472 of the Higher Education Act 17
of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1087ll), of— 18
‘‘(I) housing and food for a stu-19
dent not electing institutionally owned 20
or operated food services and not liv-21
ing in institutionally owned or oper-22
ated housing; 23
‘‘(II) books, school supplies, 24
equipment, course materials, and 25
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rental or purchase of a personal com-1
puter; 2
‘‘(III) transportation; 3
‘‘(IV) any other item described in 4
such section and not described in 5
clause (i) determined to be necessary 6
by the institution. 7
‘‘(B) The academic period covered by the 8
financial aid offer, and an explanation that the 9
amount of financial aid offered may change— 10
‘‘(i) for academic periods not covered 11
by the aid offer; or 12
‘‘(ii) by program. 13
‘‘(C) An indication of whether cost and aid 14
estimates are based on full-time or part-time 15
enrollment. 16
‘‘(D) An indication, as applicable, about 17
whether any costs described in subparagraph 18
(A)(i) which are subject to change are— 19
‘‘(i) estimated based on the previous 20
year; or 21
‘‘(ii) set for the academic period indi-22
cated in accordance with subparagraph 23
(B). 24
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‘‘(2) GRANTS AND SCHOLARSHIPS .—The aggre-1
gate amount of grants and scholarships, differen-2
tiated by source, that the student does not have to 3
repay, such as grant aid offered under title IV of the 4
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070 et 5
seq.), grant aid offered through other Federal pro-6
grams, grant aid offered by the institution, grant aid 7
offered by the State, and, if known, grant aid or 8
scholarship from an outside source to the student for 9
such academic period, including a disclosure that the 10
grants and scholarships do not have to be repaid, ex-11
cept that institutions shall be authorized to list indi-12
vidual grants and scholarships by name at the dis-13
cretion of the institution. 14
‘‘(3) N
ET PRICE.— 15
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—The net price that the 16
student, is estimated to have to pay for the stu-17
dent to attend the institution for such academic 18
period, including the following: 19
‘‘(i) M
INIMUM AMOUNT COVERED BY 20
STUDENT FOR ENROLLMENT .—The net 21
price of tuition and fees (and other re-22
quired expenses), which is equal to— 23
‘‘(I) the sum of the costs de-24
scribed in paragraph (1)(A) that are 25
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required for students (as determined 1
under paragraph (5)(B)) for the pe-2
riod indicated in paragraph (1)(B); 3
minus 4
‘‘(II) the total amount of grant 5
and scholarship aid described in para-6
graph (2) that is included in the fi-7
nancial aid offer and available to the 8
student for the costs described in sub-9
clause (I). 10
‘‘(ii) E
STIMATED ANNUAL NET PRICE 11
OF ATTENDANCE .—The estimated net 12
price of attendance, which is equal to— 13
‘‘(I) the cost of attendance for 14
the student for the period indicated in 15
paragraph (1)(B); minus 16
‘‘(II) the total amount of grant 17
and scholarship aid described in para-18
graph (2). 19
‘‘(B) D
ISCLOSURE.—A disclosure that the 20
net price is based on an estimate of the total 21
cost of attendance for the year and not nec-22
essarily equivalent to the amount the student 23
will owe directly to the institution. 24
‘‘(4) L
OANS.— 25
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‘‘(A) Information on any education loan of-1
fered through any Federal or State program 2
(including any loan under part D or part E of 3
title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 4
(20 U.S.C. 1087a et seq.; 20 U.S.C. 1087aa et 5
seq.)) that the institution offers for the student 6
for the academic period covered by the offer, 7
which shall be made— 8
‘‘(i) with clear use of the word ‘loan’ 9
to describe the recommended loan 10
amounts; and 11
‘‘(ii) with clear labeling of subsidized 12
and unsubsidized loans. 13
‘‘(B) If applicable, a disclosure that such 14
loans have to be repaid with interest. 15
‘‘(C) Information on any other loan that 16
the student or parent has applied for and been 17
approved for, regardless of the source. 18
‘‘(5) S
TUDENT EMPLOYMENT .—Information on 19
work-study employment opportunities (including 20
work-study programs under part C of title IV of the 21
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1087–51 22
et seq.), institutional work-study programs, or State 23
work-study programs), including— 24
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‘‘(A) the maximum annual amount the stu-1
dent may earn through the program; and 2
‘‘(B) a disclosure that any amounts re-3
ceived pursuant to such a program may be— 4
‘‘(i) subject to the availability of quali-5
fied employment opportunities upon stu-6
dents enrollment; and 7
‘‘(ii) disbursed over time as earned by 8
the student. 9
‘‘(6) P
ROCESS FOR ACCEPTING , ADJUSTING, OR 10
DECLINING AID AND NEXT STEPS .— 11
‘‘(A) The deadlines and a summary of the 12
process (including the next steps) for— 13
‘‘(i) accepting the financial aid of-14
fered; 15
‘‘(ii) adjusting the amount of aid of-16
fered; and 17
‘‘(iii) declining the aid offered. 18
‘‘(B) Information on when and how costs 19
described in paragraph (1)(A)(i) must be paid, 20
including whether such costs are required or op-21
tional for the student. 22
‘‘(C) A disclosure that verification of infor-23
mation provided on the Free Application for 24
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Federal Student Aid may require the student to 1
submit further documentation. 2
‘‘(D) Information about where a student or 3
the student’s family can seek additional infor-4
mation regarding the financial aid offered, in-5
cluding contact information for the institution’s 6
financial aid office and the Department of Edu-7
cation’s website on financial aid. 8
‘‘(E) Information about where a student or 9
a student’s family can seek additional informa-10
tion on college costs and student outcomes, in-11
cluding a link to the Department of Education’s 12
College Scorecard website (or successor 13
website). 14
‘‘(7) N
ET PRICE CALCULATOR .—A link to the 15
universal net price calculator described in section 16
132(c)(4). 17
‘‘(8) A
DDITIONAL INFORMATION .—Any other 18
information the Secretary of Education, in consulta-19
tion with the heads of relevant Federal agencies, in-20
cluding the Secretary of the Treasury and the Direc-21
tor of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, 22
determines necessary, based on the results and input 23
of the consumer testing under subsection (h)(2), and 24
limited only to effectively communicating college 25
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costs and financial aid eligibility to students and 1
parents. 2
‘‘(c) O
THERREQUIREDCONTENTS FOR AID 3
O
FFER.—The standard form developed under subsection 4
(a) shall include, in addition to the information described 5
in subsection (b), the following information in a concise 6
format determined by the Secretary of Education, in con-7
sultation with the heads of relevant Federal agencies and 8
the individuals and entities described in subsection (a): 9
‘‘(1) Additional options and potential resources 10
for paying for the amount listed in subsection (b)(3), 11
such as tuition payment plans. 12
‘‘(2) The following information relating to pri-13
vate student loans: 14
‘‘(A) A disclosure that private education 15
loans may be available to cover remaining need, 16
except that the institution may not include pri-17
vate education loans other than under the con-18
ditions described in subsection (b)(4)(C) and 19
must include a disclosure that such loans— 20
‘‘(i) are subject to an additional appli-21
cation process; and 22
‘‘(ii) must be repaid by the borrower 23
or their co-signer, and may not be eligible 24
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for the benefits available for loans made 1
under title IV. 2
‘‘(B) A statement that students consid-3
ering borrowing to cover the cost of attendance 4
should consider available Federal student loans 5
prior to applying for private education loans, in-6
cluding an explanation that Federal student 7
loans offer generally more favorable terms and 8
beneficial repayment options than private loans. 9
‘‘(d) A
DDITIONALFORMATTINGREQUIREMENTS FOR 10
F
INANCIALAIDOFFER.—The financial aid offer shall 11
meet the following requirements: 12
‘‘(1) Clearly distinguish between the aid offered 13
under paragraphs (2) and (4) of subsection (b), by 14
including a subtotal for the aid offered in each of 15
such paragraphs and by refraining from commin-16
gling the different types of aid described in such 17
paragraphs. 18
‘‘(2) Use standard terminology and definitions, 19
as described in subsection (f)(1), and use plain lan-20
guage where possible. 21
‘‘(3) Use the standard aid offer described in 22
subsection (f)(2). 23
‘‘(e) S
UPPLEMENTAL CONTENT AND DISCLOSURES 24
T
OBEPROVIDED.—In addition to the standard form de-25
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scribed under subsection (a), institutions shall provide, in 1
supplemental documents or through easily accessible 2
weblinks to the institution’s portal or a website, the fol-3
lowing: 4
‘‘(1) The renewability requirements and condi-5
tions under which the student can expect to receive 6
similar amounts of such financial aid for each aca-7
demic period the student is enrolled at the institu-8
tion. 9
‘‘(2) Whether the aid offer may change if aid 10
from outside sources is applied after the student re-11
ceives the initial aid offer, and, if applicable, how 12
that aid will change. 13
‘‘(3) If loans under part D or part E of title 14
IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 15
1087a et seq.; 20 U.S.C. 1087aa et seq.) or other 16
education loans offered through Federal programs 17
are included— 18
‘‘(A) a disclosure that the interest rates 19
and fees on such loans are set annually and af-20
fect total cost over time, and a link to any 21
website that includes current information on in-22
terest rates and fees; and 23
‘‘(B) if an institution’s recommended Fed-24
eral student loan aid offered in subsection 25
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(b)(4) is less than the Federal maximum avail-1
able to the student, the institution shall provide 2
additional information on Federal student loans 3
including the types and amounts for which the 4
student is eligible and the process for request-5
ing higher loan amounts if offered loan 6
amounts were included. 7
‘‘(4) If the institution opts not to disclose other 8
items described in subsection (b)(1)(A)(ii)(V) as 9
part of the aid offer, a list of such other items and 10
the allowance amount for each such item. 11
‘‘(f) S
TANDARDINFORMATION ESTABLISHED BY 12
S
ECRETARY.— 13
‘‘(1) S
TANDARD TERMINOLOGY .—Not later 14
than 3 months after the date of enactment of the 15
College Cost Reduction Act, the Secretary of Edu-16
cation, in consultation with the heads of relevant 17
Federal agencies, and the individuals and entities 18
described in subsection (a) shall establish standard 19
terminology and definitions for the terms described 20
in subsection (b). 21
‘‘(2) S
TANDARD FORM.— 22
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—The Secretary of Edu-23
cation shall develop multiple draft financial aid 24
offers for consumer testing, carry out consumer 25
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testing for such forms, and establish a finalized 1
standard financial aid offer in accordance 2
with— 3
‘‘(i) the process established under sub-4
section (h); and 5
‘‘(ii) the requirements of this section. 6
‘‘(B) S
EPARATE FINANCIAL AID OFFERS .— 7
The Secretary shall develop separate financial 8
aid offers for— 9
‘‘(i) undergraduate students; and 10
‘‘(ii) graduate students. 11
‘‘(g) A
DDITIONALINFORMATION; REMOVAL OFIN-12
FORMATION.—Nothing in this section shall preclude an in-13
stitution from— 14
‘‘(1) supplementing the financial aid offer with 15
additional information, provided that such informa-16
tion utilizes the same standard terminology identi-17
fied in subsection (f)(1) and does not misrepresent 18
costs, financial aid offered, or net price; or 19
‘‘(2) deleting a required item or disclosure if— 20
‘‘(A) the student is ineligible for such aid; 21
‘‘(B) the institution does not participate in 22
the aid program or type; 23
‘‘(C) the aid offer does not include the aid 24
program or type; or 25
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‘‘(D) a cost of attendance item is not ap-1
plicable to the student. 2
‘‘(h) D
EVELOPMENT OF FINANCIALAIDOFFER.— 3
‘‘(1) D
RAFT FORM.—Not later than 9 months 4
after the date of enactment of the College Cost Re-5
duction Act, the Secretary of Education, in consulta-6
tion with the heads of relevant Federal agencies and 7
the individuals and entities described in subsection 8
(a) shall design and produce multiple draft financial 9
aid offers for consumer testing with postsecondary 10
students or prospective students. In developing that 11
form, the Secretary shall ensure that— 12
‘‘(A) the headings described in paragraphs 13
(1) through (4) of subsection (b) are in the 14
same font, appears in the same order, and are 15
displayed prominently on the financial aid offer, 16
such that none of that information is inappro-17
priately omitted or deemphasized; 18
‘‘(B) the other information required under 19
subsection (b) appears in a standard format 20
and design on the financial aid offer; and 21
‘‘(C) the institution may include a logo or 22
brand alongside the title of the financial aid 23
offer. 24
‘‘(2) C
ONSUMER TESTING.— 25
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‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 9 1
months after the date of enactment of the Col-2
lege Cost Reduction Act, the Secretary of Edu-3
cation, in consultation with the heads of rel-4
evant Federal agencies, shall establish a process 5
to submit the financial aid offer drafts devel-6
oped under paragraph (1) for consumer testing 7
among representatives of students (including 8
low-income students, first generation college 9
students, adult students, veterans, 10
servicemembers, and prospective students), stu-11
dents’ families (including low-income families, 12
families with first generation college students, 13
and families with prospective students), institu-14
tions of higher education, secondary school and 15
postsecondary counselors, and nonprofit con-16
sumer groups. 17
‘‘(B) L
ENGTH OF CONSUMER TESTING .— 18
The Secretary of Education shall ensure that 19
the consumer testing under this paragraph lasts 20
not longer than 8 months after the process for 21
consumer testing is developed under subpara-22
graph (A). 23
‘‘(3) F
INAL FORM.— 24
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‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—The results of con-1
sumer testing under paragraph (2) shall be 2
used in the development of the finalized stand-3
ard financial aid offer required under sub-4
section (f)(2). 5
‘‘(B) R
EPORTING REQUIREMENT .—Not 6
later than 3 months after the date on which the 7
consumer testing under paragraph (2) con-8
cludes, the Secretary of Education shall submit 9
to Congress, and publish on its website— 10
‘‘(i) the final standard financial aid 11
offer; and 12
‘‘(ii) a report detailing the results of 13
such testing, including whether the Sec-14
retary of Education added, modified, or 15
moved any additional items to the stand-16
ard financial aid offer pursuant to sub-17
section (b)(6). 18
‘‘(4) A
UTHORITY TO MODIFY .—The Secretary 19
of Education may modify or remove the definitions, 20
terms, formatting, and design of the financial aid 21
offer based on the results of consumer testing re-22
quired under this subsection and before finalizing 23
the form, or in subsequent consumer testing. The 24
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Secretary may also recommend additional changes to 1
Congress. 2
‘‘(i) C
OST OFATTENDANCEDEFINED.—In this sec-3
tion, the term ‘cost of attendance’ has the meaning given 4
such term in section 472 of the Higher Education Act of 5
1965 (20 U.S.C. 1087ll).’’. 6
(b) U
SE OFMANDATORYFINANCIALAIDOFFER AND 7
T
ERMS.—Part B of title I of the Higher Education Act 8
of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1011 et seq.) is amended by adding 9
at the end the following: 10
‘‘SEC. 124. USE OF MANDATORY FINANCIAL AID OFFER AND 11
TERMS. 12
‘‘(a) I
NGENERAL.—Notwithstanding any other pro-13
vision of law, each institution of higher education that re-14
ceives Federal financial assistance under this Act shall— 15
‘‘(1) use the financial aid offer developed under 16
section 484 of the Higher Education Opportunity 17
Act (20 U.S.C. 1092 note) in providing paper, mo-18
bile-optimized offers, or other electronic offers to all 19
students who apply for aid and are accepted at the 20
institution; and 21
‘‘(2) use the standard terminology and defini-22
tions developed by the Secretary of Education under 23
subsection (f)(1) of that section for all communica-24
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tions from the institution related to financial aid of-1
fers. 2
‘‘(b) E
FFECTIVEDATE.—The requirements under 3
this section shall take effect on the first date on which 4
the Secretary releases the Free Application for Federal 5
Student Aid for the applicable award year associated with 6
that application, if such date occurs not less than 1 year 7
after the Secretary of Education finalizes the standard 8
terminology and form developed in accordance with section 9
484 of the Higher Education Opportunity Act (20 U.S.C. 10
1092 note). 11
‘‘(c) A
DMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES.—Notwith-12
standing any other provision of law, the Secretary shall 13
not have the authority to prescribe regulations to carry 14
out this section.’’. 15
SEC. 112. COLLEGE SCORECARD WEBSITE. 16
(a) C
OLLEGESCORECARDWEBSITE.— 17
(1) D
EFINITIONS; CONFORMING AMEND -18
MENTS.—Section 132 of the Higher Education Act 19
of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1015a(a)) is amended— 20
(A) by amending subsection (a) to read as 21
follows: 22
‘‘(a) D
EFINITIONS.—In this section: 23
‘‘(1) C
OLLEGE SCORECARD WEBSITE .—The 24
term ‘College Scorecard website’ means the College 25
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Scorecard website required under subsection (c) and 1
includes any successor website. 2
‘‘(2) C
OST OF ATTENDANCE .—The term ‘cost of 3
attendance’ has the meaning given such term in sec-4
tion 472. 5
‘‘(3) T
OTAL NET PRICE REQUIRED FOR COM -6
PLETION.—The term ‘total net price required for 7
completion’ means, with respect to the period of 8
completion of a program of study— 9
‘‘(A) the sum of the required costs de-10
scribed in section 484(b)(3)(A)(i)(I) charged to 11
a student for such period of completion; minus 12
‘‘(B) the total amount of grant and schol-13
arship aid described in paragraph (2) of section 14
484(b) that is available to the student for the 15
costs described in subparagraph (A) for comple-16
tion of a program of study.’’; 17
(B) by striking subsections (b) through 18
(g); and 19
(C) by redesignating subsection (h) as sub-20
section (b). 21
(2) S
CORECARD AUTHORIZED .—Section 132 of 22
the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 23
1015a) is further amended— 24
(A) by striking subsection (i); and 25
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(B) by inserting after subsection (b) the 1
following: 2
‘‘(c) C
ONSUMERINFORMATION.— 3
‘‘(1) A
VAILABILITY OF INFORMATION FOR 4
TITLE IV INSTITUTIONS AND PROGRAMS .—Not later 5
than 18 months after the date of the enactment of 6
the College Cost Reduction Act, the Secretary shall 7
make publicly available on the College Scorecard 8
website the following aggregated information with 9
respect to each institution of higher education and 10
each program of study at such institution, as appli-11
cable, that participates in a program under title IV: 12
‘‘(A) A link to the website of the institu-13
tion. 14
‘‘(B) A link to the net price calculator for 15
such institution. 16
‘‘(C) A link to the website of the institu-17
tion containing campus safety data with respect 18
to such institution. 19
‘‘(D) The geographic location of the insti-20
tution. 21
‘‘(E) Information on the type of institu-22
tion, including sector, size, predominant and 23
highest credential awarded, research intensity, 24
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programs of study offered, and other character-1
istics of the institution. 2
‘‘(F) Information on student enrollment, 3
including the number and percentage of stu-4
dents enrolled full-time, less than full-time, and 5
enrolled in distance education. 6
‘‘(G) Information on student progression 7
and completion, including time to credential 8
and rates of withdrawal, retention, transfer, or 9
completion. 10
‘‘(H) Information on college costs and fi-11
nancial aid, including average, median, min-12
imum, and maximum values of— 13
‘‘(i) the cost of attendance, including 14
such cost disaggregated by the costs de-15
scribed in paragraphs (1) through (14) of 16
section 472(a); 17
‘‘(ii) the grants and scholarships re-18
ceived by students at the institution and 19
the number and percentage of such stu-20
dents receiving such grants and scholar-21
ships, disaggregated by source and whether 22
such aid is need-based, merit-based, an 23
athletic scholarship, or other type of grant 24
or scholarship; and 25
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‘‘(iii) the total net price required for 1
completion for students who received Fed-2
eral financial assistance described in para-3
graph (2)(I). 4
‘‘(I) Information on student debt and re-5
payment, including— 6
‘‘(i) the average, median, minimum, 7
and maximum amounts borrowed by stu-8
dents under title IV; and 9
‘‘(ii) information with respect to re-10
payment of loans made under title IV, in-11
cluding borrower-based repayment rates, 12
dollar-based repayment rates, and time 13
spent in repayment. 14
‘‘(J) Information on the earnings of stu-15
dents who received Federal financial assistance 16
described in paragraph (2)(I), including the av-17
erage, median, minimum, and maximum values 18
of— 19
‘‘(i) with respect to students who com-20
plete a program of study in an award 21
year— 22
‘‘(I) the annual earnings of such 23
students; and 24
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‘‘(II) the value-added earnings of 1
such students; and 2
‘‘(ii) with respect to students who do 3
not complete a program of study in an 4
award year, the annual earnings of such 5
students. 6
‘‘(2) D
ISAGGREGATED INFORMATION .—The 7
Secretary shall ensure the information described in 8
paragraph (1) is disaggregated, as applicable, by the 9
following student characteristics: 10
‘‘(A) Financial circumstances including— 11
‘‘(i) household income categories, as 12
determined by students’ adjusted gross in-13
come, family size, and poverty line (as de-14
fined in section 401(a)); and 15
‘‘(ii) student aid index categories, as 16
determined by the Secretary. 17
‘‘(B) Sex. 18
‘‘(C) Race and ethnicity. 19
‘‘(D) Classification as a student with a dis-20
ability. 21
‘‘(E) Enrollment status. 22
‘‘(F) Residency status. 23
‘‘(G) Status as an international student. 24
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‘‘(H) Status as a recipient of Federal fi-1
nancial assistance, including— 2
‘‘(i) a Pell grant; 3
‘‘(ii) a loan made under title IV; and 4
‘‘(iii) veterans’ education benefits (as 5
defined in section 480(c)). 6
‘‘(J) Status as a participant in a program 7
described in section 116(b)(3)(A)(ii) of the 8
Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (29 9
U.S.C. 3131(b)(3)(A)(ii)). 10
‘‘(3) I
NSTITUTIONAL AND PROGRAM COMPARI -11
SON.—The Secretary shall include on the College 12
Scorecard website a method for users to easily com-13
pare institutions and programs, including in a man-14
ner that allows for such comparison based on— 15
‘‘(A) the institutional and program infor-16
mation described in paragraph (1); and 17
‘‘(B) the student characteristics described 18
in paragraph (2). 19
‘‘(4) U
NIVERSAL NET PRICE CALCULATOR .— 20
The Secretary shall include on the College Scorecard 21
website a universal net price calculator that enables 22
users to answer questions and receive personalized 23
pricing information for each institution of higher 24
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education and program of study offered by such in-1
stitution. 2
‘‘(5) U
PDATES.— 3
‘‘(A) D
ATA.—The Secretary shall update 4
the College Scorecard website not less than an-5
nually. 6
‘‘(B) T
ECHNOLOGY AND FORMAT .—The 7
Secretary shall regularly assess the format and 8
technology of the College Scorecard website and 9
make any changes or updates that the Sec-10
retary considers appropriate. 11
‘‘(6) C
ONSUMER TESTING .—In developing and 12
maintaining the College Scorecard website, the Sec-13
retary, in consultation with appropriate departments 14
and agencies of the Federal Government, shall— 15
‘‘(A) not later than 6 months after the 16
date of the enactment of the College Cost Re-17
duction Act, and not less than once every 3 18
years thereafter, consumer testing with appro-19
priate persons, including current and prospec-20
tive college students, family members of such 21
students, institutions of higher education, and 22
experts, to ensure that the College Scorecard 23
website is usable and easily understandable and 24
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provides useful and relevant information to stu-1
dents and families; and 2
‘‘(B) prominently display on such website 3
in simple, understandable, and unbiased terms 4
for the most recent academic year for which 5
satisfactory data is available, the information 6
described in paragraphs (1) and (2) that was 7
determined to be useful and relevant to stu-8
dents and families based on the consumer test-9
ing described in subparagraph (A) for each in-10
stitution and program of study (as applicable). 11
‘‘(7) P
ROVISION OF APPROPRIATE LINKS TO 12
PROSPECTIVE STUDENTS AFTER SUBMISSION OF 13
FAFSA.—The Secretary shall provide to each student 14
who submits a Free Application for Federal Student 15
Aid described in section 483 a link to the webpage 16
of the College Scorecard website that contains the 17
information required under paragraph (1) for each 18
institution of higher education such student includes 19
on such application. 20
‘‘(8) I
NTERAGENCY COORDINATION .—The Sec-21
retary, in consultation with each appropriate head of 22
a department or agency of the Federal Government, 23
shall ensure, to the greatest extent practicable, that 24
any information related to higher education that is 25
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published by such department or agency is con-1
sistent with the information published on the College 2
Scorecard website. 3
‘‘(9) D
ATA COLLECTION AND DUPLICATED RE -4
PORTING.—Notwithstanding any other provision of 5
this section, to the extent that another provision of 6
this section requires the same reporting or collection 7
of data that is required under this Act, an institu-8
tion of higher education, or the Secretary or Com-9
missioner, shall use the reporting or data required 10
under this subsection to satisfy both requirements. 11
‘‘(10) D
ATA PRIVACY.— 12
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—The Secretary shall 13
ensure any information made available under 14
this section is made available in accordance 15
with the privacy laws described in section 16
132(f)(1)(C)(iv). 17
‘‘(B) S
MALL INSTITUTIONS AND PROGRAM 18
OF STUDY.—For purposes of publishing the in-19
formation described in paragraphs (1) and (2), 20
for any year for which the number of students 21
is determined by the Secretary to be of insuffi-22
cient size to maintain the privacy of student 23
data, the Secretary shall— 24
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‘‘(i) aggregate up to 4 years of addi-1
tional data for such program of study to 2
obtain data for a sufficient number of stu-3
dents to maintain student privacy; 4
‘‘(ii) in the case of a program of 5
study, if the method described in clause (i) 6
is insufficient to maintain student privacy, 7
aggregate data for students who completed 8
or who were enrolled in, as applicable, 9
similar program of study of the institution 10
to obtain data for a sufficient number of 11
students to maintain student privacy; and 12
‘‘(iii) in the case of a program of 13
study, if the methods described in clauses 14
(i) and (ii) are insufficient to maintain stu-15
dent privacy, or additional data described 16
in such clauses is not available or can not 17
be aggregated, aggregate data with respect 18
to all students who completed or were en-19
rolled in, as applicable, any program of 20
study of the institution of the same creden-21
tial level, in lieu of data specific to stu-22
dents in such program of study.’’. 23
(b) C
ONFORMINGAMENDMENTS.—The Higher Edu-24
cation Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1001 et seq.), as amended 25
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by subsection (a) of this section, is further amended by 1
striking ‘‘College Navigator’’ each place it appears and in-2
serting ‘‘College Scorecard’’. 3
(c) R
EFERENCES.—Any reference in any law (other 4
than the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1001 5
et seq.)), regulation, document, record, or other paper of 6
the United States to the College Navigator website shall 7
be considered to be a reference to the College Scorecard 8
website. 9
SEC. 113. POSTSECONDARY STUDENT DATA SYSTEM. 10
Section 132 of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 11
U.S.C. 1015a) is further amended— 12
(1) by redesignating subsections (j) and (k) as 13
subsections (d) and (e), respectively; 14
(2) by redesignating subsection (l) as subsection 15
(g); and 16
(3) by inserting after subsection (e), as so re-17
designated, the following: 18
‘‘(f) P
OSTSECONDARYSTUDENTDATASYSTEM.— 19
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.— 20
‘‘(A) E
STABLISHMENT OF SYSTEM .—Not 21
later than 3 years after the date of enactment 22
of the College Cost Reduction Act, the Commis-23
sioner of the National Center for Education 24
Statistics (referred to in this subsection as the 25
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‘Commissioner’) in consultation with the Direc-1
tor of the Institute of Education Sciences (re-2
ferred to as ‘the Director’) shall develop and 3
maintain a secure and privacy-protected post-4
secondary student-level data system in order 5
to— 6
‘‘(i) accurately evaluate student en-7
rollment patterns, progression, completion, 8
and postcollegiate outcomes, and higher 9
education costs and financial aid; 10
‘‘(ii) assist with transparency, institu-11
tional improvement, and analysis of Fed-12
eral aid programs; 13
‘‘(iii) provide accurate, complete, and 14
customizable information for students and 15
families making decisions about postsec-16
ondary education; and 17
‘‘(iv) reduce the reporting burden on 18
institutions of higher education in accord-19
ance with section 111 of the College Cost 20
Reduction Act. 21
‘‘(B) A
VOIDING DUPLICATE REPORTING .— 22
Notwithstanding any other provision of this sec-23
tion, to the extent that another provision of this 24
section requires the same reporting or collection 25
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of data that is required under this subsection, 1
an institution of higher education, or the Sec-2
retary or Commissioner, shall use the reporting 3
or data required for the postsecondary student 4
data system under this subsection to satisfy 5
both requirements. 6
‘‘(C) D
EVELOPMENT PROCESS .—In devel-7
oping the postsecondary student data system 8
described in this subsection, the Commissioner, 9
in consultation with the Director, shall— 10
‘‘(i) focus on the needs of— 11
‘‘(I) users of the data system; 12
and 13
‘‘(II) entities, including institu-14
tions of higher education, reporting to 15
the data system; 16
‘‘(ii) take into consideration, to the 17
extent practicable— 18
‘‘(I) the guidelines outlined in— 19
‘‘(aa) the ‘United States 20
Web Design Standards’ main-21
tained by the General Services 22
Administration; and 23
‘‘(bb) the ‘Digital Services 24
Playbook’ and ‘TechFAR Hand-25
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book for Procuring Digital Serv-1
ices Using Agile Processes’ of the 2
United States Digital Service; 3
and 4
‘‘(II) the relevant successor docu-5
ments or recommendations of such 6
guidelines; 7
‘‘(iii) use modern, relevant privacy- 8
and security-enhancing technology, and en-9
hance and update the data system as nec-10
essary to carry out the purpose of this sub-11
section; 12
‘‘(iv) ensure data privacy and security 13
is consistent with any relevant Federal law 14
relating to privacy or data security, includ-15
ing— 16
‘‘(I) the requirements of sub-17
chapter II of chapter 35 of title 44, 18
United States Code, specifying secu-19
rity categorization under the Federal 20
Information Processing Standards or 21
any relevant successor of such stand-22
ards; 23
‘‘(II) security requirements that 24
are consistent with the Federal agency 25
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responsibilities in section 3554 of title 1
44, United States Code, or any rel-2
evant successor of such responsibil-3
ities; and 4
‘‘(III) security requirements, 5
guidelines, and controls consistent 6
with cybersecurity standards and best 7
practices developed by the National 8
Institute of Standards and Tech-9
nology, including frameworks, con-10
sistent with section 2(c) of the Na-11
tional Institute of Standards and 12
Technology Act (15 U.S.C. 272(c)), or 13
any relevant successor of such frame-14
works; 15
‘‘(v) follow Federal data minimization 16
practices to ensure only the minimum 17
amount of data is collected to meet the 18
system’s goals, in accordance with Federal 19
data minimization standards and guide-20
lines developed by the National Institute of 21
Standards and Technology; and 22
‘‘(vi) provide notice to students out-23
lining the data included in the system and 24
how the data are used. 25
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‘‘(D) LIMITATION.—The data system de-1
veloped under this subsection may only include 2
data with respect to— 3
‘‘(i) students receiving— 4
‘‘(I) Federal financial assistance 5
under title IV of this Act; or 6
‘‘(II) veteran’s education bene-7
fits, as defined in section 480(c); and 8
‘‘(ii) participants in a program de-9
scribed in section 116(b)(3)(A)(ii) of the 10
Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act 11
(29 U.S.C. 3131(b)(3)(A)(ii)). 12
‘‘(2) D
ATA ELEMENTS.— 13
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—Not later than 3 years 14
after the date of enactment of the College Cost 15
Reduction Act, the Commissioner, in consulta-16
tion with the Postsecondary Student Data Sys-17
tem Advisory Committee and the Director, es-18
tablished under subparagraph (B), shall deter-19
mine— 20
‘‘(i) the data elements to be included 21
in the postsecondary student data system, 22
in accordance with subparagraphs (C) and 23
(D); and 24
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‘‘(ii) how to include the data elements 1
required under subparagraph (C), and any 2
additional data elements selected under 3
subparagraph (D), in the postsecondary 4
student data system. 5
‘‘(B) P
OSTSECONDARY STUDENT DATA 6
SYSTEM ADVISORY COMMITTEE .— 7
‘‘(i) E
STABLISHMENT.—Not later 8
than 1 year after the date of enactment of 9
the College Cost Reduction Act, the Com-10
missioner, in consultation with the Direc-11
tor, shall establish a Postsecondary Stu-12
dent Data System Advisory Committee (re-13
ferred to in this subsection as the ‘Advi-14
sory Committee’), whose members shall in-15
clude— 16
‘‘(I) the Chief Privacy Officer of 17
the Department or an official of the 18
Department delegated the duties of 19
overseeing data privacy at the Depart-20
ment; 21
‘‘(II) the Chief Security Officer 22
of the Department or an official of 23
the Department delegated the duties 24
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of overseeing data security at the De-1
partment; 2
‘‘(III) representatives of diverse 3
institutions of higher education, which 4
shall include equal representation be-5
tween 2-year and 4-year institutions 6
of higher education, and from public, 7
nonprofit, and proprietary institutions 8
of higher education, including minor-9
ity-serving institutions; 10
‘‘(IV) representatives from State 11
higher education agencies, entities, 12
bodies, or boards; 13
‘‘(V) representatives of postsec-14
ondary students; 15
‘‘(VI) representatives from rel-16
evant Federal agencies; 17
‘‘(VII) individuals with expertise 18
in data privacy and security; and 19
‘‘(VIII) other stakeholders (in-20
cluding individuals with consumer 21
protection and postsecondary edu-22
cation research). 23
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‘‘(ii) REQUIREMENTS.—The Commis-1
sioner, working with the Director, shall en-2
sure that the Advisory Committee— 3
‘‘(I) adheres to all requirements 4
under chapter 10 of title 5, United 5
States Code (commonly known as the 6
‘Federal Advisory Committee Act’); 7
‘‘(II) establishes operating and 8
meeting procedures and guidelines 9
necessary to execute its advisory du-10
ties; and 11
‘‘(III) is provided with appro-12
priate staffing and resources to exe-13
cute its advisory duties. 14
‘‘(C) R
EQUIRED DATA ELEMENTS .—The 15
data elements in the postsecondary student 16
data system shall include the following: 17
‘‘(i) Student-level data elements nec-18
essary to calculate the information within 19
the surveys designated by the Commis-20
sioner as ‘student-related surveys’ in the 21
Integrated Postsecondary Education Data 22
System (IPEDS), as such surveys are in 23
effect on the day before the date of enact-24
ment of the College Cost Reduction Act, 25
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except that in the case that collection of 1
such elements would conflict with the pro-2
hibition under subparagraph (F), such ele-3
ments in conflict with such prohibition 4
shall be included in the aggregate instead 5
of at the student level. 6
‘‘(ii) Student-level data elements re-7
ported by institutions in accordance with 8
section 668.408 of title 34, Code of Fed-9
eral Regulations, as in effect on July 1, 10
2024. 11
‘‘(iii) Student-level data elements nec-12
essary to allow for reporting student en-13
rollment, persistence, progression (includ-14
ing credit accumulation) retention, trans-15
fer, completion, and time and credits to 16
credential measures for all credential levels 17
separately (including certificate, associate, 18
baccalaureate, and advanced degree levels), 19
within and across institutions of higher 20
education (including across all categories 21
of institution level, control, and predomi-22
nant degree awarded). The data elements 23
shall allow for reporting about all such 24
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data disaggregated by the following cat-1
egories: 2
‘‘(I) Enrollment status as a first- 3
time student, recent transfer student, 4
or other nonfirst-time student. 5
‘‘(II) Attendance intensity, 6
whether full-time or part-time. 7
‘‘(III) Credential-seeking status, 8
by credential level (including non-9
credit-seeking and noncredit creden-10
tials). 11
‘‘(IV) Race or ethnicity, in a 12
manner that captures all the racial 13
groups specified in the most recent 14
American Community Survey of the 15
Bureau of the Census. 16
‘‘(V) Age intervals. 17
‘‘(VI) Sex. 18
‘‘(VII) Status as a first genera-19
tion college student (as defined in sec-20
tion 402A(h)). 21
‘‘(VIII) Economic status. 22
‘‘(IX) Measures related to college 23
readiness, including participation in 24
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postsecondary remedial coursework or 1
gateway course completion. 2
‘‘(X) Program of study. 3
‘‘(XI) Status as an online edu-4
cation student, whether exclusively or 5
partially enrolled in online education. 6
‘‘(XII) Military or veteran benefit 7
status (as determined based on receipt 8
of veteran’s education benefits, as de-9
fined in section 480(c)). 10
‘‘(XIII) Federal Pell Grant re-11
cipient status under section 401 and 12
Federal loan recipient status under 13
title IV. 14
‘‘(XIV) Status as a participant in 15
a program described in section 16
116(b)(3)(A)(ii) of the Workforce In-17
novation and Opportunity Act (29 18
U.S.C. 3131(b)(3)(A)(ii)). 19
‘‘(D) R
EEVALUATION.—Not less than once 20
every 3 years after the implementation of the 21
postsecondary student data system described in 22
this subsection, the Commissioner, in consulta-23
tion with the Advisory Committee described in 24
subparagraph (B) and working with the Direc-25
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tor, shall report to Congress the data elements 1
included in the postsecondary student data sys-2
tem and recommend any additional data ele-3
ments to be included in such system. 4
‘‘(E) P
ROHIBITIONS.—The postsecondary 5
student data system shall not include individual 6
health data (including data relating to physical 7
health or mental health), student discipline 8
records or data, elementary and secondary edu-9
cation data, an exact address, course grades, 10
postsecondary entrance examination results, po-11
litical affiliation, religion, or any other data in 12
the postsecondary student data system not de-13
scribed in this subsection. 14
‘‘(3) P
ERIODIC MATCHING WITH OTHER FED -15
ERAL DATA SYSTEMS.— 16
‘‘(A) D
ATA SHARING AGREEMENTS .— 17
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—The Commis-18
sioner, in consultation with the Director, 19
shall ensure secure and privacy-protected 20
periodic data matches by entering into 21
data sharing agreements with each of the 22
following Federal agencies and offices: 23
‘‘(I) The Secretary of the Treas-24
ury and the Commissioner of the In-25
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ternal Revenue Service, in order to 1
calculate aggregate program- and in-2
stitution-level earnings of postsec-3
ondary students described in subpara-4
graph (B)(ii). 5
‘‘(II) The Secretary of Defense, 6
in order to assess the use of postsec-7
ondary educational benefits and the 8
outcomes of servicemembers who are 9
receiving veteran’s education benefits 10
(as defined in section 480(c)). 11
‘‘(III) The Secretary of Veterans 12
Affairs, in order to assess the use of 13
postsecondary educational benefits 14
and outcomes of veterans who are re-15
ceiving veteran’s education benefits 16
(as defined in section 480(c)). 17
‘‘(IV) The Director of the Bu-18
reau of the Census, in order to assess 19
the employment outcomes of former 20
postsecondary education students de-21
scribed in paragraph (1)(D). 22
‘‘(V) The Chief Operating Officer 23
of the Office of Federal Student Aid, 24
in order to analyze the use of postsec-25
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ondary educational benefits provided 1
under this Act. 2
‘‘(VI) The Commissioner of the 3
Social Security Administration, in 4
order to evaluate labor market out-5
comes of former postsecondary edu-6
cation students described in para-7
graph (1)(D). 8
‘‘(VII) The Secretary of Health 9
and Human Services, in order to 10
evaluate the wages of former postsec-11
ondary education students described 12
in paragraph (1)(D). 13
‘‘(ii) D
ATA SHARING AGREEMENTS .— 14
The heads of Federal agencies and offices 15
described under clause (i) shall enter into 16
data sharing agreements with the Commis-17
sioner to ensure secure and privacy-pro-18
tected periodic data matches as described 19
in this paragraph. 20
‘‘(B) C
ATEGORIES OF DATA .—The Com-21
missioner, in consultation with the Director, 22
shall, at a minimum, seek to ensure that the se-23
cure and privacy-protected periodic data 24
matches described in subparagraph (A) permit 25
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consistent reporting of the following categories 1
of data for students described in paragraph 2
(1)(D) who completed a program of study and 3
who did not complete a program of study: 4
‘‘(i) Enrollment, retention, transfer, 5
and completion outcomes. 6
‘‘(ii) Financial indicators for postsec-7
ondary students receiving Federal grants 8
and loans, including grant and loan aid by 9
source, cumulative student debt, loan re-10
payment status, and repayment plan. 11
‘‘(iii) Post-completion outcomes, in-12
cluding earnings and employment (includ-13
ing industry, occupation, and location of 14
employment, and further education, by 15
program of study and credential level) and 16
as measured at time intervals appropriate 17
to the credential sought and earned. 18
‘‘(C) P
ERIODIC DATA MATCH STREAM -19
LINING AND CONFIDENTIALITY .— 20
‘‘(i) S
TREAMLINING.—In carrying out 21
the secure and privacy-protected periodic 22
data matches under this paragraph, the 23
Commissioner shall— 24
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‘‘(I) ensure that such matches 1
are not continuous, but occur only pe-2
riodically at appropriate intervals, as 3
determined by the Commissioner to 4
meet the goals of subparagraph (A); 5
and 6
‘‘(II) seek to— 7
‘‘(aa) streamline the data 8
collection and reporting require-9
ments for institutions of higher 10
education; 11
‘‘(bb) minimize duplicative 12
reporting across or within Fed-13
eral agencies or departments, in-14
cluding reporting requirements 15
applicable to institutions of high-16
er education under the Workforce 17
Innovation and Opportunity Act 18
(29 U.S.C. 3101 et seq.) and the 19
Carl D. Perkins Career and 20
Technical Education Act of 2006; 21
‘‘(cc) protect student pri-22
vacy; and 23
‘‘(dd) streamline the applica-24
tion process for student loan ben-25
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efit programs available to bor-1
rowers based on data available 2
from different Federal data sys-3
tems. 4
‘‘(ii) R
EVIEW.—Not less often than 5
once every 3 years after the establishment 6
of the postsecondary student data system 7
under this subsection, the Commissioner, 8
in consultation with the Advisory Com-9
mittee and the Director, shall review meth-10
ods for streamlining data collection from 11
institutions of higher education and mini-12
mizing duplicative reporting within the De-13
partment and across Federal agencies that 14
provide data for the postsecondary student 15
data system. 16
‘‘(iii) C
ONFIDENTIALITY.—The Com-17
missioner shall ensure that any periodic 18
matching or sharing of data through peri-19
odic data system matches established in 20
accordance with this paragraph— 21
‘‘(I) complies with the security 22
and privacy protections described in 23
paragraph (1)(C)(iv) and other Fed-24
eral data protection protocols; 25
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‘‘(II) follows industry best prac-1
tices commensurate with the sensi-2
tivity of specific data elements or 3
metrics; 4
‘‘(III) does not result in the cre-5
ation of a single standing, linked Fed-6
eral database at the Department that 7
maintains the information reported 8
across other Federal agencies; and 9
‘‘(IV) discloses to postsecondary 10
students what data are included in the 11
data system and periodically matched 12
and how the data are used. 13
‘‘(iv) C
ORRECTION.—The Commis-14
sioner, in consultation with the Advisory 15
Committee and Director, shall establish a 16
process for students to request access to 17
only their personal information for inspec-18
tion and request corrections to inaccuracies 19
in a manner that protects the student’s 20
personally identifiable information. The 21
Commissioner shall respond in writing to 22
every request for a correction from a stu-23
dent. 24
‘‘(4) P
UBLICLY AVAILABLE INFORMATION .— 25
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‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—The Commissioner 1
shall make the summary aggregate information 2
described in subparagraph (C), at a minimum, 3
publicly available through a user-friendly con-4
sumer information website and analytic tool for 5
institutional and research use that— 6
‘‘(i) provides appropriate mechanisms 7
for users to customize and filter informa-8
tion by institutional and student character-9
istics; 10
‘‘(ii) allows users to build summary 11
aggregate reports of information, including 12
reports that allow comparisons across mul-13
tiple institutions and programs, subject to 14
subparagraph (B); 15
‘‘(iii) uses appropriate statistical dis-16
closure limitation techniques necessary to 17
ensure that the data released to the public 18
cannot be used to identify specific individ-19
uals; and 20
‘‘(iv) provides users with appropriate 21
contextual factors to make comparisons, 22
which may include national median figures 23
of the summary aggregate information de-24
scribed in subparagraph (C). 25
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‘‘(B) NO PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE IN -1
FORMATION AVAILABLE .—The summary aggre-2
gate information described in this paragraph 3
shall not include personally identifiable informa-4
tion. 5
‘‘(C) S
UMMARY AGGREGATE INFORMATION 6
AVAILABLE.—The summary aggregate informa-7
tion described in this paragraph shall, at a min-8
imum, include each of the following for each in-9
stitution of higher education: 10
‘‘(i) Measures of student access, in-11
cluding— 12
‘‘(I) admissions selectivity and 13
yield; and 14
‘‘(II) enrollment, disaggregated 15
by each category described in para-16
graph (2)(C)(iii). 17
‘‘(ii) Measures of student progression, 18
including retention rates and persistence 19
rates, disaggregated by each category de-20
scribed in paragraph (2)(C)(iii). 21
‘‘(iii) Measures of student completion, 22
including— 23
‘‘(I) transfer rates and outcomes, 24
completion rates, and time and credits 25
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to credential, disaggregated by each 1
category described in paragraph 2
(2)(C)(iii); and 3
‘‘(II) number of completions, 4
disaggregated by each category de-5
scribed in paragraph (2)(C)(iii). 6
‘‘(iv) Measures of student costs, in-7
cluding— 8
‘‘(I) tuition, required fees, cost of 9
attendance, grants and scholarships, 10
net price, and unmet need 11
disaggregated by in-State tuition or 12
in-district tuition status (if applica-13
ble), direct and indirect costs, pro-14
gram of study (if applicable), and cre-15
dential level; and 16
‘‘(II) typical grant amounts and 17
loan amounts received by students re-18
ported separately from Federal, State, 19
local, institutional, employers, and 20
other sources, and cumulative debt, 21
disaggregated by— 22
‘‘(aa) each category de-23
scribed in paragraph (2)(C)(iii); 24
and 25
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‘‘(bb) completion status. 1
‘‘(v) Measures of postcollegiate stu-2
dent outcomes, including return on invest-3
ment, employment rates, earnings, loan re-4
payment and default rates, and further 5
education rates. These measures shall— 6
‘‘(I) be disaggregated by— 7
‘‘(aa) each category de-8
scribed in paragraph (2)(C)(iii); 9
and 10
‘‘(bb) completion status; and 11
‘‘(II) be measured immediately 12
after leaving postsecondary education 13
and at time intervals appropriate to 14
the credential sought or earned. 15
‘‘(D) D
EVELOPMENT CRITERIA .—In devel-16
oping the method and format of making the in-17
formation described in this paragraph publicly 18
available, the Commissioner shall— 19
‘‘(i) focus on the needs of the users of 20
the information, which will include stu-21
dents, families of students, potential stu-22
dents, researchers, and other consumers of 23
education data; 24
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‘‘(ii) take into consideration, to the 1
extent practicable, the guidelines described 2
in paragraph (1)(C)(ii)(I), and relevant 3
successor documents or recommendations 4
of such guidelines; 5
‘‘(iii) use modern, relevant technology 6
and enhance and update the postsecondary 7
student data system with information, as 8
necessary to carry out the purpose of this 9
paragraph; 10
‘‘(iv) ensure data privacy and security 11
in accordance with standards and guide-12
lines developed by the National Institute of 13
Standards and Technology, and in accord-14
ance with any other Federal law relating to 15
privacy or security, including complying 16
with the requirements of subchapter II of 17
chapter 35 of title 44, United States Code, 18
specifying security categorization under the 19
Federal Information Processing Standards, 20
and security requirements, and setting of 21
National Institute of Standards and Tech-22
nology security baseline controls at the ap-23
propriate level; and 24
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‘‘(v) conduct consumer testing to de-1
termine how to make the information as 2
meaningful to users as possible. 3
‘‘(5) P
ERMISSIBLE DISCLOSURES OF DATA .— 4
‘‘(A) D
ATA REPORTS AND QUERIES .— 5
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—Not later than 3 6
years after the date of enactment of the 7
College Cost Reduction Act, the Commis-8
sioner in consultation with the Director, 9
shall develop and implement a secure and 10
privacy-protected process for making stu-11
dent-level, nonpersonally identifiable infor-12
mation, with direct identifiers removed, 13
from the postsecondary student data sys-14
tem available for vetted research and eval-15
uation purposes approved by the Commis-16
sioner in a manner compatible with prac-17
tices for disclosing National Center for 18
Education Statistics restricted-use survey 19
data as in effect on the day before the date 20
of enactment of the College Cost Reduction 21
Act, or by applying other research and dis-22
closure restrictions to ensure data privacy 23
and security. Such process shall be ap-24
proved by the National Center for Edu-25
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cation Statistics’ Disclosure Review Board 1
(or successor body). 2
‘‘(ii) P
ROVIDING DATA REPORTS AND 3
QUERIES TO INSTITUTIONS AND STATES .— 4
‘‘(I) I
N GENERAL.—The Commis-5
sioner shall provide feedback reports, 6
at least annually, to each institution 7
of higher education, each postsec-8
ondary education system that fully 9
participates in the postsecondary stu-10
dent data system, and each State 11
higher education body as designated 12
by the governor. 13
‘‘(II) F
EEDBACK REPORTS .—The 14
feedback reports provided under this 15
clause shall include program-level and 16
institution-level information from the 17
postsecondary student data system re-18
garding students who are associated 19
with the institution or, for State rep-20
resentatives, the institutions within 21
that State, on or before the date of 22
the report, on measures including stu-23
dent mobility (including transfer and 24
completion rates) and workforce out-25
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comes, provided that the feedback ag-1
gregate summary reports protect the 2
privacy of individuals. 3
‘‘(III) D
ETERMINATION OF CON -4
TENT.—The content of the feedback 5
reports shall be determined by the 6
Commissioner in consultation with the 7
Advisory Committee and the Director. 8
‘‘(iii) P
ERMITTING STATE DATA QUE -9
RIES.—The Commissioner shall, in con-10
sultation with the Advisory Committee and 11
as soon as practicable, create a process 12
through which States may submit lists of 13
secondary school graduates within the 14
State to receive summary aggregate out-15
comes for those students who enrolled at 16
an institution of higher education, includ-17
ing postsecondary enrollment, retention 18
and transfer, and college completion, pro-19
vided that those data protect the privacy of 20
individuals and that the State data sub-21
mitted to the Commissioner are not stored 22
in the postsecondary education system. 23
‘‘(iv) R
EGULATIONS.—The Commis-24
sioner shall promulgate regulations to en-25
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sure fair, secure and privacy-protected, and 1
equitable access to data reports and que-2
ries under this paragraph. 3
‘‘(B) D
ISCLOSURE LIMITATIONS .—In car-4
rying out the public reporting and disclosure re-5
quirements of this subsection, the Commis-6
sioner shall use appropriate statistical disclo-7
sure limitation techniques necessary to ensure 8
that the data released to the public cannot in-9
clude personally identifiable information or be 10
used to identify specific individuals. 11
‘‘(C) S
ALE OF DATA PROHIBITED .—Data 12
collected under this subsection, including the 13
public-use data set and data comprising the 14
summary aggregate information available under 15
paragraph (4), shall not be sold to any third 16
party by the Commissioner, including any insti-17
tution of higher education or any other entity. 18
‘‘(D) L
IMITATION ON USE BY OTHER FED -19
ERAL AGENCIES.— 20
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—The Commissioner 21
shall not allow any other Federal agency to 22
use data collected under this subsection for 23
any purpose except— 24
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‘‘(I) for vetted research and eval-1
uation conducted by the other Federal 2
agency, as described in subparagraph 3
(A)(i); or 4
‘‘(II) for a purpose explicitly au-5
thorized by an Act of Congress. 6
‘‘(ii) P
ROHIBITION ON LIMITATION OF 7
SERVICES.—The Secretary, or the head of 8
any other Federal agency, shall not use 9
data collected under this subsection to 10
limit services to students. 11
‘‘(E) L
AW ENFORCEMENT .—Personally 12
identifiable information collected under this 13
subsection shall not be used for any Federal, 14
State, or local law enforcement activity or any 15
other activity that would result in adverse ac-16
tion against any student or a student’s family. 17
‘‘(F) L
IMITATION OF USE FOR FEDERAL 18
RANKINGS OR SUMMATIVE RATING SYSTEM .— 19
The comprehensive data collection and analysis 20
necessary for the postsecondary student data 21
system under this subsection shall not be used 22
by the Secretary or any Federal entity to estab-23
lish any Federal ranking system of institutions 24
of higher education or a system that results in 25
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a summative Federal rating of institutions of 1
higher education. 2
‘‘(G) R
ULE OF CONSTRUCTION .—Nothing 3
in this paragraph shall be construed to prevent 4
the use of individual categories of aggregate in-5
formation to be used for accountability pur-6
poses. 7
‘‘(H) R
ULE OF CONSTRUCTION REGARDING 8
COMMERCIAL USE OF DATA .—Nothing in this 9
paragraph shall be construed to prohibit third- 10
party entities from using publicly available in-11
formation in this data system for commercial 12
use. 13
‘‘(6) S
UBMISSION OF DATA.— 14
‘‘(A) R
EQUIRED SUBMISSION.—Each insti-15
tution of higher education participating in a 16
program under title IV, or the assigned agent 17
of such institution, shall, for each instructional 18
program, and in accordance with section 19
487(a)(17), collect, and submit to the Commis-20
sioner, the data requested by the Commissioner 21
to carry out this subsection. 22
‘‘(B) V
OLUNTARY SUBMISSION .—Any insti-23
tution of higher education not participating in 24
a program under title IV may voluntarily par-25
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ticipate in the postsecondary student data sys-1
tem under this subsection by collecting and sub-2
mitting data to the Commissioner, as the Com-3
missioner may request to carry out this sub-4
section. 5
‘‘(C) P
ERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE INFOR -6
MATION.—In accordance with paragraph 7
(2)(C)(i), if the submission of an element of 8
student-level data is prohibited under para-9
graph (2)(F) (or otherwise prohibited by law), 10
the institution of higher education shall submit 11
that data to the Commissioner in the aggregate. 12
‘‘(7) U
NLAWFUL WILLFUL DISCLOSURE .— 13
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—It shall be unlawful 14
for any person who obtains or has access to 15
personally identifiable information in connection 16
with the postsecondary student data system de-17
scribed in this subsection to willfully disclose to 18
any person (except as authorized in this Act or 19
by any Federal law) such personally identifiable 20
information. 21
‘‘(B) P
ENALTY.—Any person who violates 22
subparagraph (A) shall be subject to a penalty 23
described under section 3572(f) of title 44, 24
United States Code, and section 183(d)(6) of 25
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the Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 (20 1
U.S.C. 9573(d)(6)). 2
‘‘(C) E
MPLOYEE OF OFFICER OF THE 3
UNITED STATES.—If a violation of subpara-4
graph (A) is committed by any officer or em-5
ployee of the United States, the officer or em-6
ployee shall be dismissed from office or dis-7
charged from employment upon conviction for 8
the violation. 9
‘‘(8) D
ATA SECURITY.—The Commissioner shall 10
produce and update as needed guidance and regula-11
tions relating to privacy, security, and access which 12
shall govern the use and disclosure of data collected 13
in connection with the activities authorized in this 14
subsection. The guidance and regulations developed 15
and reviewed shall protect data from unauthorized 16
access, use, and disclosure, and shall include— 17
‘‘(A) an audit capability, including manda-18
tory and regularly conducted audits; 19
‘‘(B) access controls; 20
‘‘(C) requirements to ensure sufficient data 21
security, quality, validity, and reliability; 22
‘‘(D) confidentiality protection in accord-23
ance with the applicable provisions of sub-24
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chapter III of chapter 35 of title 44, United 1
States Code; 2
‘‘(E) appropriate and applicable privacy 3
and security protection, including data retention 4
and destruction protocols and data minimiza-5
tion, in accordance with the most recent Fed-6
eral standards developed by the National Insti-7
tute of Standards and Technology; and 8
‘‘(F) protocols for managing a breach, in-9
cluding breach notifications, in accordance with 10
the standards of National Center for Education 11
Statistics. 12
‘‘(9) D
ATA COLLECTION.—The Commissioner 13
shall ensure that data collection, maintenance, and 14
use under this subsection complies with section 552a 15
of title 5, United States Code. 16
‘‘(10) D
EFINITIONS.—In this subsection: 17
‘‘(A) I
NSTITUTION OF HIGHER EDU -18
CATION.—The term ‘institution of higher edu-19
cation’ has the meaning given the term in sec-20
tion 102. 21
‘‘(B) M
INORITY-SERVING INSTITUTION.— 22
The term ‘minority-serving institution’ means 23
an institution of higher education listed in sec-24
tion 371(a). 25
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‘‘(C) PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE INFOR -1
MATION.—The term ‘personally identifiable in-2
formation’ means personally identifiable infor-3
mation within the meaning of section 444 of the 4
General Education Provisions Act.’’. 5
SEC. 114. DATABASE OF STUDENT INFORMATION PROHIB-6
ITED. 7
(a) I
NGENERAL.—Section 134(b) of the Higher 8
Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1015c(b)) is amended 9
to read as follows: 10
‘‘(b) E
XCEPTION.—The provisions of subsection (a) 11
shall not apply to a system (or a successor system)— 12
‘‘(1) that— 13
‘‘(A) is necessary for the operation of pro-14
grams authorized by title II, IV, or VII; and 15
‘‘(B) was in use by the Secretary, directly 16
or through a contractor, as of the day before 17
the date of enactment of the College Cost Re-18
duction Act; or 19
‘‘(2) required under section 132.’’. 20
(b) P
ROGRAMPARTICIPATIONAGREEMENTS.— 21
(1) I
N GENERAL.—Paragraph (17) of section 22
487(a) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 23
U.S.C. 1094(a)) is amended to read as follows: 24
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‘‘(17) The institution or the assigned agent of 1
the institution will collect and submit to the Com-2
missioner for Education Statistics data in accord-3
ance with section 132(f), the non-student related 4
surveys within the Integrated Postsecondary Edu-5
cation Data System (IPEDS), or any other Federal 6
institution of higher education data collection effort 7
(as designated by the Secretary), in a timely manner 8
and to the satisfaction of the Secretary.’’. 9
(2) E
FFECTIVE DATE.—The amendment made 10
by paragraph (1) shall take effect no later than 3 11
years after the date of enactment of this Act. 12
(c) R
EPORTINGBURDEN.—The Secretary of Edu-13
cation and the Commissioner for Education Statistics 14
shall take such steps as are necessary to ensure that the 15
development and maintenance of the postsecondary stu-16
dent data system required under section 132(f) of the 17
Higher Education Act of 1965, as added by section 113 18
of this Act, occurs in a manner that reduces the reporting 19
burden for entities that reported into the Integrated Post-20
secondary Education Data System (IPEDS). 21
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TITLE II—ACCESS AND 1
AFFORDABILITY 2
PART A—FINANCIAL NEED 3
SEC. 201. AMOUNT OF NEED; COST OF ATTENDANCE; ME-4
DIAN COST OF COLLEGE. 5
(a) A
MOUNT OF NEED.—Section 471 (20 U.S.C. 6
1087kk), as amended by the FAFSA Simplification Act, 7
is further amended by amending paragraph (1) to read 8
as follows: 9
‘‘(1)(A) for award year 2024–2025, the cost of 10
attendance of such student; and 11
‘‘(B) for award year 2025–2026 and each sub-12
sequent award year, the median cost of college of the 13
program of study of such student, minus’’. 14
(b) C
OST OFATTENDANCE.—Section 472(c) (20 15
U.S.C. 1087ll(c)), as amended by the FAFSA Simplifica-16
tion Act, is further amended by striking ‘‘of the institu-17
tion’’ and inserting ‘‘of each program of study at the insti-18
tution’’. 19
(c) M
EDIANCOST OFCOLLEGE.—Part F of title IV 20
(20 U.S.C. 1087kk), as amended by the FAFSA Sim-21
plification Act, is further amended by inserting after sec-22
tion 472, as amended by subsection (b), the following: 23
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‘‘SEC. 472A. DETERMINATION OF MEDIAN COST OF COL-1
LEGE. 2
‘‘For the purpose of this title, the term ‘median cost 3
of college’, when used with respect to a program of study 4
offered by one or more institutions of higher education for 5
an award year, means the median of the cost of attendance 6
(as defined in section 472) for the program of study across 7
all institutions of higher education offering such a pro-8
gram for the preceding award year.’’. 9
PART B—FINANCIAL AID 10
Subpart 1—Grants 11
SEC. 211. FEDERAL PELL GRANT PROGRAM. 12
(a) A
WARDMAYNOTEXCEEDMEDIANCOST OF 13
C
OLLEGE.—Section 401(b)(3) (20 U.S.C. 1070a(b)(3)), 14
as amended by title VII of division FF of the Consolidated 15
Appropriations Act, 2021 (title VII of division FF of Pub-16
lic Law 116–260) (referred to in this Act as the ‘‘FAFSA 17
Simplification Act’’), is further amended by adding at the 18
end the following: 19
‘‘(3) A
WARD MAY NOT EXCEED MEDIAN COST 20
OF COLLEGE.—No Federal Pell Grant under this 21
subpart shall exceed the median cost of college (as 22
defined in section 472A) for the program at which 23
that student is in attendance. If, with respect to any 24
student, it is determined that the amount of a Fed-25
eral Pell Grant for that student exceeds the median 26
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cost of college for such program for that year, the 1
amount of the Federal Pell Grant shall be reduced 2
until the Federal Pell Grant does not exceed the me-3
dian cost of college for such program for that year.’’. 4
(b) P
ELLPLUS PROGRAM.—Section 401 (20 U.S.C. 5
1070a), as amended by the FAFSA Simplification Act, is 6
further amended by adding at the end the following: 7
‘‘(k) P
ELLPLUSPROGRAM.— 8
‘‘(1) P
ROGRAM ESTABLISHED .— 9
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—For each award year 10
for which a student receives a Federal Pell 11
Grant and meets the requirements of paragraph 12
(2), the Secretary shall award such student an 13
additional Federal Pell Grant, referred to as a 14
‘Federal Pell Plus Grant’, in an amount equal 15
to the amount of the student’s Federal Pell 16
Grant award determined under this section for 17
such award year, except as provided in subpara-18
graph (B). 19
‘‘(B) M
EDIAN COST OF COLLEGE REDUC -20
TIONS.—In any case in which a student is 21
awarded a Federal Pell Grant under this sec-22
tion and a Federal Pell Plus grant under this 23
subsection for an award year, the combined 24
total of such Federal Pell Grant and such Fed-25
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eral Pell Plus Grant of such student shall not 1
exceed the median cost of college (as defined in 2
section 472A) of the program in which the stu-3
dent is in attendance for that year. In the case 4
that such combined total exceeds the median 5
cost of college for the program for that year, 6
the Secretary shall reduce the amount of the 7
Federal Pell Plus Grant awarded to the student 8
until the combined total of such reduced Fed-9
eral Pell Plus Grant and the Federal Pell Grant 10
of the student does not exceed such median cost 11
of college. 12
‘‘(2) S
TUDENT ELIGIBILITY.—A student meets 13
the requirements of this paragraph, if the student— 14
‘‘(A) during the award year during which 15
the student receives a Federal Pell Plus Grant 16
under paragraph (1)— 17
‘‘(i) is enrolled in the student’s first 18
undergraduate baccalaureate course of 19
study; and 20
‘‘(ii) is maintaining progress toward 21
completion within 100 percent of the ex-22
pected time to completion, as determined 23
by calculating the difference between— 24
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‘‘(I) the program length for the 1
program of study in which such stu-2
dent is in attendance; and 3
‘‘(II) the period of such program 4
that such student has completed; and 5
‘‘(B) has completed at least 4 semesters, 6
or the equivalent, of such program. 7
‘‘(3) D
URATION LIMITS.—The period during 8
which a student receives a Federal Pell Plus Grant 9
under paragraph (1) shall be included in calculating 10
the duration limits with respect to such student 11
under subsection (d)(5), and to the extent that such 12
period was a fraction of a semester or the equiva-13
lent, only that same fraction of such semester or 14
equivalent shall count towards such duration limits. 15
‘‘(4) P
ELL PLUS INSTITUTIONAL AND PRO -16
GRAMMATIC ELIGIBILITY.—For purposes of this sub-17
section, a Pell Plus institution is an eligible institu-18
tion for purposes of this subpart that— 19
‘‘(A) notifies the Secretary that the institu-20
tion desires to participate in the Pell Plus pro-21
gram under this subsection— 22
‘‘(i) with respect to a specific program 23
of study at the institution; or 24
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‘‘(ii) with respect to each program of 1
study at the institution; 2
‘‘(B) agrees to provide, to each student re-3
ceiving a Federal Pell Plus Grant under para-4
graph (1)— 5
‘‘(i) for each award year for which the 6
student receives such Federal Pell Plus 7
Grant, a notification that shall include— 8
‘‘(I) whether the student is main-9
taining the progress toward comple-10
tion required under paragraph 11
(2)(A)(ii); 12
‘‘(II) in a case in which the stu-13
dent is not maintaining such progress 14
toward completion, a list of available 15
student support services and addi-16
tional resources to assist the student 17
in completing the course of study for 18
which the student is receiving the 19
Federal Pell Plus Grant in the man-20
ner described under paragraph 21
(2)(A)(ii); and 22
‘‘(III) the amount of funds the 23
student is receiving under the Federal 24
Pell Plus Grant; and 25
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‘‘(ii) in the case of a student who, as 1
of the end of the first semester of the third 2
academic year of the program of study in 3
which the student is in attendance, is not 4
maintaining the progress toward comple-5
tion required under paragraph (2)(A)(ii), a 6
warning during such third academic year 7
that the student will not be eligible for a 8
Federal Pell Plus Grant under paragraph 9
(1) for the fourth academic year of such 10
course of study unless the student dem-11
onstrates, by not later than the beginning 12
of the fourth academic year, progress to-13
ward completing such course of study by 14
the end of the fourth academic year of 15
such course of study; 16
‘‘(C) meets the requirements of paragraph 17
(5); and 18
‘‘(D) the Secretary determines meets the 19
requirements of this paragraph and paragraph 20
(5). 21
‘‘(5) M
AXIMUM TOTAL PRICE GUARANTEE .— 22
‘‘(A) G
UARANTEE.—To be eligible to be a 23
Pell Plus institution under this subsection, an 24
eligible institution shall— 25
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‘‘(i) provide to each student receiving 1
a Federal Pell Grant, prior to the first 2
award year in which the student enrolls at 3
the institution— 4
‘‘(I) for each program of study 5
participating in the Pell Plus pro-6
gram, the maximum total price for 7
completion of the program of study, 8
determined by the institution in ac-9
cordance with section 415C(e); and 10
‘‘(II) a guarantee that, for the 11
minimum guarantee period for which 12
the student receives a Federal Pell 13
Grant, if the student is enrolled in 14
any program of study participating in 15
the Pell Plus program, the maximum 16
total price for completion of such pro-17
gram of study charged to the student 18
will not exceed the median value- 19
added earnings of students who com-20
pleted such program, based on the 21
most recent data available on the Col-22
lege Scorecard in the award year prior 23
to the first award year in which the 24
student enrolls at the institution; and 25
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‘‘(ii) provide information about the 1
guarantee described in clause (i)(II) to 2
prospective students by including such in-3
formation on the public website of the in-4
stitution and in the catalog, marketing ma-5
terials, and other official publications of 6
the institution. 7
‘‘(B) D
URATION OF MINIMUM GUARANTEE 8
PERIOD.— 9
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—The minimum pe-10
riod during which a student shall be pro-11
vided a guarantee under subparagraph (A) 12
with respect to the maximum total price 13
for completion of a program of study at an 14
eligible institution shall be the median time 15
to credential of students who completed 16
any undergraduate program of study at 17
the institution during the most recent 18
award year for which data are available, 19
except that such minimum guarantee pe-20
riod shall not be less than the program 21
length of the program of study in which 22
the student is enrolled. 23
‘‘(ii) L
IMITATION.—An eligible institu-24
tion shall not be required to provide a 25
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maximum total price guarantee under sub-1
paragraph (A) to a student after the con-2
clusion of the 6-year period beginning on 3
the first day on which the student enrolled 4
at such institution.’’. 5
(c) I
NFORMATIONDISSEMINATIONACTIVITY.—Sec-6
tion 485(a)(1) (20 U.S.C. 1092(a)(1)) is amended— 7
(1) in subparagraph (U), by striking ‘‘and’’ at 8
the end; 9
(2) in subparagraph (V), by striking the period 10
at the end and inserting ‘‘; and’’; and 11
(3) by adding at the end the following: 12
‘‘(W) in the case of an institution under 13
section 401(k), any applicable information with 14
respect to the institution’s participation in the 15
Federal Pell Plus Grant program under such 16
subsection.’’. 17
(d) E
FFECTIVEDATE.—The amendments made by 18
this section shall take effect with respect to award year 19
2025–2026 and each succeeding award year. 20
SEC. 212. CAMPUS-BASED AID PROGRAMS. 21
(a) T
ERMINATION OF CERTAINPROGRAMS.—Not-22
withstanding subparts 3 and 4 of part A, or part C, of 23
title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 24
1070 et seq.), or any other provision of law, except as ex-25
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pressly authorized by an Act of Congress enacted after 1
the date of enactment of this Act, beginning on October 2
1, 2026— 3
(1) no funds are authorized to be appropriated, 4
or may be expended, under this Act or any other Act 5
to— 6
(A) make payments to institutions for Fed-7
eral Supplemental Educational Opportunity 8
Grants under subpart 3 of part A of title IV of 9
such Act (20 U.S.C. 1070b et seq.); or 10
(B) make payments to States for the 11
Leveraging Educational Assistance Partnership 12
Program under subpart 4 of part A of title IV 13
(20 U.S.C. 1070c et seq.); and 14
(2) the authority of the Secretary to carry out 15
any program or activity described in paragraph (1) 16
shall be terminated. 17
(b) P
ROMISEGRANTS.—Subpart 4 of part A of title 18
IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070c 19
et seq.) is amended to read as follows: 20
‘‘Subpart 4—Promoting Real Opportunities to 21
Maximize Investments and Savings in Education 22
‘‘SEC. 415A. PURPOSE. 23
‘‘(a) P
URPOSE.—It is the purpose of this subpart to 24
provide performance-based grants to— 25
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‘‘(1) assist institutions in providing certainty to 1
students and families about postsecondary afford-2
ability; 3
‘‘(2) increase postsecondary access and eco-4
nomic mobility; and 5
‘‘(3) ensure that students, institutions, and tax-6
payers receive a financial return for investments in 7
postsecondary education. 8
‘‘SEC. 415B. PROMISE GRANTS. 9
‘‘For award year 2026–2027 and each succeeding 10
award year, from reserved funds remitted to the Secretary 11
in accordance with section 454(d) and additional funds au-12
thorized under section 415E, as necessary, the Secretary 13
shall award PROMISE grants to eligible institutions to 14
carry out the purpose of this subpart. PROMISE grants 15
awarded under this subpart shall be performance-based 16
and shall be awarded to each eligible institution for a 6- 17
year period in an amount that is determined in accordance 18
with section 415D. 19
‘‘SEC. 415C. ELIGIBLE INSTITUTIONS; APPLICATION. 20
‘‘(a) E
LIGIBLEINSTITUTION.—To be eligible for a 21
PROMISE grant under this subpart, an institution 22
shall— 23
‘‘(1) be an institution of higher education under 24
section 102, except that an institution described in 25
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section 102(a)(1)(C) shall not be an eligible institu-1
tion under this subpart; and 2
‘‘(2) meet the maximum total price guarantee 3
requirements under subsection (c). 4
‘‘(b) A
PPLICATION.—An eligible institution seeking a 5
PROMISE grant under this subpart (including a renewal 6
of such a grant) shall submit to the Secretary an applica-7
tion, at such time as the Secretary may require, that con-8
tains the information required in this subsection. Such ap-9
plication shall— 10
‘‘(1) demonstrate that the institution— 11
‘‘(A) meets the maximum total price guar-12
antee requirements under subsection (c); and 13
‘‘(B) will continue to meet the maximum 14
total price guarantee requirements for each 15
award year during the grant period with respect 16
to students first enrolling at the institution for 17
each such award year; 18
‘‘(2) describe how grant funds awarded under 19
this subpart will be used by the institution to carry 20
out the purposes of this Act, including activities re-21
lated to— 22
‘‘(A) postsecondary affordability, includ-23
ing— 24
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‘‘(i) the expansion and continuation of 1
the maximum total price guarantee re-2
quirements under subsection (c); and 3
‘‘(ii) any other activities to be carried 4
out by the institution to increase postsec-5
ondary affordability and minimize the total 6
net price required for completion (as de-7
fined in section 132(a)) paid by students 8
receiving need-based student aid; 9
‘‘(B) postsecondary access, which may in-10
clude— 11
‘‘(i) the activities described in section 12
485E of this Act; and 13
‘‘(ii) any other activities to be carried 14
out by the institution to increase postsec-15
ondary access and expand opportunities for 16
low- and middle-income students; and 17
‘‘(C) postsecondary student success, which 18
may include— 19
‘‘(i) activities to improve completion 20
rates and reduce time to credential, includ-21
ing the activities described in section 741 22
of this Act, as amended by the College 23
Cost Reduction Act; and 24
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‘‘(ii) any other activities to be carried 1
out by the institution to increase value- 2
added earnings and postsecondary student 3
success; 4
‘‘(3) describe— 5
‘‘(A) how the institution will evaluate the 6
effectiveness of the institution’s use of grant 7
funds awarded under this subpart; and 8
‘‘(B) how the institution will collect and 9
disseminate information on promising practices 10
developed with the use of such grant funds; and 11
‘‘(4) in the case of an institution that has pre-12
viously received a grant under this subpart, contain 13
the evaluation required under paragraph (3) for 14
each previous grant. 15
‘‘(c) M
AXIMUMTOTALPRICEGUARANTEEREQUIRE-16
MENTS.—As a condition of eligibility for a PROMISE 17
grant under this subpart, an institution shall— 18
‘‘(1) for each award year beginning after the 19
date of enactment of the College Cost Reduction 20
Act, not later than one year before the start of each 21
such award year (except that, for the first award 22
year beginning after such date of enactment, the in-23
stitution shall meet these requirements as soon as 24
practicable such date of enactment)— 25
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‘‘(A) determine the maximum total price 1
for completion, in accordance with subsection 2
(e), for each program of study at the institu-3
tion— 4
‘‘(i) applicable to students in each in-5
come category described in section 6
132(c)(2)(A)(i); and 7
‘‘(ii) applicable to students in each 8
student aid index category determined by 9
the Secretary in accordance with section 10
132(c)(2)(A)(ii); and 11
‘‘(B) publish such information on the insti-12
tution’s website and in the institution’s catalog, 13
marketing materials, or other official publica-14
tions; 15
‘‘(2) for the award year for which the institu-16
tion is applying for a PROMISE grant, and at least 17
one award year preceding such award year, provide 18
to each student who first enrolls, or plans to enroll, 19
in the institution during the award year and who re-20
ceives Federal financial aid under this title a max-21
imum total price guarantee, in accordance with this 22
section, for the minimum guarantee period applica-23
ble to the student; and 24
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‘‘(3) provide to the Secretary an assurance that 1
the institution will continue to meet each of the 2
maximum total price guarantee requirements under 3
this subsection for students who first enroll, or plan 4
to enroll, in the institution during each award year 5
included in the grant period. 6
‘‘(d) D
URATION OF MINIMUMGUARANTEE PE-7
RIOD.— 8
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—The minimum period dur-9
ing which a student shall be provided a guarantee 10
under subsection (c) with respect to the maximum 11
total price for completion of a program of study at 12
an institution shall be the median time to credential 13
of students who completed any undergraduate pro-14
gram of study at the institution during the most re-15
cent award year for which data are available, except 16
that such minimum guarantee period shall not be 17
less than the program length of the program of 18
study in which the student is enrolled. 19
‘‘(2) L
IMITATION.—An institution shall not be 20
required to provide a maximum total price guarantee 21
under subsection (c) to a student after the conclu-22
sion of the 6-year period beginning on the first day 23
on which the student enrolled at such institution. 24
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‘‘(e) DETERMINATION OF MAXIMUMTOTALPRICE 1
FORCOMPLETION.— 2
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—For the purposes of sub-3
section (c) and the Pell Plus program under section 4
401(k), an institution shall determine, prior to the 5
first award year in which a student enrolls at the in-6
stitution, the maximum total price that may be 7
charged to the student for completion of a program 8
of study at the institution for the minimum guar-9
antee period applicable to a student, before applica-10
tion of any Federal Pell grants or other Federal fi-11
nancial aid under this title. Such a maximum total 12
price for completion shall be determined for students 13
in each income category and student aid index cat-14
egory (as determined in accordance with section 15
132(c)(2)(A)). In determining the maximum total 16
price for completion to be charged to each such cat-17
egory of students, the institution may consider the 18
ability of a category of students to pay tuition and 19
fees (including the required costs described in sec-20
tion 484(b)(3)(A)(i)(I)), but may not include in such 21
consideration any Federal Pell grants or other Fed-22
eral financial aid awards that may be available to 23
such category of students under this title. 24
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‘‘(2) MULTIPLE MAXIMUM TOTAL PRICE GUAR -1
ANTEES.—In the event that a student receives more 2
than one maximum total price guarantee because the 3
student is included in more than one category of stu-4
dents for which the institution determines a max-5
imum total price guarantee amount for the purposes 6
of subsection (c), or the student is participating in 7
the Pell Plus program under section 401(k), the 8
maximum total price guarantee applicable to such 9
student for the purposes of this section and the Pell 10
Plus program shall be equal to the lowest such guar-11
antee amount. 12
‘‘SEC. 415D. GRANT AMOUNTS; FLEXIBLE USE OF FUNDS. 13
‘‘(a) G
RANTAMOUNTFORMULA.— 14
‘‘(1) F
ORMULA.—Subject to subsection (b), the 15
amount of a PROMISE grant for an eligible institu-16
tion for each year of the grant period shall be deter-17
mined by the Secretary annually and shall be the 18
amount determined by multiplying— 19
‘‘(A) the lesser of— 20
‘‘(i) the difference determined by sub-21
tracting one from the quotient of— 22
‘‘(I) the average, for the 3 most 23
recent award years for which data are 24
available, of the median value-added 25
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earnings (as defined in section 103) 1
for each such award year of students 2
who completed any program of study 3
of the institution; divided by 4
‘‘(II) the average for the 3 most 5
recent award years, of the maximum 6
total price applicable for each such 7
award year to students enrolled in the 8
institution in any program of study 9
who received financial aid under this 10
title; or 11
‘‘(ii) the number two; 12
‘‘(B) the average, for the 3 most recent 13
award years, of the total dollar amount of Fed-14
eral Pell Grants (excluding Pell Plus Grants 15
awarded under section 401(k)) awarded to stu-16
dents enrolled in the institution in each such 17
award year; and 18
‘‘(C) the average, for the 3 most recent 19
award years, of the percentage of low-income 20
students who received Federal financial assist-21
ance under this title who were enrolled in the 22
institution in each such award year who— 23
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‘‘(i) completed a program of study at 1
the institution within 100 percent of the 2
program length of such program; or 3
‘‘(ii) only in the case of a two-year in-4
stitution or a less than two-year institu-5
tion— 6
‘‘(I) transfer to a four-year insti-7
tution; and 8
‘‘(II) within 4 years after first 9
enrolling at the two-year or less than 10
two-year institution, complete a pro-11
gram of study at the four-year institu-12
tion for which a bachelor’s degree (or 13
substantially similar credential) is 14
awarded. 15
‘‘(2) D
EFINITION OF LOW -INCOME.—In this 16
section, the term ‘low-income’, when used with re-17
spect to a student, means that the student’s family 18
income does not exceed the maximum income in the 19
lowest income category described in section 20
132(c)(2)(A)(i). 21
‘‘(b) M
AXIMUMGRANTAMOUNT.—Notwithstanding 22
subsection (a), the maximum amount an eligible institu-23
tion may receive annually for a grant under this subpart 24
shall be the amount equal to— 25
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‘‘(1) the average, for the 3 most recent award 1
years, of the number of students enrolled in the in-2
stitution in an award year who receive Federal fi-3
nancial aid under this title; multiplied by 4
‘‘(2) $5,000. 5
‘‘(c) F
LEXIBLEUSE OFFUNDS.—A PROMISE 6
grant awarded under this subpart shall be used by an eli-7
gible institution to carry out the purposes of this subpart, 8
including— 9
‘‘(1) carrying out activities included in the insti-10
tution’s application for such grant related to post-11
secondary affordability, access, and student success; 12
‘‘(2) evaluating the effectiveness of the activi-13
ties carried out with such grant in accordance with 14
section 415C(b)(3)(A); and 15
‘‘(3) collecting and disseminating promising 16
practices related to the activities carried out with 17
such grant, in accordance with section 18
415C(b)(3)(B). 19
‘‘SEC. 415E. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. 20
‘‘(a) A
UTHORIZATIONTOUSERESERVEDFUNDS.— 21
To carry out this subpart, there shall be available to the 22
Secretary any funds remitted to the Secretary as risk- 23
sharing payments in accordance with section 454(d) for 24
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any award year. The Secretary shall use the funds received 1
through risk-sharing payments to provide the grants. 2
‘‘(b) S
ECONDARYAUTHORIZATION.—In addition to 3
the amounts available to the Secretary under subsection 4
(a), there are authorized to be appropriated, for fiscal year 5
2026 and each of the 9 succeeding fiscal years, 6
$2,000,000,000, to carry out this subpart in any award 7
year for which the amounts available under subsection (a) 8
are insufficient to fully fund the PROMISE grants award-9
ed under this subpart in such award year. 10
‘‘(c) I
NSUFFICIENTFUNDS.—If the amounts made 11
available to carry out this subpart for a fiscal year are 12
not sufficient to provide grants to all eligible institutions 13
in the amount determined under this subpart, the Sec-14
retary shall first provide grants to the eligible institutions 15
that have the highest percentage of students who are low- 16
income students (as defined in section 415D).’’. 17
Subpart 2—Loans 18
SEC. 221. LOAN LIMITS. 19
(a) S
TAFFORDLOANS.— 20
(1) A
GGREGATE AND ANNUAL LIMITS FOR 21
GRADUATE AND PROFESSIONAL STUDENTS .—Section 22
455(a) (20 U.S.C. 1087e(a)) is amended— 23
(A) in paragraph (3)— 24
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(i) in subparagraph (A)(ii), by insert-1
ing before the period at the end the fol-2
lowing: ‘‘, except that for any period of in-3
struction beginning on or after July 1, 4
2025, such maximum annual amount shall 5
be determined in accordance with subpara-6
graph (C)’’; 7
(ii) in subparagraph (B), by inserting 8
before the period at the end the following: 9
‘‘for any period of instruction through 10
June 30, 2025’’; and 11
(iii) by adding at the end the fol-12
lowing: 13
‘‘(C) A
NNUAL LIMITS.—Notwithstanding 14
any provision of this part or part B, for any pe-15
riod of instruction beginning on or after July 1, 16
2025, the maximum annual amount of Federal 17
Direct Unsubsidized Stafford loans that a grad-18
uate or professional student may borrow in any 19
academic year (as defined in section 481(a)(2)) 20
or its equivalent shall be median cost of college 21
(as defined in section 472A) of the program of 22
study in which the student is enrolled, except 23
that the sum of such annual loan amount and 24
other financial assistance (as defined in section 25
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480(i)) that the student receives for such aca-1
demic year may not exceed the cost of attend-2
ance of such student. 3
‘‘(D) A
GGREGATE LIMITS .—Notwith-4
standing any provision of this part or part B, 5
for any period of instruction beginning on or 6
after July 1, 2025, the maximum aggregate 7
amount of Federal Direct Unsubsidized Staf-8
ford loans that— 9
‘‘(i) a graduate student may borrow 10
shall be $100,000; and 11
‘‘(ii) a professional student may bor-12
row shall be $150,000. 13
‘‘(E) E
XCEPTION FOR CERTAIN STU -14
DENTS.— 15
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—The provisions 16
listed in clause (ii) shall not apply with re-17
spect to any individual who, as of June 30, 18
2025, is enrolled in a program of study at 19
an institution of higher education, and has 20
received a loan (or on whose behalf a loan 21
was made) under this part for such pro-22
gram, during the individual’s expected time 23
to completion of such program, as deter-24
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mined by calculating by the difference be-1
tween— 2
‘‘(I) the program length for the 3
program of study in which such indi-4
vidual is enrolled; and 5
‘‘(II) the period of such program 6
that such individual has completed, 7
except that such expected time to comple-8
tion may not exceed 3 years. 9
‘‘(ii) P
ROVISIONS.—An individual de-10
scribed in clause (i) shall not be subject to 11
subparagraphs (C) and (D) of this para-12
graph, or paragraph (4) or (6).’’. 13
(2) A
NNUAL LIMITS FOR UNDERGRADUATE 14
BORROWERS.—Section 455(a) (20 U.S.C. 1087e(a)) 15
is further amended by adding at the end the fol-16
lowing: 17
‘‘(4) A
NNUAL AND AGGREGATE LOAN LIMITS 18
FOR UNDERGRADUATE AND ALL BORROWERS .— 19
‘‘(A) U
NDERGRADUATE STUDENTS .— 20
‘‘(i) A
NNUAL LOAN LIMITS.— 21
‘‘(I) S
UBSIDIZED LOANS.—Not-22
withstanding any provision of this 23
part or part B, for any period of in-24
struction beginning on or after July 1, 25
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2025, the maximum annual amount of 1
Federal Direct Stafford loans that an 2
undergraduate student may borrow in 3
any academic year (as defined in sec-4
tion 481(a)(2)) or its equivalent shall 5
be the difference between— 6
‘‘(aa) the median cost of col-7
lege (as defined in section 472A) 8
of the program of study in which 9
the student is enrolled; and 10
‘‘(bb) the sum of the Fed-11
eral Pell Grant and Federal Pell 12
Plus Grant under section 401 13
awarded to the student for such 14
academic year, 15
except that (1) the amount of such 16
Federal Direct Stafford loans awarded 17
to the student for such academic year 18
may not exceed the maximum annual 19
limit described in section 428(b)(1) 20
that is applicable to such student; and 21
(2) the sum of such Federal Direct 22
Stafford Loans, the amount of such 23
Federal Pell Grant, Federal Pell Plus 24
Grant, and other financial assistance 25
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(as defined in section 480(i)) that the 1
student receives for such academic 2
year may not exceed the cost of at-3
tendance of such student. 4
‘‘(II) U
NSUBSIDIZED LOANS .— 5
Notwithstanding any provision of this 6
part or part B, for any period of in-7
struction beginning on or after July 1, 8
2025, the maximum annual amount of 9
Federal Direct Unsubsidized Stafford 10
loans that an undergraduate student 11
may borrow in any academic year (as 12
defined in section 481(a)(2)) or its 13
equivalent shall be the difference be-14
tween— 15
‘‘(aa) the median cost of col-16
lege (as defined in section 472A) 17
of the program of study in which 18
the student is enrolled; and 19
‘‘(bb) the sum of— 20
‘‘(AA) the amount of 21
Federal Direct Stafford 22
loans awarded to such stu-23
dent for such academic year; 24
and 25
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‘‘(BB) the amount of 1
the Federal Pell Grant and 2
Federal Pell Plus Grant 3
under section 401 awarded 4
to the student for such aca-5
demic year, 6
except that the sum of all Fed-7
eral financial aid under this title 8
and other financial assistance (as 9
defined in section 480(i)) that 10
such student receives for such 11
academic year may not exceed 12
the cost of attendance for such 13
student. 14
‘‘(ii) A
GGREGATE LIMITS.—Notwith-15
standing any provision of this part or part 16
B, for any period of instruction beginning 17
on or after July 1, 2025, with respect to 18
an undergraduate student— 19
‘‘(I) the maximum aggregate 20
amount of Federal Direct Stafford 21
loans and Federal Direct Unsub-22
sidized Stafford loans that may be 23
borrowed shall be $50,000; 24
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‘‘(II) the maximum aggregate 1
amount of Federal Direct Stafford 2
loans that may be borrowed shall be 3
$23,000; and 4
‘‘(III) the maximum aggregate 5
amount of Federal Direct Unsub-6
sidized Stafford loans that may be 7
borrowed shall be $50,000. 8
‘‘(B) S
TUDENTS IN A QUALIFYING UNDER -9
GRADUATE PROGRAM .— 10
‘‘(i) A
GGREGATE LIMITS .—Notwith-11
standing the aggregate limits described in 12
subparagraph (A)(ii), a student enrolled in 13
a qualifying undergraduate program shall 14
be subject to the aggregate limits for pro-15
fessional students described in paragraph 16
(3)(D)(ii). 17
‘‘(ii) Q
UALIFYING UNDERGRADUATE 18
PROGRAM DEFINED .—For purposes of this 19
subparagraph, the term ‘qualifying under-20
graduate program’ means a program of 21
study— 22
‘‘(I) for which the total tuition 23
and fees (including the required costs 24
described in section 25
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484(b)(3)(A)(i)(I)) exceeds the aggre-1
gate limits for undergraduate students 2
described in subparagraph (A)(ii); 3
‘‘(II) that meets certification re-4
quirements of the Federal agency that 5
directly regulates the program and 6
provides final licensing and credentials 7
to students upon completion; and 8
‘‘(III) that has had, for the pre-9
vious three award years— 10
‘‘(aa) a verified completion 11
rate of at least 70 percent, within 12
150 percent of the program 13
length of such program of study; 14
and 15
‘‘(bb) a verified job place-16
ment rate of at least 70 percent, 17
measured 180 days after comple-18
tion. 19
‘‘(C) A
LL STUDENTS.—The maximum ag-20
gregate amount of loans made, insured, or 21
guaranteed under this title to a student shall be 22
$200,000.’’. 23
(3) I
NSTITUTIONALLY DETERMINED LIMITS .— 24
Section 455(a) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 25
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(20 U.S.C. 1087e(a)) is further amended by adding 1
at the end the following: 2
‘‘(5) I
NSTITUTIONALLY DETERMINED LIMITS .— 3
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—Notwithstanding any 4
other provision of this subsection, an eligible in-5
stitution (at the discretion of a financial aid ad-6
ministrator at the institution) may prorate or 7
limit the amount of a loan any student who is 8
enrolled in a program of study for a period of 9
instruction beginning on or after July 1, 2024, 10
at that institution, may borrow under this part 11
for an academic year— 12
‘‘(i) if the institution can reasonably 13
demonstrate that outstanding amounts 14
owed of loans made under this title are or 15
would be excessive for students who com-16
plete such program, based on the most re-17
cently available data from the College 18
Scorecard (or successor website of the De-19
partment) on— 20
‘‘(I) the median of the value- 21
added earnings of students who com-22
plete such program; and 23
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‘‘(II) the median debt owed, and 1
the repayment rate, on loans made 2
under this part, of such students; 3
‘‘(ii) in a case in which the student is 4
enrolled on a less than full-time basis or 5
the student is enrolled for less than the pe-6
riod of enrollment to which the annual loan 7
limit applies under this subsection, based 8
on the student’s enrollment status; or 9
‘‘(iii) based on the year of the pro-10
gram for which the student is seeking such 11
loan. 12
‘‘(B) A
PPLICATION TO ALL STUDENTS .— 13
Any proration or limiting of loan amounts 14
under subparagraph (A) shall be applied in the 15
same manner to all students enrolled in a pro-16
gram of study. 17
‘‘(C) I
NCREASES FOR INDIVIDUAL STU -18
DENTS.—Upon the request of a student whose 19
loan amount for an academic year has been 20
prorated or limited under subparagraph (A), an 21
eligible institution (at the discretion of the fi-22
nancial aid administrator at the institution) 23
may increase such loan amount to an amount 24
not exceeding the annual loan amount applica-25
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ble to such student under this paragraph for 1
such academic year.’’. 2
(b) T
ERMINATION OF AUTHORITYTOMAKEFED-3
ERALDIRECTPLUSLOANS TOANYSTUDENT ORPARENT 4
B
ORROWER.—Section 455(a) of the Higher Education Act 5
of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1087e(a)) is amended by adding at 6
the end the following: 7
‘‘(6) T
ERMINATION OF AUTHORITY TO MAKE 8
FEDERAL DIRECT PLUS LOANS .—Notwithstanding 9
any provision of this part or part B, except as pro-10
vided in paragraph (3)(E), for any period of instruc-11
tion beginning on or after July 1, 2025, no Federal 12
Direct PLUS loans may be made to any parent bor-13
rower or graduate or professional student bor-14
rower.’’. 15
SEC. 222. LOAN REPAYMENT. 16
(a) R
EPAYMENT PLANS.—Section 455(d) of the 17
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1087e(d)) is 18
amended— 19
(1) in paragraph (1)(D) by inserting ‘‘(includ-20
ing a repayment assistance plan under 455(e)(9))’’ 21
after ‘‘an income contingent repayment plan’’; and 22
(2) by adding at the end the following: 23
‘‘(6) R
EPAYMENT PLANS FOR LOANS MADE ON 24
OR AFTER JULY 1, 2024.— 25
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‘‘(A) DESIGN AND SELECTION .—Notwith-1
standing paragraph (1), beginning on July 1, 2
2024, the Secretary shall offer a borrower of a 3
loan made under this part on or after July 1, 4
2024, two plans for repayment of such loan, in-5
cluding principal and interest on the loan. The 6
borrower shall be entitled to accelerate, without 7
penalty, repayment on such loans. The borrower 8
may choose— 9
‘‘(i) a standard repayment plan with a 10
fixed monthly repayment amount paid over 11
a fixed period of time, not to exceed 10 12
years; or 13
‘‘(ii) a repayment assistance plan 14
under section 455(e)(9). 15
‘‘(B) S
ELECTION BY SECRETARY .—If such 16
borrower does not select a repayment plan de-17
scribed in subparagraph (A), the Secretary shall 18
provide the borrower with the repayment plan 19
described in subparagraph (A)(i). 20
‘‘(C) C
HANGES IN SELECTION.— 21
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—Subject to clause 22
(ii), a borrower may change the borrower’s 23
selection of a repayment plan under sub-24
paragraph (A), or the Secretary’s selection 25
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of a plan for the borrower under subpara-1
graph (B), as the case may be. Nothing in 2
this subsection shall prohibit the Secretary 3
from encouraging distressed borrowers 4
from enrolling in the repayment assistance 5
plan under section 455(e)(9). 6
‘‘(ii) S
AME REPAYMENT PLAN RE -7
QUIRED.—All loans made under this part 8
on or after July 1, 2024, to a borrower 9
shall be repaid under the same repayment 10
plan under subparagraph (A), except that 11
the borrower may repay an excepted PLUS 12
loan or an excepted consolidation loan (as 13
such terms are defined in section 14
455(e)(9)) separately from other loans 15
made under this part to the borrower. 16
‘‘(D) R
EPAYMENT AFTER DEFAULT .—The 17
Secretary may require a borrower who has de-18
faulted on a loan made under this part to— 19
‘‘(i) pay all reasonable collection costs 20
associated with such loan; and 21
‘‘(ii) repay the loan pursuant to the 22
repayment assistance plan under section 23
455(e)(9). 24
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‘‘(E) PROHIBITIONS.—The Secretary may 1
not— 2
‘‘(i) authorize a borrower of a loan 3
made under this part on or after July 1, 4
2024, to repay such loan pursuant to a re-5
payment plan that is not described in 6
clause (i) or (ii) of subparagraph (A); or 7
‘‘(ii) carry out or modify a repayment 8
plan for any loan made under this part on 9
or after July 1, 2024, that is not described 10
in such clause (i) or (ii).’’. 11
(b) R
EPAYMENTASSISTANCEPLAN.—Section 455(e) 12
of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 13
1087e(e)) is amended by adding at the end the following: 14
‘‘(9) R
EPAYMENT ASSISTANCE PLAN .— 15
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—Notwithstanding any 16
other provision of this Act, beginning on July 17
1, 2024, the Secretary shall carry out a repay-18
ment assistance program that shall have the 19
terms and conditions of an income-contingent 20
repayment plan described in paragraphs (1) 21
through (8), except that— 22
‘‘(i) a borrower of any loan made 23
under this part (other than an excepted 24
PLUS loan or excepted consolidation loan), 25
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may elect to have the borrower’s aggregate 1
monthly payment for all such loans not ex-2
ceed the applicable monthly payment for 3
the borrower, except that a borrower may 4
not be precluded from repaying an amount 5
that exceeds such applicable monthly pay-6
ment for any month; 7
‘‘(ii) the Secretary shall apply the bor-8
rower’s monthly payment under this para-9
graph first toward interest due on such a 10
loan, next toward any fees due on the loan, 11
and then toward the principal of the loan; 12
‘‘(iii) any principal due and not paid 13
under clause (ii) shall be deferred; 14
‘‘(iv) the amount of time the borrower 15
makes monthly payments under clause (i) 16
may exceed 10 years; 17
‘‘(v) notwithstanding paragraph (7), 18
the Secretary shall repay or cancel any 19
outstanding balance of principal and inter-20
est due on all loans made under this part 21
(other than excepted PLUS loans or ex-22
cepted consolidation loans) to a borrower— 23
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‘‘(I) who, at any time, elected to 1
participate in a repayment assistance 2
plan under clause (i); 3
‘‘(II) whose final monthly pay-4
ment for such loans prior to the loan 5
cancellation under this clause was 6
made under such repayment assist-7
ance plan; and 8
‘‘(III) who has repaid on such 9
loans (pursuant to a repayment assist-10
ance plan under clause (i), a standard 11
repayment plan under subsection 12
(d)(6)(A)(i), or a combination of any 13
such plan or any of the repayment 14
plans listed in clause (ii), (iii), (iv), or 15
(v) of paragraph (7)(B), or, in the 16
case of a consolidation loan, pursuant 17
to a repayment schedule described 18
item (aa)(BB) of this subclause) an 19
amount that is equal to— 20
‘‘(aa)(AA) the total amount 21
of principal and interest that the 22
borrower would have repaid 23
under a standard repayment plan 24
under paragraph (1)(A) or 25
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(6)(A)(i) of subsection (d), based 1
on a 10-year repayment period, 2
when the borrower entered repay-3
ment on such loans; or 4
‘‘(BB) in the case of a Fed-5
eral Direct Consolidation Loan, 6
the total amount of principal and 7
interest that the borrower would 8
have repaid under the repayment 9
schedule established for the loan 10
under section 428C(c)(2) on the 11
date on which such loan was 12
made; plus 13
‘‘(bb) an amount equal to 14
the amount of any unpaid inter-15
est that has accrued, but was not 16
included in the calculation of the 17
total amount of principal and in-18
terest that would have been re-19
paid under the standard repay-20
ment plan or schedule described 21
in item (aa)— 22
‘‘(AA) during any 23
deferment period described 24
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in clause (i) or (ii) of sub-1
section (f)(2)(A); or 2
‘‘(BB) during any for-3
bearance period while serv-4
ing in a medical or dental 5
internship or residency pro-6
gram as described in section 7
428(c)(3)(A)(i)(I); and 8
‘‘(vi) a borrower who is repaying a 9
loan pursuant to a repayment assistance 10
plan under clause (i) may elect, at any 11
time, to terminate repayment pursuant to 12
such plan and repay such loan under the 13
standard repayment plan under subsection 14
(d)(6)(A)(i). 15
‘‘(B) R
EPAYMENT ASSISTANCE FOR DIS -16
TRESSED BORROWERS .— 17
‘‘(i) I
NTEREST SUBSIDY .—For each 18
month for which a borrower’s aggregate 19
monthly payment under this paragraph is 20
insufficient to pay the total amount of in-21
terest that accrues on a loan for the 22
month, the amount of interest accrued and 23
not paid for the month shall be subtracted 24
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from the total amount of interest due on 1
such loan for the month. 2
‘‘(ii) P
RINCIPAL SUBSIDY.—For each 3
month for which a borrower’s aggregate 4
monthly payment under this paragraph re-5
pays an amount due on an individual loan 6
that is less than twice the total amount of 7
interest that accrues on such loan for the 8
month, the amount of the total principal 9
due on such loan shall be reduced by an 10
amount equal to half of the monthly pay-11
ment under this paragraph on such loan 12
for the month. 13
‘‘(C) D
EFINITIONS.—In this paragraph: 14
‘‘(i) A
DJUSTED GROSS INCOME .—The 15
term ‘adjusted gross income’ has the 16
meaning given the term in section 62 of 17
the Internal Revenue Code of 1986. 18
‘‘(ii) A
PPLICABLE MONTHLY PAY -19
MENT.—The term ‘applicable monthly pay-20
ment’ means, when used with respect to a 21
borrower, the amount obtained by dividing 22
by 12, 10 percent of the result obtained by 23
calculating, on at least an annual basis, 24
the amount by which— 25
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‘‘(I) the adjusted gross income of 1
the borrower or, if the borrower is 2
married and files a Federal income 3
tax return jointly with or separately 4
from the borrower’s spouse, the ad-5
justed gross income of the borrower 6
and the borrower’s spouse; exceeds 7
‘‘(II) 150 percent of the poverty 8
line applicable to the borrower’s fam-9
ily size as determined under section 10
673(2) of the Community Services 11
Block Grant Act (42 U.S.C. 9902(2)). 12
‘‘(iii) E
XCEPTED CONSOLIDATION 13
LOAN.—The term ‘excepted Consolidation 14
Loan’ means a Federal Direct Consolida-15
tion Loan, if the proceeds of such loan 16
were used to the discharge the liability 17
on— 18
‘‘(I) an excepted PLUS loan; or 19
‘‘(II) a Federal Direct Consolida-20
tion loan, if the proceeds of such loan 21
were used to discharge the liability on 22
an excepted PLUS loan. 23
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‘‘(iv) EXCEPTED PLUS LOAN .—The 1
term ‘excepted PLUS Loan’ has the mean-2
ing given the term in section 493C.’’. 3
SEC. 223. LOAN REHABILITATION. 4
Section 428F(a)(5) of the Higher Education Act of 5
1965 (20 U.S.C. 1078–6(a)(5)) is amended by striking 6
‘‘one time’’ and inserting ‘‘two times’’. 7
SEC. 224. INTEREST CAPITALIZATION. 8
(a) F
EDERALPLUSLOANS.—Section 428B(d)(2) of 9
the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1078– 10
2(d)(2)) is amended to read as follows: 11
‘‘(2) N
O CAPITALIZATION OF INTEREST .—Inter-12
est on loans made under this section for which pay-13
ments of principal are deferred pursuant to para-14
graph (1) shall be paid monthly or quarterly, if 15
agreed upon by the borrower and the lender.’’. 16
(b) F
EDERALCONSOLIDATION LOANSDEFER-17
RALS.—Section 428C(b)(4)(C)(ii)(III) of the Higher Edu-18
cation Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1078–3(b)(4)(C)(III)) is 19
amended by striking ‘‘or capitalized,’’. 20
(c) L
OANLIMITS FORUNSUBSIDIZEDSTAFFORD 21
L
OANS.—Section 428H(d)(5) of the Higher Education 22
Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1078–8(d)(5)) is amended by in-23
serting ‘‘before the date of enactment of the College Cost 24
Reduction Act’’ after ‘‘Interest capitalized’’. 25
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(d) UNSUBSIDIZEDSTAFFORDLOANS FORMIDDLE 1
I
NCOMEBORROWERS.—Section 428H(e)(2) of the Higher 2
Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1078–8(e)(2)) is 3
amended— 4
(1) in subparagraph (A), in the matter before 5
clause (i), by striking ‘‘, if agreed upon by the bor-6
rower and the lender’’ and all that follows through 7
clause (ii)(IV) and inserting ‘‘be paid monthly or 8
quarterly, if agreed upon by the borrower and the 9
lender.’’; 10
(2) by striking subparagraph (B); and 11
(3) by redesignating subparagraph (C) as sub-12
paragraph (B). 13
(e) I
NCOMECONTINGENT REPAYMENT.—Section 14
455(e)(5) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 15
1087e(e)(5)) is amended by striking the last sentence and 16
inserting ‘‘No interest may be capitalized on such loan on 17
or after the date of the enactment of the College Cost Re-18
duction Act, and the Secretary shall promulgate regula-19
tions with respect to the treatment of accrued interest that 20
is not capitalized’’. 21
(f) E
FFECT OFDEFERMENT ON PRINCIPAL ANDIN-22
TEREST.—Section 455(f)(1)(B) of the Higher Education 23
Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1087e(f)(1)(B)) is amended by 24
striking ‘‘capitalized or’’. 25
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(g) INCOME-BASEDREPAYMENTPROGRAM.—Section 1
493C(b)(3)(B) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 2
U.S.C. 1098e(b)(3)(B)) is amended by inserting ‘‘shall ac-3
crue but not’’ before ‘‘be capitalized’’. 4
SEC. 225. ORIGINATION FEES. 5
(a) R
EPEAL OFORIGINATIONFEES.—Subsection (c) 6
of section 455 of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 7
U.S.C. 1087e(c)) is repealed. 8
(b) E
FFECTIVEDATE.—The amendment made by 9
subsection (a) shall apply with respect to loans made 10
under part D of title IV of the Higher Education Act of 11
1965 (20 U.S.C. 1087a et seq.) for which the first dis-12
bursement of principal is made, or, in the case of a Fed-13
eral Direct Consolidation Loan, the application is received, 14
on or after July 1, 2024. 15
TITLE III—ACCOUNTABILITY 16
AND STUDENT SUCCESS 17
PART A—ACCOUNTABILITY 18
Subpart 1—Department of Education 19
SEC. 301. AGREEMENTS WITH INSTITUTIONS. 20
Section 454 of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 21
U.S.C. 1087d) is amended— 22
(1) in subsection (a)— 23
(A) in paragraph (5), by striking ‘‘and’’ 24
after the semicolon; 25
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(B) by redesignating paragraph (6) as 1
paragraph (7); and 2
(C) by inserting after paragraph (5) the 3
following new paragraph: 4
‘‘(6) remit annual risk-sharing payments to the 5
Secretary in accordance with the requirements under 6
subsection (d); and’’; and 7
(2) by adding at the end the following new sub-8
section: 9
‘‘(d) R
ISK-SHARINGREQUIREMENTS.— 10
‘‘(1) A
NNUAL RISK-SHARING PAYMENTS RE -11
QUIRED.—Beginning in award year 2024–2025, 12
each institution of higher education participating in 13
the direct student loan program under this part 14
shall, for qualifying student loans, remit to the Sec-15
retary, at such time as the Secretary may specify, an 16
annual risk-sharing payment for each student cohort 17
of the institution, based on the non-repayment bal-18
ance of such cohort and calculated in accordance 19
with paragraph (3). 20
‘‘(2) S
TUDENT COHORTS.— 21
‘‘(A) C
OHORTS ESTABLISHED .—For each 22
institution of higher education, the Secretary 23
shall establish student cohorts, beginning with 24
award year 2023–2024, as follows: 25
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‘‘(i) COMPLETING STUDENT CO -1
HORT.—For each program of study at 2
such institution, a student cohort com-3
prised of all students who received Federal 4
financial assistance under this title and 5
who completed such program during such 6
award year. 7
‘‘(ii) U
NDERGRADUATE NON -COM-8
PLETING STUDENT COHORT .—For such in-9
stitution, a student cohort comprised of all 10
students who received Federal financial as-11
sistance under this title, who were enrolled 12
in the institution during the previous 13
award year in a program of study leading 14
to an undergraduate credential, and who at 15
the time the cohort is established— 16
‘‘(I) have not completed such 17
program of study; and 18
‘‘(II) are not enrolled at the in-19
stitution in any program of study 20
leading to an undergraduate creden-21
tial. 22
‘‘(iii) G
RADUATE NON -COMPLETING 23
STUDENT COHORT .—For each program of 24
study leading to a graduate credential at 25
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such institution, a student cohort com-1
prised of all students who received Federal 2
financial assistance under this title, who 3
were enrolled in such program during the 4
previous award year, and who at the time 5
the cohort is established— 6
‘‘(I) have not completed such 7
program of study; and 8
‘‘(II) are not enrolled in such 9
program. 10
‘‘(B) Q
UALIFYING STUDENT LOAN .—For 11
the purposes of this subsection, the term ‘quali-12
fying student loan’ means a Federal Direct 13
loan, including a Federal Direct Consolidation 14
loan, made under this part that— 15
‘‘(i) was made to a student included 16
in a student cohort of an institution; and 17
‘‘(ii) except in the case of a loan de-18
scribed in clause (i) or (ii) of subparagraph 19
(C), is not included in any other student 20
cohort of any institution of higher edu-21
cation. 22
‘‘(C) S
PECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES .— 23
‘‘(i) M
ULTIPLE CREDENTIALS .—In 24
the case of a student who completes two or 25
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more programs of study during the same 1
award year, each qualifying student loan of 2
the student shall be included in the student 3
cohort for each of such program of study 4
for such award year. 5
‘‘(ii) T
REATMENT OF CERTAIN CON -6
SOLIDATION LOANS .—A Federal Direct 7
Consolidation loan made under this title 8
shall not be considered a qualifying stu-9
dent loan for a student cohort for an 10
award year if all of the loans included in 11
such consolidation loan are attributable to 12
another student cohort. 13
‘‘(iii) C
ONSOLIDATION AFTER INCLU -14
SION IN A STUDENT COHORT .—If a quali-15
fying student loan is consolidated into a 16
consolidation loan under this title after 17
such qualifying student loan has been in-18
cluded in a student cohort, the percentage 19
of the consolidation loan that was attrib-20
utable to such student cohort at the time 21
of consolidation shall remain attributable 22
to the student cohort for the life of the 23
consolidation loan. 24
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‘‘(3) CALCULATION OF RISK -SHARING PAY-1
MENTS.— 2
‘‘(A) R
ISK-SHARING PAYMENT FORMULA .— 3
For each student cohort of an institution of 4
higher education established under this sub-5
section, the annual risk-sharing payment for 6
such cohort shall be equal to— 7
‘‘(i) the risk-sharing percentage deter-8
mined for the cohort in accordance with 9
subparagraph (B); multiplied by 10
‘‘(ii) the non-repayment balance for 11
the cohort for the award year, determined 12
in accordance with subparagraph (C). 13
‘‘(B) R
ISK-SHARING PERCENTAGE .—The 14
risk-sharing percentage of a student cohort of 15
an institution shall be determined by the Sec-16
retary when the cohort is established, shall re-17
main constant for the life of the student cohort, 18
and shall be determined as follows: 19
‘‘(i) C
OMPLETING STUDENT CO -20
HORTS.—The risk-sharing percentage of a 21
completing student cohort shall be equal to 22
the percentage determined by— 23
‘‘(I) subtracting from one the 24
quotient of— 25
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‘‘(aa) the median value- 1
added earnings (as defined in 2
section 103) of students who 3
completed such program of study 4
in the most recent award year for 5
which data is available, as re-6
ported on the College Scorecard 7
at the time the cohort was estab-8
lished; divided by 9
‘‘(bb) the median total price 10
charged to students included in 11
such cohort; and 12
‘‘(II) multiplying the difference 13
determined under subclause (I) by 14
100. 15
‘‘(ii) S
PECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES FOR 16
COMPLETING STUDENT COHORTS .— 17
‘‘(I) H
IGH-RISK COHORTS.—Not-18
withstanding clause (i), if the median 19
value-added earnings of a completing 20
student cohort under clause (i)(I)(aa) 21
is negative, the risk-sharing percent-22
age of the student cohort shall be 100 23
percent. 24
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‘‘(II) LOW-RISK COHORTS.—Not-1
withstanding clause (i), if the median 2
value-added earnings of a completing 3
student cohort under clause (i)(I)(aa) 4
exceeds the median total price of such 5
cohort under clause (i)(I)(bb), the 6
risk-sharing percentage of the student 7
cohort shall be 0 percent. 8
‘‘(iii) N
ON-COMPLETING STUDENT CO -9
HORTS.—The risk-sharing percentage of a 10
non-completing student cohort shall be de-11
termined based on the most recent data 12
available in the award year in which the 13
cohort is established, and— 14
‘‘(I) for an undergraduate non- 15
completing student cohort, shall be 16
equal to the percentage of under-17
graduate students who received Fed-18
eral financial assistance under this 19
title at such institution who— 20
‘‘(aa) did not complete an 21
undergraduate program of study 22
at the institution within 150 per-23
cent of the program length of 24
such program; or 25
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‘‘(bb) only in the case of a 1
two-year institution, did not, 2
within 6 years after first enroll-3
ing at the two-year institution, 4
complete a program of study at a 5
four-year institution for which a 6
bachelor’s degree (or substan-7
tially similar credential) is 8
awarded; and 9
‘‘(II) for a graduate non-com-10
pleting student cohort, shall be equal 11
to the percentage of students who re-12
ceived Federal financial assistance 13
under this title at the institution for 14
the applicable graduate program of 15
study and who did not complete such 16
program of study within 150 percent 17
of the program length. 18
‘‘(C) N
ON-REPAYMENT LOAN BALANCE .— 19
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—For each award 20
year, the Secretary shall determine the 21
non-repayment loan balance for such 22
award year for each student cohort of an 23
institution of higher education by calcu-24
lating the sum of— 25
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‘‘(I) for loans in such cohort in 1
repayment status that are being re-2
paid under a standard 10-year repay-3
ment plan under section 455(d)(1), 4
the difference between the total 5
amount of payments due from all bor-6
rowers on such loans during such 7
year, as required under section 8
455(d)(1)(A), and the total amount of 9
payments made by all such borrowers 10
on such loans during such year; plus 11
‘‘(II) for loans in such cohort in 12
repayment status that are being re-13
paid under the repayment assistance 14
plan under section 455(e)(9)— 15
‘‘(aa) the difference between 16
the total amount of payments 17
due from all borrowers on such 18
loans during such year, as re-19
quired under section 455(e)(9), 20
and the total amount of pay-21
ments made by all such bor-22
rowers on such loans during such 23
year; plus 24
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‘‘(bb) the total amount of 1
repayment assistance for such 2
loans under such section 3
455(e)(9) during such year, in-4
cluding the unpaid principal re-5
duced, and interest subtracted, 6
by the Secretary. 7
‘‘(ii) S
PECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES .—For 8
the purpose of calculating the non-repay-9
ment loan balance of student cohorts under 10
this paragraph, the Secretary shall— 11
‘‘(I) for each qualifying student 12
loan in a student cohort that is in-13
cluded in another student cohort be-14
cause the student who borrowed such 15
loan completed two or more programs 16
of study during the same award year, 17
the total amount of repayment assist-18
ance and amounts due but not paid 19
for such qualifying student loan shall 20
be divided equally among each of the 21
student cohorts in which such loan is 22
included; and 23
‘‘(II) for each consolidation loan 24
in a student cohort— 25
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‘‘(aa) determine the percent-1
age of the outstanding principal 2
balance of the consolidation loan 3
attributable to such student co-4
hort— 5
‘‘(AA) at the time of 6
that loan was included in 7
such cohort, in the case of a 8
loan consolidated before in-9
clusion in such cohort; or 10
‘‘(BB) at the time of 11
consolidation, in the case of 12
a loan consolidated after in-13
clusion in such cohort; and 14
‘‘(bb) include in the calcula-15
tions under clause (i) for such 16
student cohort only the percent-17
age of the total amount of repay-18
ment assistance and amounts due 19
but not paid for the consolidation 20
loan for such year that is equal 21
to the percentage of the consoli-22
dation loan determined under 23
item (aa). 24
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‘‘(D) TOTAL PRICE.—With respect to a 1
student who received Federal financial assist-2
ance under this title and who completes a pro-3
gram of study, the term ‘total price’ means the 4
total amount, before Federal financial assist-5
ance under this title was applied, a student was 6
required to pay to complete the program of 7
study. A student’s total price shall be calculated 8
by the Secretary as the difference between— 9
‘‘(i) the total amount of tuition and 10
fees (including the required costs described 11
in section 484(b)(3)(A)(i)(I)) that were 12
charged to such student before the applica-13
tion of any Federal financial assistance 14
provided under this title; minus 15
‘‘(ii) the total amount of grants and 16
scholarships described in section 17
480(i)awarded to such student from non- 18
Federal sources for such program of study. 19
‘‘(4) N
OTIFICATION AND REMITTANCE .—Begin-20
ning with the first award year for which risk-sharing 21
payments are required under this subsection, and for 22
each succeeding award year, the Secretary shall— 23
‘‘(A) notify each institution of higher edu-24
cation of the amounts and due dates of each 25
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annual risk-sharing payment calculated under 1
paragraph (3) for each student cohort of the in-2
stitution within 30 days of calculating such 3
amounts; and 4
‘‘(B) require the institution to remit such 5
payments within 90 days of such notification. 6
‘‘(5) P
ENALTY FOR LATE PAYMENTS .— 7
‘‘(A) T
HREE-MONTH DELINQUENCY .—If 8
an institution fails to remit to the Secretary a 9
risk-sharing payment for a student cohort as 10
required under this subsection within 90 days 11
of receiving notification from the Secretary in 12
accordance with paragraph (4), the institution 13
shall pay to the Secretary, in addition to such 14
risk-sharing payment, interest on such pay-15
ment, at a rate that is the average rate applica-16
ble to the loans in such student cohort. 17
‘‘(B) T
WELVE-MONTH DELINQUENCY .—If 18
an institution fails to remit to the Secretary a 19
risk-sharing payment for a student cohort as 20
required under this subsection, plus interest 21
owed in under subparagraph (A), within 12 22
months of receiving notification from the Sec-23
retary in accordance with paragraph (4), the in-24
stitution shall be ineligible to make direct loans 25
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to any student enrolled in the program of study 1
for which the institution has failed to make the 2
risk-sharing payments until such payment is 3
made. 4
‘‘(C) E
IGHTEEN-MONTH DELINQUENCY .— 5
If an institution fails to remit to the Secretary 6
a risk-sharing payment for a student cohort as 7
required under this subsection, plus interest 8
owed under subparagraph (A), within 18 9
months of receiving notification from the Sec-10
retary in accordance with paragraph (4), the in-11
stitution shall be ineligible to make direct loans 12
or award Federal Pell grants under section 401 13
to any student enrolled in the institution until 14
such payment is made. 15
‘‘(D) T
WO-YEAR DELINQUENCY .—If an in-16
stitution fails to remit to the Secretary a risk- 17
sharing payment for a student cohort as re-18
quired under this subsection, plus interest owed 19
under subparagraph (A), within 2 years of re-20
ceiving notification from the Secretary in ac-21
cordance with paragraph (4), the institution 22
shall be ineligible to participate in any program 23
under this title for a period of not less than 10 24
years. 25
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‘‘(6) RELIEF FOR VOLUNTARY CESSATION OF 1
FEDERAL DIRECT LOANS FOR A PROGRAM OF 2
STUDY.—The Secretary shall, upon the request of an 3
institution that voluntarily ceases to make Federal 4
direct loans to students enrolled in a specific pro-5
gram of study, reduce the amount of the annual 6
risk-sharing payment owed by the institution for 7
each student cohort associated with such program by 8
50 percent if the institution assures the Secretary 9
that the institution will not make Federal direct 10
loans to any student enrolled in such program of 11
study (or any substantially similar program of 12
study) for a period of not less than 10 award years, 13
beginning with the first award year that begins after 14
the date on which the Secretary reduces such risk- 15
sharing payment. 16
‘‘(7) R
ESERVATION OF FUNDS FOR PROMISE 17
GRANTS.—Notwithstanding any other provision of 18
law, the Secretary shall reserve the funds remitted 19
to the Secretary as risk-sharing payments in accord-20
ance with this subsection, and such funds shall be 21
made available to the Secretary only for the purpose 22
of awarding PROMISE grants in accordance with 23
subpart 4 of part A of this title.’’. 24
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SEC. 302. REGULATORY RELIEF. 1
(a) 90/10.— 2
(1) R
EGULATION REPEALED .—Section 668.28 3
of title 34, Code of Federal Regulations (relating to 4
the 90/10 rule), as added or amended by the final 5
regulations published by the Department of Edu-6
cation in the Federal Register on October 28, 2022 7
(87 Fed. Reg. 65426 et seq.), is repealed and will 8
have no force or effect. 9
(2) A
MENDMENTS.—Section 487 of the Higher 10
Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1094) is amend-11
ed— 12
(A) in subsection (a), by striking para-13
graph (24); 14
(B) by striking subsection (d); and 15
(C) by redesignating subsections (e) 16
through (j) as subsections (d) through (i), re-17
spectively. 18
(b) F
INANCIALVALUETRANSPARENCY AND GAIN-19
FULEMPLOYMENT.— 20
(1) R
EGULATION REPEALED .—Sections 600.10, 21
600.21, 668.2, 668.13, 668.43, 668.91, 668.402 22
through 668.409 (excluding section 668.408), and 23
668.601 through 668.606 of title 34, Code of Fed-24
eral Regulations (relating to financial value trans-25
parency and gainful employment), as added or 26
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amended by the final regulations published by the 1
Department of Education in the Federal Register on 2
October 10, 2023 (88 FR 70004 et seq.), are re-3
pealed and will have no force or effect. 4
(2) P
ROHIBITION.—The Secretary of Education 5
shall not, on or after the date of enactment of this 6
Act, promulgate or enforce any regulation or rule 7
with respect to the definition or application of the 8
term ‘‘gainful employment’’ for any purpose under 9
the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1001 10
et seq.). 11
(c) C
HANGES INOWNERSHIP.— 12
(1) R
EGULATION REPEALED .—Sections 600.2, 13
600.4, 600.20, 600.21, and 600.31 of title 34, Code 14
of Federal Regulations (relating to changes in own-15
ership), as added or amended by the final regula-16
tions published by the Department of Education in 17
the Federal Register on October 28, 2022 (87 Fed. 18
Reg. 65426 et seq.), are repealed and will have no 19
force or effect. 20
(2) A
MENDMENTS.—Section 498(i) of the 21
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1099c(i)) 22
is amended— 23
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(A) in the subsection heading, by inserting 1
‘‘
ANDPROPOSEDCHANGES OF OWNERSHIP’’ 2
after ‘‘O
WNERSHIP’’; 3
(B) in paragraph (1)— 4
(i) by striking ‘‘(1) An eligible institu-5
tion’’, and inserting the following: ‘‘(1)(A) 6
An eligible institution’’; 7
(ii) by striking ‘‘the requirements of 8
section 102 (other than the requirements 9
in subsections (b)(5) and (c)(3))’’ and in-10
serting ‘‘the applicable requirements of 11
section 102 or 103(13)’’; and 12
(iii) by adding at the end the fol-13
lowing: 14
‘‘(B)(i) Prior to a change in ownership re-15
sulting in a change of control, an institution 16
may seek a pretransaction determination about 17
whether the institution will meet the applicable 18
requirements of section 102 or 103(13) and 19
this section after such proposed change in own-20
ership by submitting to the Secretary a materi-21
ally complete pretransaction review application. 22
‘‘(ii) In reviewing applications submitted 23
under clause (i), the Secretary shall only pro-24
vide a comprehensive review of each such appli-25
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cation, and may not provide an abbreviated or 1
partial review. 2
‘‘(iii) If an institution submits a materially 3
complete pretransaction review application at 4
least 90 days prior to the transaction and the 5
Secretary approves the application, the subse-6
quent change in ownership application shall also 7
be approved and the institution shall be cer-8
tified as meeting the requirements for such 9
transaction, provided that the institution— 10
‘‘(I) complies with the applicable 11
terms of this section; and 12
‘‘(II) the transaction resulting in a 13
change of control does not differ materially 14
in its terms from the transaction proposed 15
in the pretransaction review application.’’; 16
(C) in paragraph (2)— 17
(i) in subparagraph (E), by striking 18
‘‘or’’ at the end; 19
(ii) in subparagraph (F), by striking 20
the period at the end and inserting ‘‘; or’’; 21
and 22
(iii) by adding the following at the 23
end: 24
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‘‘(G) in the case of a proprietary institution of 1
higher education, a conversion to a public or other 2
nonprofit institution of higher education.’’; 3
(D) by adding at the end the following: 4
‘‘(5)(A) Subject to subparagraph (B), when any insti-5
tution submits an application for a change in ownership 6
resulting in a change in control under this section or sub-7
mits a pretransaction review application under paragraph 8
(1)(B) (other than in the case of a conversion trans-9
action), the institution shall be required to pay to the Sec-10
retary an administrative fee that shall— 11
‘‘(i) be in an amount equal to 0.15 percent of 12
the total institutional revenue derived from this title 13
by such institution for the most fiscal year for which 14
data is available; and 15
‘‘(ii) be used exclusively for expenses related to 16
the processing of such application, and be available 17
to the Secretary without further appropriation, ex-18
clusively for expenses related to the processing of 19
such approval or application. 20
‘‘(B) In the case of a proprietary institution submit-21
ting an application for conversion, or a pretransaction re-22
view application for conversion, the institution shall be re-23
quired to pay to the Secretary an administrative fee that 24
shall— 25
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‘‘(i) be in an amount equal to 0.30 percent of 1
the total institutional revenue derived from this title 2
by such institution for the most fiscal year for which 3
data is available; and 4
‘‘(ii) be used exclusively for expenses related to 5
the processing of such application, and of which— 6
‘‘(I) 50 percent shall be available to the 7
Secretary without further appropriation, exclu-8
sively for expenses related to the processing of 9
such application; and 10
‘‘(II) 50 percent shall be remitted by the 11
Secretary to the Commissioner of the Internal 12
Revenue, and shall be available, without further 13
appropriation, to the Commissioner of Internal 14
Revenue exclusively for purposes of determining 15
whether the institution seeking such conversion 16
or pretransaction review is an institution ex-17
empt from tax and is otherwise in compliance 18
with applicable requirements of the Internal 19
Revenue Code of 1986. 20
‘‘(C) An institution that pays a fee under subpara-21
graph (A) or (B) for a pretransaction application with re-22
spect to a proposed transaction shall not be required to 23
pay another fee under such subparagraph for a change 24
in ownership application with respect to such transaction. 25
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‘‘(D) In no case may any fee remitted under subpara-1
graph (A) or (B) exceed $120,000 for any transaction (or 2
pretransaction) application, nor may the Secretary require 3
an institution that has paid a fee under subparagraph (B) 4
to pay an additional fee under subparagraph (A). 5
‘‘(6)(A) The Secretary shall approve or deny a mate-6
rially complete application (including pretransaction re-7
views and conversion applications) submitted under this 8
section as soon as practicable and not later than the 90- 9
day period beginning on the date of receipt of such an 10
application, except that in a case in which the Secretary 11
determines, on a nondelegable basis, that good cause exists 12
to not make the determination during such 90-day period, 13
the Secretary shall notify the institution in writing detail-14
ing the reasons for a good cause extension. 15
‘‘(B) If the Secretary fails to approve or deny a mate-16
rially complete application during the period described in 17
subparagraph (A) and does not find good cause for exten-18
sion, the materially complete application shall be deemed 19
approved. 20
‘‘(C) In no case may the Secretary grant a good cause 21
extension under this section to an institution for more 22
than one month at a time, or for a total of more than 23
more than 12 months. 24
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‘‘(D) To ensure timely submission of all relevant doc-1
umentation, the Secretary may deny an application if an 2
institution does not make a good faith effort to submit 3
to the Secretary, in a timely manner— 4
‘‘(i) all relevant documentation; or 5
‘‘(ii) a materially complete application. 6
‘‘(E)(i) Upon approving or denying an application 7
under this paragraph, the Secretary shall publish in the 8
Federal Register the reasoning for such approval or de-9
nial, including— 10
‘‘(I) a copy of the approval or denial letter sent 11
to the institution; and 12
‘‘(II) any analysis regarding how the Secretary 13
determined under paragraph 7(A)(iii) that a director 14
of the institution was an interested or disinterested 15
party to the transaction. 16
‘‘(ii) The Secretary shall not publish under clause (i) 17
any information that is otherwise exempt from disclosure 18
under section 552 of title 5, United States Code (relating 19
to the Freedom of Information Act), including trade se-20
crets and commercial or financial information that is privi-21
leged or confidential. 22
‘‘(7)(A) In the case of a proprietary institution that 23
subsequent to the transaction would be owned and oper-24
ated by an entity (in this paragraph referred to as the 25
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‘buyer’) seeking to be recognized as a public or other non-1
profit institution, the buyer shall meet the definition of 2
a nonprofit institution under section 103(13) if— 3
‘‘(i) the buyer pays no more than fair market 4
value for any assets of the proprietary institution; 5
‘‘(ii) the buyer pays no more than fair market 6
value for any service or lease contracts, including 7
such service and lease contracts provided by the en-8
tity selling the proprietary institution; and 9
‘‘(iii) to prevent self-dealing in the case where 10
one or more individuals with a substantial ownership 11
or controlling interests in the proprietary institution 12
will also have substantial or controlling interests in 13
the institution seeking to be recognized as a public 14
or other nonprofit institution (meaning that one or 15
more individuals are on both sides of the trans-16
action), the change of control transaction, and any 17
substantial asset acquisition, service, or lease agree-18
ments with the proprietary institution shall be ap-19
proved by a disinterested committee of directors of 20
the entity that seeks to be recognized as a public or 21
other nonprofit institution. 22
‘‘(B) For the purposes of this paragraph, parties to 23
the transaction are entitled to a rebuttable presumption 24
that the assets, lease contracts, and service contracts that 25
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are part of the transaction are purchased at fair market 1
value if— 2
‘‘(i) the acquiring entity pays no more than fair 3
market value for such assets, lease contracts, or 4
service contracts; and 5
‘‘(ii) the value of the assets, lease contracts, or 6
service contracts are evaluated by at least one inde-7
pendent third-party entity hired by parties on both 8
sides of the transaction. 9
‘‘(8)(A) An institution that has been approved for 10
conversion by the Secretary shall be subject to a moni-11
toring period for a 5-year period beginning on the day 12
after the date of such approval. In conducting the moni-13
toring of the institution under this paragraph, the Sec-14
retary— 15
‘‘(i) shall only conduct monitoring to ensure 16
that the institution is in compliance with the re-17
quirements of section 103(13) and paragraph (7) of 18
this subsection; and 19
‘‘(ii) may require the institution to submit reg-20
ular reports or conduct audits of such institution re-21
lating to such compliance. 22
‘‘(B) Each institution that is subject to the moni-23
toring period under this paragraph shall remit an annual 24
fee to the Secretary— 25
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‘‘(i) in an amount equal to 0.15 percent of the 1
total revenue derived from this title by such institu-2
tion for the most recent fiscal year for which data 3
is available; and 4
‘‘(ii) that shall be exclusively for expenses re-5
lated to monitoring of the institution for the period 6
described in subparagraph (A)— 7
‘‘(I) of which 50 percent shall be used by 8
the Secretary, without further appropriation, 9
exclusively for expenses related to monitoring of 10
the institution during such period; and 11
‘‘(II) of which 50 percent shall be remitted 12
by the Secretary to the Commissioner of Inter-13
nal Revenue, to be available to such Commis-14
sioner, without further appropriation, exclu-15
sively for monitoring compliance with the Inter-16
nal Revenue Code of such institution during 17
such period. 18
‘‘(C) An institution may not be subject to an annual 19
fee under subparagraph (B) for monitoring related to a 20
conversion that exceeds $60,000. 21
‘‘(D) If the Secretary determines that an institution 22
should be subject to the monitoring under this paragraph 23
beyond the 5-year period described in subparagraph (A), 24
the Secretary shall provide the reasons justifying an exten-25
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sion in writing to the institution (and in the Federal Reg-1
ister) at least 30 days before the expiration of such period. 2
‘‘(E) Any institution that is subject to monitoring 3
under this paragraph may seek a waiver to be exempt from 4
such monitoring (including the annual fee under subpara-5
graph (B)) on an annual basis for any year during the 6
monitoring period and the Secretary shall grant such waiv-7
er if there is no ongoing contractual or financial relation-8
ship between the institution and the former entity or indi-9
viduals that previously owned the institution. The Sec-10
retary may grant a waiver for more than 1 year in the 11
case where the entity that formerly owned the proprietary 12
institution has closed or no longer exists and the Secretary 13
determines the institution is not at risk of violating the 14
requirements of section 103(13) or paragraph (7) of this 15
subsection. 16
‘‘(9) Any institution that submits an application for 17
conversion shall not promote or market itself, in any man-18
ner, as a public or other nonprofit institution of higher 19
education unless— 20
‘‘(A) the Secretary has provided final approval 21
of the conversion of the institution to a public or 22
other nonprofit institution of higher education under 23
this section; 24
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‘‘(B) an accrediting agency or association recog-1
nized by the Secretary pursuant to section 496 has 2
approved such public or nonprofit status of the insti-3
tution; 4
‘‘(C) the State has given final approval to the 5
institution as a public or nonprofit institution of 6
higher education, as applicable; and 7
‘‘(D) in the case of an institution seeking non-8
profit status, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue 9
has approved the institution as tax exempt pursuant 10
to the Internal Revenue Code of 1986. 11
‘‘(10) Not later than 270 days after the date of enact-12
ment of the College Cost Reduction Act, and periodically 13
thereafter, the Secretary shall publish (and update as nec-14
essary) in the Federal Register— 15
‘‘(A) descriptions of the documents and mate-16
rials the Secretary expects or requires institutions of 17
higher education to submit (including any standard-18
ized forms) as part of any pretransaction application 19
or change in ownership application under this sec-20
tion, including a description of what the Secretary 21
considers to be a materially complete application; 22
and 23
‘‘(B) after at least a 30-day notice and com-24
ment period, responses to any public comments re-25
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ceived with respect to such descriptions or updates 1
to such descriptions. 2
‘‘(11) In a case in which the Secretary requests a doc-3
ument under this section as part of a pretransaction or 4
change in ownership application that is not described in 5
the Federal Register under paragraph (10), the Secretary 6
shall— 7
‘‘(A) substantiate, in writing to the institution, 8
the reasons why the Secretary is requesting such 9
documents; and 10
‘‘(B) publish such reasons in the Federal Reg-11
ister, including whether the Secretary may request 12
other institutions that submit applications under this 13
section to produce similar documentation. 14
‘‘(12)(A) Not later than 18 months after the date of 15
enactment of the College Cost Reduction Act, and annu-16
ally thereafter, the Secretary shall submit a report to au-17
thorizing committees, and post such report on a publicly 18
available website regarding implementation of the amend-19
ments made to this section by such Act, including the fol-20
lowing information: 21
‘‘(i) The mean and median length of time taken 22
by the Secretary to review applications under this 23
section during the preceding 12-month period. 24
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‘‘(ii) The number of applications approved or 1
denied during the preceding 12-month period. 2
‘‘(iii) For any application not processed during 3
the 90-day period beginning on the date of receipt 4
of the application for which the Secretary found 5
good cause under paragraph (6)(A) to extend the 6
deadline in which the application shall be processed, 7
a copy of the letter sent to the institution explaining 8
why the Secretary believed good cause existed for 9
such extension. 10
‘‘(iv) For any application not processed during 11
such 90-day period, which was deemed to be auto-12
matically approved by the requirements of this sec-13
tion under paragraph (6)(B), the name of each insti-14
tution involved and an explanation for why the appli-15
cation was not processed in a timely manner. 16
‘‘(v) Any legislative suggestions the Secretary 17
may have to improve the application or monitoring 18
process under this section. 19
‘‘(B) If the Secretary fails to submit a report under 20
this paragraph by not later than 90 days after the dead-21
line for such submission under subparagraph (A), the Sec-22
retary may not, for the 12-month period following such 23
failure, spend the fees remitted by institutions under this 24
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section or remit such fees to the Commissioner unless 1
Congress provides for such use by further appropriation. 2
‘‘(13) For the purposes of this subsection, the term 3
‘conversion’ means any transaction under which— 4
‘‘(A) a proprietary institution is reorganized 5
and seeks recognition as a public or other nonprofit 6
institution; or 7
‘‘(B) the control of a proprietary institution is 8
transferred as a result of a sale, donation, or other 9
method to an entity that seeks certification under 10
this section as a public or other nonprofit institu-11
tion.’’. 12
(3) A
PPLICATION.—The amendments made by 13
this section shall be apply with respect to applica-14
tions submitted for change of control or conversion 15
submitted on or after January 1, 2023. 16
(4) R
EPORT.— Not later than 5 years after the 17
date of enactment of this Act, the Comptroller Gen-18
eral shall submit to the Committee on Education 19
and the Workforce of the House of Representatives 20
and the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, 21
and Pensions of the Senate, a report on the imple-22
mentation of the amendments made by this sub-23
section, including recommendations to improve— 24
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(A) the application process under section 1
498(i) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 2
U.S.C. 1099c(i)), as amended by paragraph (2), 3
for institutions of higher education seeking a 4
change in ownership resulting in a change in 5
control; or 6
(B) the monitoring process under such sec-7
tion for institutions of higher education that 8
have recently converted from being recognized 9
as a proprietary institution to a public or other 10
nonprofit institution. 11
(d) F
INANCIALRESPONSIBILITY.— 12
(1) R
EGULATION REPEALED .—Sections 668.15, 13
668.23, 668.171, and 668.174 through 668.177 of 14
title 34, Code of Federal Regulations (relating to fi-15
nancial responsibility), as added or amended by the 16
final regulations published by the Department of 17
Education in the Federal Register on October 31, 18
2023 (87 Fed. Reg. 74568 et seq.), are repealed and 19
will have no force or effect. 20
(2) A
MENDMENTS.—Section 498(c) of the 21
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 6 U.S.C. 22
1099c(c)) is amended— 23
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(A) by redesignating paragraphs (3), (4), 1
(5), and (6) as paragraphs (4), (5), (6), and 2
(7), respectively; 3
(B) in paragraph (2)— 4
(i) by striking ‘‘paragraph (1), if’’ and 5
inserting ‘‘paragraph (1), the Secretary 6
shall prescribe criteria regarding ratios 7
that aid in the determination financial re-8
sponsibility. Such ratios shall be first 9
issued in draft form to the institution to 10
allow for adequate review, consisting of an 11
appeals process, by such institutions of 12
higher education. If’’; and 13
(ii) by striking ‘‘prescribed by the 14
Secretary regarding ratios’’ and inserting 15
‘‘prescribed by the Secretary regarding the 16
final ratios’’; 17
(C) by inserting after paragraph (2) the 18
following: 19
‘‘(3) Notwithstanding paragraph (2), the Secretary 20
shall take into account an institution’s current total finan-21
cial circumstances, including any subsequent change in the 22
institution’s overall fiscal health based on the standards 23
in paragraph (2), when making a determination of its abil-24
ity to meet the standards herein required before any sub-25
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sequent action is taken under paragraph (4). If an institu-1
tion meets the standards in paragraph (2), the institution 2
shall be seen as financially responsible.’’; 3
(D) in subparagraph (C) of paragraph (4), 4
as so redesignated, by striking ‘‘establishes to 5
the satisfaction of the Secretary, with’’ and in-6
serting ‘‘establishes, with’’; 7
(E) in paragraph (5), as so redesignated— 8
(i) in subparagraph (A), by inserting 9
‘‘and’’ after the semicolon at the end; 10
(ii) in subparagraph (B), by striking 11
‘‘; and’’ and inserting a period; and 12
(iii) by striking subparagraph (C); 13
(F) in paragraph (6), as so redesignated, 14
by striking ‘‘(3)(C)’’ and inserting ‘‘(4)(C)’’; 15
and 16
(G) by adding at the end the following new 17
paragraph: 18
‘‘(8) Not later than 18 months after the date of en-19
actment of the College Cost Reduction Act, the Secretary 20
shall pursue a process to update the ratios regarding fi-21
nancial responsibility as identified in paragraph (2). The 22
Secretary shall report the revised ratios to— 23
‘‘(A) the Committee on Education and the 24
Workforce of the House of Representatives; and 25
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‘‘(B) the Committee on Health, Education, 1
Labor, and Pensions of the Senate.’’. 2
(e) I
NCENTIVECOMPENSATION; THIRDPARTY 3
S
ERVICER.— 4
(1) A
MENDMENTS.—Section 487(a)(20) (20 5
U.S.C. 1094(a)(20)) is amended to read as follows: 6
‘‘(20) The institution will not provide any com-7
mission, bonus, or other incentive payment based di-8
rectly or indirectly on success in securing enroll-9
ments or financial aid to any persons or entities en-10
gaged in any student recruiting or admission activi-11
ties, or in making decisions regarding the award of 12
student financial assistance, except that this para-13
graph shall not apply— 14
‘‘(A) to the recruitment of foreign students 15
residing in foreign countries who are not eligi-16
ble to receive Federal student assistance; or 17
‘‘(B) to a third party where— 18
‘‘(i) the third party is providing the 19
institution recruiting or admissions activi-20
ties as part of a larger bundle of services 21
not covered by this paragraph and which 22
may include marketing or advertising ac-23
tivities that broadly disseminate or dis-24
tribute widely available information; 25
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‘‘(ii) the third party does not provide 1
any commission, bonus, or other incentive- 2
based payments to its employees or sub-3
contractors who are providing services to 4
the institution covered in this paragraph; 5
and 6
‘‘(iii) the third party is not awarding 7
or disbursing Federal financial aid 8
awards.’’. 9
(2) D
EFINITION.—Section 481(c) (20 U.S.C. 10
1088(c)) is amended to read as follows: 11
‘‘(c) T
HIRDPARTYSERVICER.— 12
‘‘(1) For purposes of this title, the term ‘third 13
party servicer’— 14
‘‘(A) means any individual, any State, or 15
any private, for-profit or nonprofit organization, 16
which enters into a contract with— 17
‘‘(i) any eligible institution of higher 18
education to administer, through either 19
manual or automated processing, any as-20
pect of such institution’s student assist-21
ance programs under this title; or 22
‘‘(ii) any guaranty agency, or any eli-23
gible lender, to administer, through either 24
manual or automated processing, any as-25
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pect of such guaranty agency’s or lender’s 1
student loan programs under part B of 2
this title, including originating, guaran-3
teeing, monitoring, processing, servicing, or 4
collecting loans; and 5
‘‘(B) does not include any individual, any 6
State, or any private, for-profit or nonprofit or-7
ganization, which conducts activities or inter-8
acts with prospective or enrolled students for 9
the purposes of— 10
‘‘(i) marketing or recruiting, such as 11
soliciting potential enrollments through the 12
dissemination of information and adver-13
tising; 14
‘‘(ii) assisting with the completion of 15
applications for enrollment, such as screen-16
ing pre-enrollment information and offer-17
ing admission counseling; 18
‘‘(iii) administering ability-to-benefit 19
tests or establishing any aspect of an eligi-20
ble career pathway program; 21
‘‘(iv) conducting activities for the re-22
tention of students, such as monitoring 23
academic engagement and conducting out-24
reach to student regarding attendance; and 25
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‘‘(v) providing instructional content, 1
such as evaluating course completion, de-2
livering mandatory tutoring, assessing stu-3
dent learning, including through electronic 4
means, or developing curricula or course 5
materials. 6
‘‘(2) The Secretary shall not regulate on the 7
definition of a ‘third party servicer’.’’. 8
(f) O
THERREPEALS.—The following regulations (in-9
cluding any supplement or revision to such regulations) 10
are repealed and shall have no legal effect: 11
(1) C
LOSED SCHOOL DISCHARGES .—Sections 12
674.33(g), 682.402(d), and 685.214 of title 34, 13
Code of Federal Regulations (relating to closed 14
school discharges), as added or amended by the final 15
regulations published by the Department of Edu-16
cation in the Federal Register on November 1, 2022 17
(87 Fed. Reg. 65904 et seq.). 18
(2) B
ORROWER DEFENSE TO REPAYMENT .— 19
Section 685.401 of title 34, Code of Federal Regula-20
tions (relating to borrower defense to repayment), as 21
added or amended by the final regulations published 22
by the Department of Education in the Federal Reg-23
ister on November 1, 2022 (87 Fed. Reg. 65904 et 24
seq.). 25
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(3) PRE-DISPUTE ARBITRATION .—Sections 1
668.41, 685.300, and 685.304 of title 34, Code of 2
Federal Regulations (relating to pre-dispute arbitra-3
tion), as added or amended by the final regulations 4
published by the Department of Education in the 5
Federal Register on November 1, 2022 (87 Fed. 6
Reg. 65904 et seq.). 7
(4) F
ALSE CERTIFICATION .—Sections 8
682.402(e), 685.215(c), and 685.215(d) of title 34, 9
Code of Federal Regulations (relating to false cer-10
tification), as added or amended by the final regula-11
tions published by the Department of Education in 12
the Federal Register on November 1, 2022 (87 Fed. 13
Reg. 65904 et seq.). 14
(5) A
DMINISTRATIVE CAPABILITY .—Sections 15
668.16 of title 34, Code of Federal Regulations (re-16
lating to administrative capability), as added or 17
amended by the final regulations published by the 18
Department of Education in the Federal Register on 19
October 31, 2023 (87 Fed. Reg. 74568 et seq.). 20
(6) C
ERTIFICATION PROCEDURES .—Sections 21
668.13, 668.14, and 668.43 of title 34, Code of Fed-22
eral Regulations (relating to certification proce-23
dures) as added or amended by the final regulations 24
published by the Department of Education in the 25
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Federal Register on October 31, 2023 (87 Fed. Reg. 1
74568 et seq.). 2
(7) A
BILITY TO BENEFIT .—Sections 668.2, 3
668.32, 668.156, and 668.157 of title 34, Code of 4
Federal Regulations (relating to ability to benefit) as 5
added or amended by the final regulations published 6
by the Department of Education in the Federal Reg-7
ister on October 31, 2023 (87 Fed. Reg. 74568 et 8
seq.). 9
(8) P
ERSONAL LIABILITY.—The electronic an-10
nouncement titled ‘‘Establishing Personal Liability 11
Requirements for Financial Losses Related to the 12
Title IV Programs’’ (GENERAL–23–11, published 13
on March 1, 2023). 14
(g) E
FFECT OFREPEAL.—Any regulations repealed 15
by subsections (c) through (e) that were in effect on June 16
30, 2023, are restored and revived as if the repeal of such 17
regulations under such subsections had not taken effect. 18
(h) P
ROHIBITION.—The Secretary of Education may 19
not implement any rule, regulation, policy, or executive ac-20
tion specified in this section (or a substantially similar 21
rule, regulation, policy, or executive action) unless author-22
ity for such implementation is explicitly provided in an Act 23
of Congress. 24
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(i) PROGRAMREVIEW ANDDATA.—Section 498A (20 1
U.S.C. 1099c–1) is amended by adding at the end the fol-2
lowing: 3
‘‘(f) T
IMELIMIT ONPROGRAMREVIEWACTIVI-4
TIES.—In conducting, responding to, and concluding pro-5
gram review activities, the Secretary shall— 6
‘‘(1) provide to the institution the initial report 7
finding not later than 90 days after concluding an 8
initial site visit; 9
‘‘(2) upon each receipt of an institution’s re-10
sponse during a program review inquiry, respond in 11
a substantive manner within 90 days; 12
‘‘(3) upon each receipt of an institution’s writ-13
ten response to a draft final program review report, 14
provide the final program review report and accom-15
panying enforcement actions, if any, within 90 days; 16
and 17
‘‘(4) conclude the entire program review process 18
not later than 2 years after the initiation of a pro-19
gram review, unless the Secretary determines that 20
such a review is sufficiently complex and cannot rea-21
sonably be concluded before the expiration of such 2- 22
year period, in which case the Secretary shall 23
promptly notify the institution of the reasons for 24
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such delay and provide an anticipated date for con-1
clusion of the review.’’. 2
SEC. 303. LIMITATION ON AUTHORITY OF SECRETARY TO 3
PROPOSE OR ISSUE REGULATIONS AND EX-4
ECUTIVE ACTIONS. 5
Part G of title IV of the Higher Education Act of 6
1965 (20 U.S.C. 1088 et seq.) is amended by inserting 7
after section 492 the following: 8
‘‘SEC. 492A. LIMITATION ON AUTHORITY OF THE SEC-9
RETARY TO PROPOSE OR ISSUE REGULA-10
TIONS AND EXECUTIVE ACTIONS. 11
‘‘(a) D
RAFTREGULATIONS.—Beginning after the 12
date of enactment of this section, a draft regulation imple-13
menting this title (as described in section 492(b)(1)) that 14
is determined by the Secretary to be economically signifi-15
cant shall be subject to the following requirements (re-16
gardless of whether negotiated rulemaking occurs): 17
‘‘(1) The Secretary shall determine whether the 18
draft regulation, if implemented, would result in an 19
increase in a subsidy cost. 20
‘‘(2) If the Secretary determines under para-21
graph (1) that the draft regulation would result in 22
an increase in a subsidy cost, then the Secretary 23
may take no further action with respect to such reg-24
ulation. 25
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‘‘(b) PROPOSED ORFINALREGULATIONS ANDEXEC-1
UTIVEACTIONS.—Beginning after the date of enactment 2
of this section, the Secretary may not issue a proposed 3
rule, final regulation, or executive action implementing 4
this title if the Secretary determines that the rule, regula-5
tion, or executive action— 6
‘‘(1) is economically significant; and 7
‘‘(2) would result in an increase in a subsidy 8
cost. 9
‘‘(c) R
ELATIONSHIP TO OTHERREQUIREMENTS.— 10
The analyses required under subsections (a) and (b) shall 11
be in addition to any other cost analysis required under 12
law for a regulation implementing this title, including any 13
cost analysis that may be required pursuant to Executive 14
Order 12866 (58 Fed. Reg. 51735; relating to regulatory 15
planning and review), Executive Order 13563 (76 Fed. 16
Reg. 3821; relating to improving regulation and regu-17
latory review), or any related or successor orders. 18
‘‘(d) D
EFINITION.—In this section, the term ‘eco-19
nomically significant’, when used with respect to a draft, 20
proposed, or final regulation or executive action, means 21
that the regulation or executive action is likely, as deter-22
mined by the Secretary— 23
‘‘(1) to have an annual effect on the economy 24
of $100,000,000 or more; or 25
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‘‘(2) adversely to affect in a material way the 1
economy, a sector of the economy, productivity, com-2
petition, jobs, the environment, public health or safe-3
ty, or State, local, or tribal governments or commu-4
nities.’’. 5
SEC. 304. OFFICE OF FEDERAL STUDENT AID. 6
(a) F
EDERALPREEMPTION.—Section 456 (20 U.S.C. 7
1087f) is amended by adding at the end the following: 8
‘‘(c) F
EDERALPREEMPTION.— 9
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—Covered activities shall not 10
be subject to any law or other requirement of any 11
State or political subdivision of a State with respect 12
to— 13
‘‘(A) disclosure requirements; 14
‘‘(B) requirements or restrictions on the 15
content, time, quantity, or frequency of commu-16
nications with borrowers, endorsers, or ref-17
erences with respect to such loans; or 18
‘‘(C) any other requirement relating to the 19
servicing or collection of a loan made under this 20
title. 21
‘‘(2) C
OVERED ACTIVITIES DEFINED .—In this 22
subsection, the term ‘covered activities’ means any 23
of the following activities, as carried out by a quali-24
fied entity: 25
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‘‘(A) Origination of a loan made under this 1
title. 2
‘‘(B) Servicing of a loan made under this 3
title. 4
‘‘(C) Collection of a loan made under this 5
title. 6
‘‘(D) Any other activity related to the ac-7
tivities described in subparagraphs (A) through 8
(C).’’. 9
(b) P
ROCUREMENT FLEXIBILITY.—Section 142 (20 10
U.S.C. 1018a) is amended— 11
(1) by redesignating subsection (l) as subsection 12
(m); and 13
(2) by inserting after subsection (k) the fol-14
lowing: 15
‘‘(l) G
UIDANCE TOSTUDENTLOANSERVICERS.— 16
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—In notifying a student loan 17
servicer of a final contract modification (as such 18
term is defined in section 2.101 of title 48, Code of 19
Federal Regulations) that instructs such loan 20
servicer to perform a function that is new or dif-21
ferent from a function such servicer performs pursu-22
ant to an existing contract, the PBO shall, not later 23
than 30 days before such contract change takes ef-24
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fect, provide such servicers with written guidance in 1
the form of— 2
‘‘(A) a change order (as such term is de-3
fined in section 2.101 of title 48, Code of Fed-4
eral Regulations); 5
‘‘(B) a dear colleague letter; or 6
‘‘(C) an electronic announcement. 7
‘‘(2) N
ON-BINDING DIRECTIVES .—A student 8
loan servicer that is notified of a final contract 9
modification described in paragraph (1) and receives 10
guidance in a form other than a form described in 11
paragraph (1) (including through emails or phone 12
calls) shall not be subject to such contract modifica-13
tion.’’. 14
Subpart 2—Accreditors 15
SEC. 311. ACCREDITING AGENCY RECOGNITION. 16
(a) C
RITERIAREQUIRED.—Section 496(a) of the 17
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1099b(a)) is 18
amended— 19
(1) in the matter preceding paragraph (1), in 20
the first sentence, by striking ‘‘or training’’ and in-21
serting ‘‘skills development’’; 22
(2) by amending paragraph (1) to read as fol-23
lows: 24
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‘‘(1) the accrediting agency or association 1
(other than an accrediting agency or association de-2
scribed in paragraph (2)(D)) shall be a State or na-3
tional agency or association and shall demonstrate 4
the ability to operate as an institutional or pro-5
grammatic accrediting agency or association within 6
the State or nationally, as appropriate;’’; 7
(3) in paragraph (2)— 8
(A) in subparagraph (A)— 9
(i) in clause (i), by striking ‘‘prin-10
cipal’’; and 11
(ii) in clause (ii), by striking ‘‘its prin-12
cipal’’ and inserting ‘‘a’’; and 13
(B) in subparagraph (C), by inserting ‘‘or’’ 14
at the end; and 15
(C) by adding at the end the following: 16
‘‘(D) is an entity (such as an industry-spe-17
cific quality assurance entity) that has been— 18
‘‘(i) determined by a State to be a re-19
liable authority as to the quality of edu-20
cation or skills development offered in such 21
State for the purposes of this Act; and 22
‘‘(ii) designated (in accordance with 23
subsection (b)(1)) by such State as an ac-24
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crediting agency or association with re-1
spect to such State for such purposes;’’; 2
(4) in paragraph (3)— 3
(A) by amending subparagraph (A) to read 4
as follows: 5
‘‘(A) subparagraph (A), (C), or (D) of 6
paragraph (2), then such agency or association 7
is— 8
‘‘(i) distinctly incorporated or orga-9
nized; and 10
‘‘(ii) both administratively and finan-11
cially separate from, and independent of, 12
any related, associated, or affiliated trade 13
association or membership organization, by 14
ensuring that— 15
‘‘(I) the members of the board or 16
governing body of the accrediting 17
agency or association are not elected 18
or selected by the board or chief exec-19
utive officer (or the representative of 20
such board or officer) of any related, 21
associated, or affiliated trade associa-22
tion or membership organization; 23
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‘‘(II) among the membership of 1
the board or governing body of the ac-2
crediting agency or association— 3
‘‘(aa) if such board or body 4
is comprised of 5 or fewer mem-5
bers, there is a minimum of one 6
public member who represents 7
business and who is not a mem-8
ber of any related, associated, or 9
affiliated trade association or 10
membership organization; and 11
‘‘(bb) if such board or body 12
is comprised of 6 or more mem-13
bers, there is a minimum of 1 14
such public member for every 6 15
members; 16
‘‘(III) guidelines are established 17
for such members to avoid conflicts of 18
interest, including specific guidelines 19
to ensure that no such member is an 20
employee of any institution accredited 21
by the agency or association or has a 22
financial interest in any such institu-23
tion; 24
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‘‘(IV) dues to the accrediting 1
agency or association are paid sepa-2
rately from any dues paid to any re-3
lated, associated, or affiliated trade 4
association or membership organiza-5
tion; and 6
‘‘(V) the budget of the accred-7
iting agency or association is devel-8
oped, decided, and maintained by the 9
accrediting agency or association with-10
out any review by, consultation with, 11
or approval by any related, associated, 12
or affiliated trade association or mem-13
bership organization;’’; 14
(B) by striking ‘‘or’’ at the end of subpara-15
graph (B); and 16
(C) by striking subparagraph (C); 17
(5) in paragraph (4)— 18
(A) in subparagraph (A)— 19
(i) by inserting ‘‘(in the manner de-20
scribed in subparagraph (B))’’ after ‘‘reli-21
gious missions’’; and 22
(ii) by striking ‘‘and’’ at the end; and 23
(B) by striking subparagraph (B) and in-24
serting the following: 25
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‘‘(B) such accrediting agency or associa-1
tion consistently applies and enforces standards 2
that respect the stated religious mission of an 3
institution of higher education by— 4
‘‘(i) basing decisions regarding accred-5
itation and preaccreditation on the stand-6
ards of accreditation of such agency or as-7
sociation; and 8
‘‘(ii) not using as a negative factor 9
the institution’s religious mission based 10
policies, decisions, and practices in the 11
areas covered by subparagraphs (B), (C), 12
(D), (E), and (F) of paragraph (5), except 13
that the agency or association may require 14
that the institution’s or a program of 15
study’s curricula include all core compo-16
nents required by the agency or association 17
that are not inconsistent with the institu-18
tion’s religious mission; and 19
‘‘(C) such agency or association dem-20
onstrates the ability to review, evaluate, and as-21
sess the quality of any instruction delivery 22
model or method such agency or association has 23
or seeks to include within its scope of recogni-24
tion, without giving preference to or differen-25
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tially treating a particular instruction delivery 1
model or method offered by an institution of 2
higher education or program, except that— 3
‘‘(i) in a case in which the instruction 4
delivery model allows for the separation of 5
the student from the instructor, the agency 6
or association shall not be required to have 7
separate standards, procedures, or policies 8
for the evaluation of the quality of any in-9
struction delivery model or method in order 10
to meet the requirements of this subpara-11
graph; and 12
‘‘(ii) in the case in which the instruc-13
tion delivery model allows for the separa-14
tion of the student from the instructor— 15
‘‘(I) the agency or association re-16
quires the institution to have proc-17
esses through which the institution es-18
tablishes that the student who reg-19
isters in a course or program is the 20
same student who participates in the 21
program (including, to the extent 22
practicable, the testing or other as-23
sessments required under the pro-24
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gram), completes the program, and 1
receives the academic credit; and 2
‘‘(II) the agency or association 3
requires that any process used by an 4
institution to comply with the require-5
ment under clause (I) does not in-6
fringe upon student privacy and is im-7
plemented in a manner that is mini-8
mally burdensome to the student;’’; 9
and 10
(6) in paragraph (5)— 11
(A) by amending subparagraph (A) to read 12
as follows: 13
‘‘(A) success with respect to student 14
achievement outcomes in relation to the institu-15
tion’s mission and to the programs the institu-16
tion offers, or the mission of a specific degree, 17
certificate, or credential program, which may 18
include different standards for different institu-19
tions or programs, and which shall include— 20
‘‘(i) standards for consideration of the 21
median total price charged to students for 22
a program of study in relation to the me-23
dian value-added earnings of students who 24
completed such program; 25
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‘‘(ii) standards for consideration of 1
learning outcomes measures (such as com-2
petency attainment and licensing examina-3
tion passage rates); 4
‘‘(iii) standards for consideration of 5
labor market outcomes measures (such as 6
employer satisfaction surveys, employ-7
ability measures, earnings gains, employ-8
ment rates, or other similar approaches); 9
and 10
‘‘(iv) standards for consideration of 11
student success outcomes measures (such 12
as completion rates, retention rates, and 13
loan repayment rates);’’; 14
(B) by amending subparagraph (I) to read 15
as follows: 16
‘‘(I) record of student complaints received 17
by, or available to, the agency or association, 18
and a process for resolving complaints received 19
by the institution; and’’; and 20
(C) in subparagraph (J), by inserting ‘‘and 21
the median total price charged to students for 22
a program of study in relation to the median 23
value-added earnings of students who completed 24
such program provided by the Secretary’’ after 25
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‘‘student loan default rate data provided by the 1
Secretary’’. 2
(b) S
ECRETARIALREQUIREMENTS AND AUTHOR-3
ITY.—Subsection (b) of section 496 of the Higher Edu-4
cation Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1099b) is amended to read 5
as follows: 6
‘‘(b) S
ECRETARIALREQUIREMENTS AND AUTHOR-7
ITY.— 8
‘‘(1) S
TATE DESIGNATED ACCREDITING AGEN -9
CY.— 10
‘‘(A) A
PPROVAL OF STATE PLANS .—The 11
Secretary shall— 12
‘‘(i) approve a State’s designation of 13
an entity as an accrediting agency or asso-14
ciation for the purposes described in sub-15
section (a)(2)(D) for a 5-year period, be-16
ginning not later than 30 days after re-17
ceipt of the plan from such State with re-18
spect to such designation, if such plan in-19
cludes each of the elements listed in sub-20
paragraph (B); 21
‘‘(ii) submit to the State and the au-22
thorizing committees, and make publicly 23
available the Secretary’s response to the 24
State with respect to such plan, including 25
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whether the plan includes each of the ele-1
ments listed in subparagraph (B); and 2
‘‘(iii) if a State’s designation of an en-3
tity as an accrediting agency or association 4
is approved pursuant to this subparagraph, 5
publish in the Federal Register with a 30- 6
day public comment period— 7
‘‘(I) the plan submitted by such 8
State with respect to such designa-9
tion; and 10
‘‘(II) the Secretary’s response to 11
such plan. 12
‘‘(B) R
EQUIRED PLAN ELEMENTS .—The 13
required elements of a State plan submitted 14
under subparagraph (A) with respect to the 15
designation of an entity as an accrediting agen-16
cy or association are as follows: 17
‘‘(i) A description of the process the 18
State used to select the entity for such des-19
ignation. 20
‘‘(ii) A justification of the State’s de-21
cision to select the entity for such designa-22
tion. 23
‘‘(iii) A description of any require-24
ments (in addition to the requirements of 25
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this section), that the State required the 1
entity to comply with as a condition of re-2
ceiving and maintaining such designation. 3
‘‘(iv) A copy of the standards, policies, 4
and procedures of the entity that the State 5
considered in selecting the entity for such 6
designation. 7
‘‘(v) The State’s assessment of how 8
the standards for accreditation of the enti-9
ty will be effective in meeting the require-10
ments of subsection (a)(5). 11
‘‘(vi) Evidence that at least one other 12
State has determined that such entity is a 13
reliable authority as to the quality of edu-14
cation offered for the purposes of this Act. 15
‘‘(vii) An assurance that the State will 16
comply with the monitoring requirements 17
described in subparagraph (C). 18
‘‘(C) S
TATE MONITORING.— 19
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—A State that has 20
designated an entity as an accrediting 21
agency or association for the purposes de-22
scribed in subsection (a)(2)(D) shall sub-23
mit to the Secretary, and to the State au-24
thorizing entity, as appropriate, a report at 25
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the end of the 5-year period for which the 1
entity has received such designation, which 2
shall include, with respect to each postsec-3
ondary education program or institution 4
that has been accredited by such entity 5
during such period, and disaggregated by 6
type of credential, certification, or de-7
gree— 8
‘‘(I) the number and percentage 9
of students who have successfully ob-10
tained a postsecondary education cre-11
dential, certification, or degree offered 12
by such program or institution; and 13
‘‘(II) the number and percentage 14
of students who were enrolled and did 15
not successfully obtain such a creden-16
tial, certification, or degree within 150 17
percent of the program length. 18
‘‘(ii) C
OUNTING TRANSFER STU -19
DENTS.—For purposes of clause (i)(I), a 20
student shall be counted as obtaining a 21
credential, certification, or degree offered 22
by a program or institution that was ac-23
credited by the entity during the period for 24
which the report under this subparagraph 25
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is being submitted, if the student obtains 1
such credential, certification, or degree 2
after transferring to another institution 3
during such period. 4
‘‘(2) A
UTHORITY TO PROVIDE AN ACCELER -5
ATED PATH TO RECOGNITION .—With respect to a 6
prospective accrediting agency or association that 7
submits to the Secretary an application for initial 8
recognition under this Act, the Secretary may pro-9
vide such recognition to such agency or association 10
within 2 years after receipt of such application, if 11
such application— 12
‘‘(A) demonstrates that the agency or asso-13
ciation— 14
‘‘(i) has at least one year of experi-15
ence in making accreditation or 16
preaccreditation decisions; and 17
‘‘(ii) has policies in place that meet all 18
the criteria under subsection (a) for rec-19
ognition covering the range of the specific 20
degrees, certificates, institutions, or pro-21
gram of study for which the agency or as-22
sociation seeks such recognition; and 23
‘‘(B) provides an assurance that if the 24
agency or association receives such recognition, 25
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the agency or association will submit to the 1
Secretary monitoring reports regarding accredi-2
tation or preaccreditation decisions, as appro-3
priate. 4
‘‘(3) D
EVELOPMENT OF COMMON TERMI -5
NOLOGY.—Not later than 18 months after the date 6
of enactment of the College Cost Reduction Act, the 7
Secretary shall— 8
‘‘(A) convene a panel of experts to develop 9
common terminology for accrediting agencies or 10
associations to use in making accrediting deci-11
sions with respect to program of study or insti-12
tutions, such as a common understanding of 13
monitoring, warning, show cause, and other rel-14
evant statuses, as appropriate; and 15
‘‘(B) publish the recommendations for such 16
common terminology in the Federal Register 17
with a 60-day public comment period.’’. 18
(c) O
PERATINGPROCEDURESREQUIRED.— 19
(1) O
N-SITE INSPECTIONS AND REVIEWS .— 20
Paragraph (1) of section 496(c) (20 U.S.C. 21
1099b(c)) is amended— 22
(A) by inserting ‘‘(which may vary based 23
on institutional risk consistent with policies pro-24
mulgated by the agency or association to deter-25
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•HR 6951 IH
mine such risk and interval frequency as au-1
thorized under subsection (p))’’ after ‘‘inter-2
vals’’; and 3
(B) by striking ‘‘, including those regard-4
ing distance education’’. 5
(2) M
ECHANISM TO IDENTIFY INSTITUTIONS 6
AND PROGRAMS EXPERIENCING DIFFICULTIES .— 7
Section 496(c) (20 U.S.C. 1099b(c)) is further 8
amended— 9
(A) by redesignating paragraphs (2) 10
through (9) as paragraphs (3) through (10), re-11
spectively; and 12
(B) by inserting after paragraph (1) the 13
following: 14
‘‘(2) develops a policy process to identify any 15
institution or program of study accredited by the 16
agency or association that is not meeting the stand-17
ards for accreditation of the agency or association, 18
with a focus on the standards assessing an institu-19
tion’s or program of study’s student achievement 20
outcomes described in subsection (a)(5)(A), and 21
other indicators, which shall include— 22
‘‘(A) not less than annually, evaluating the 23
extent to which such an identified institution or 24
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program of study continues to be in compliance 1
with such standards or other indicators; and 2
‘‘(B) as appropriate, requiring the institu-3
tion or program of study to submit a plan, on 4
an annual basis, to the accrediting agency or 5
association to— 6
‘‘(i) address and remedy performance 7
issues with respect to such compliance; and 8
‘‘(ii) ensure that such plan is success-9
fully implemented.’’. 10
(3) P
ROCEDURES WITH RESPECT TO SUB -11
STANTIVE CHANGES .—Paragraph (5) of section 12
496(c) (20 U.S.C. 1099b(c)) (as redesignated by 13
paragraph (2)(A)) is amended to read as follows: 14
‘‘(5) establishes and applies or maintains poli-15
cies, which ensure that any substantive change to 16
the educational mission, program of study, or pro-17
gram of study of an institution after the agency or 18
association has granted the institution accreditation 19
or preaccreditation status does not adversely affect 20
the capacity of the institution to continue to meet 21
the agency’s or association’s standards for such ac-22
creditation or preaccreditation status, which shall in-23
clude policies that— 24
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‘‘(A) require the institution to obtain the 1
agency’s or association’s approval of the sub-2
stantive change before the agency or association 3
includes the change in the scope of the institu-4
tion’s accreditation or preaccreditation status; 5
and 6
‘‘(B) define substantive change to include, 7
at a minimum— 8
‘‘(i) any change in the established 9
mission or objectives of the institution; 10
‘‘(ii) any change in the legal status, 11
form of control, or ownership of the insti-12
tution, including the acquisition or addition 13
of any other institution or new location 14
where more than 50 percent of a program 15
is offered; 16
‘‘(iii) the addition of program of study 17
at a higher credential level from the cre-18
dential level previously accredited by the 19
agency or association; or 20
‘‘(iv) the entering into a contract 21
under which an institution or organization 22
not certified to participate in programs 23
under this title offers more than 25 per-24
cent but less than 50 percent of the in-25
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•HR 6951 IH
struction of an educational program of the 1
institution with such accreditation or 2
preaccreditation status;’’. 3
(4) P
UBLIC AVAILABILITY.—Section 496(c) (20 4
U.S.C. 1099b(c)) is further amended— 5
(A) in paragraph (8) (as redesignated by 6
paragraph (2)(A))— 7
(i) in the matter preceding subpara-8
graph (A), by inserting ‘‘, on the agency’s 9
or association’s website,’’ after ‘‘public’’; 10
and 11
(ii) in subparagraph (C), by inserting 12
before the semicolon at the end the fol-13
lowing: ‘‘, and a summary of why such ac-14
tion was taken or such placement was 15
made’’; 16
(B) in paragraph (9) (as so redesignated), 17
by striking ‘‘and’’ at the end; 18
(C) in paragraph (10)(B) (as so redesig-19
nated), by inserting before the period at the end 20
the following: ‘‘, including an assurance that 21
the institution does not deny a transfer of cred-22
it based solely on the accreditation of the insti-23
tution at which the credit was earned’’; and 24
(D) by adding at the end the following: 25
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‘‘(11) such agency or association shall make 1
publicly available, on the agency or association’s 2
website, a list of the institutions of higher education 3
or program of study accredited by such agency or 4
association, which includes, with respect to each 5
such institution or program of study— 6
‘‘(A) the year accreditation was granted; 7
‘‘(B) the most recent date of an award of 8
accreditation or reaccreditation; and 9
‘‘(C) the anticipated date of the institu-10
tion’s next evaluation for reaccreditation.’’. 11
(5) P
ROHIBITION ON LITMUS TESTS .—Section 12
496(c) (20 U.S.C. 1099b(c)) is further amended by 13
adding at the end the following: 14
‘‘(12) confirms that the standards for accredita-15
tion of the agency or association do not— 16
‘‘(A) except as provided in subparagraph 17
(B)— 18
‘‘(i) require, encourage, or coerce any 19
institution to— 20
‘‘(I) support, oppose, or commit 21
to supporting or opposing— 22
‘‘(aa) a specific partisan, po-23
litical, or ideological viewpoint or 24
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•HR 6951 IH
belief or set of such viewpoints or 1
beliefs; or 2
‘‘(bb) a specific viewpoint or 3
belief or set of viewpoints or be-4
liefs on social, cultural, or polit-5
ical issues; or 6
‘‘(II) support or commit to sup-7
porting the disparate treatment of any 8
individual or group of individuals on 9
the basis of any protected class under 10
Federal civil rights law, except as re-11
quired by Federal law or a court 12
order; or 13
‘‘(ii) assess an institution’s or pro-14
gram of study’s commitment to any ide-15
ology, belief, or viewpoint; 16
‘‘(B) prohibit an institution— 17
‘‘(i) from having a religious mission or 18
from requiring an applicant, student, em-19
ployee, or independent contractor (such as 20
an adjunct professor) of such an institu-21
tion to— 22
‘‘(I) provide or adhere to a state-23
ment of faith; or 24
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‘‘(II) adhere to a code of conduct 1
consistent with the stated religious 2
mission of such institution or the reli-3
gious tenets of such organization; or 4
‘‘(ii) from requiring an applicant, stu-5
dent, employee, or contractor to take an 6
oath to uphold the Constitution of the 7
United States; or 8
‘‘(C) require, encourage, or coerce an insti-9
tution of higher education to violate any right 10
protected by the Constitution;’’. 11
(6) P
ROHIBITION ON ASSESSMENT OF ELECTED 12
OR APPOINTED OFFICIALS .—Section 496(c) (20 13
U.S.C. 1099b(c)) is further amended by adding at 14
the end the following: 15
‘‘(13) confirms that the standards for accredita-16
tion of the agency or association do not assess the 17
roles (including actions or statements) of elected and 18
appointed State and Federal officials and legislative 19
bodies;’’. 20
(7) P
ROHIBITION OF PRACTICES THAT DRIVE 21
CREDENTIAL INFLATION .—Section 496(c) (20 22
U.S.C. 1099b(c)) is further amended by adding at 23
the end the following: 24
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‘‘(14) confirms that the standards for accredita-1
tion of the agency or association do not require an 2
institution to develop a program of study leading to 3
a degree, certificate, or recognized postsecondary 4
credential that is not in response to the needs of an 5
industry or occupation.’’. 6
(d) L
ENGTH OFRECOGNITION.—Subsection (d) of 7
section 496 (20 U.S.C. 1099b) is amended— 8
(1) by striking ‘‘No accrediting’’ and inserting 9
the following: 10
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—Except as otherwise pro-11
vided in paragraph (2), no accrediting’’; and 12
(2) by adding at the end the following new 13
paragraph: 14
‘‘(2) L
ONGER RECOGNITION AUTHORIZED FOR 15
CERTAIN AGENCIES AND ASSOCIATIONS .—Notwith-16
standing paragraph (1), an accrediting agency or as-17
sociation that has been recognized by the Secretary 18
for the purpose of this Act for a period of 5 years, 19
may be recognized for an additional period of up to 20
3 years, if the Secretary determines, based on the 21
performance of the accrediting agency or association 22
during its recognition period under this Act, that the 23
accrediting agency or association— 24
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‘‘(A) has the capability to evaluate the 1
quality of institutions or program of study; and 2
‘‘(B) has maintained compliance with the 3
criteria for accrediting agencies or associations 4
required by this section.’’. 5
(e) L
IMITATION ONSCOPE OFCRITERIA.—Section 6
496 (20 U.S.C. 1099b) is further amended by amending 7
subsection (g) to read as follows: 8
‘‘(g) L
IMITATION ONSCOPE OFCRITERIA.— 9
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—The Secretary shall not es-10
tablish criteria for accrediting agencies or associa-11
tions that are not required by this section. 12
‘‘(2) I
NSTITUTIONAL ELIGIBILITY.—An institu-13
tion of higher education shall be eligible for partici-14
pation in programs under this title if the institution 15
is in compliance with the standards of its accrediting 16
agency or association that assess the institution in 17
accordance with subsection (a)(5), regardless of any 18
additional standards adopted by the agency or asso-19
ciation for purposes unrelated to participation in 20
programs under this title.’’. 21
(f) C
HANGE OFACCREDITINGAGENCY.—Section 496 22
(20 U.S.C. 1099b) is further amended by amending sub-23
section (h) to read as follows: 24
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‘‘(h) CHANGE OFACCREDITINGAGENCY ORASSOCIA-1
TION.— 2
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—The Secretary shall recog-3
nize the accreditation of any otherwise eligible insti-4
tution or program of study if the institution (or pro-5
gram) is in the process of changing its accrediting 6
agency or association, unless the institution (or pro-7
gram) is subject to one or more covered actions. 8
‘‘(2) C
OVERED ACTION DEFINED .—For pur-9
poses of this subsection, the term ‘covered action’ 10
means one or more of the following, when used with 11
respect to an institution or program of study: 12
‘‘(A) A pending or final action brought by 13
a State agency to suspend, revoke, withdraw, or 14
terminate the institution’s legal authority to 15
provide postsecondary education in the State. 16
‘‘(B) A decision by a recognized accred-17
iting agency or association to deny accreditation 18
or preaccreditation to the institution or pro-19
gram of study. 20
‘‘(C) A pending or final action brought by 21
a recognized accrediting agency or association 22
to suspend, revoke, withdraw, or terminate the 23
institution’s or program of study’s accreditation 24
or preaccreditation. 25
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‘‘(D) Probation or an equivalent status im-1
posed on the institution or program of study by 2
a recognized accrediting agency or association. 3
‘‘(3) I
NSTITUTIONS OF HIGHER EDUCATION 4
NOT SUBJECT TO COVERED ACTIONS .—An institu-5
tion (or program of study) that is not subject to a 6
covered action described in paragraph (1) and that 7
desires to change its accrediting agency or associa-8
tion for a reason not related to any such covered ac-9
tion (such as compliance with State law) may make 10
such a change without the approval of the Secretary, 11
as long as the institution (or program) and the new 12
accrediting agency or association of the institution 13
(or program), not later than 30 days after the ac-14
creditation decision by such agency or association, 15
notify the Secretary, in writing, of the effective date 16
of the institution’s (or program’s) accreditation by 17
such agency or association.’’. 18
(g) D
UALACCREDITATIONRULE.—Section 496 (20 19
U.S.C. 1099b) is further amended by amending subsection 20
(i) to read as follows: 21
‘‘(i) D
UALACCREDITATIONRULE.— 22
‘‘(1) R
ECOGNITION BY SECRETARY .—The Sec-23
retary shall recognize the accreditation of any other-24
wise eligible institution of higher education if the in-25
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stitution of higher education is accredited, as an in-1
stitution, by more than one accrediting agency or as-2
sociation. 3
‘‘(2) D
ESIGNATION BY INSTITUTION .—If the in-4
stitution is accredited, as an institution, by more 5
than one accrediting agency or association, the insti-6
tution— 7
‘‘(A) shall designate which agency’s or as-8
sociation’s accreditation shall be utilized in de-9
termining the institution’s eligibility for partici-10
pation in programs under this Act; and 11
‘‘(B) may change this designation at the 12
end of the institution’s period of recognition.’’. 13
(h) R
ELIGIOUSINSTITUTIONSRULE.—Section 496 14
(20 U.S.C. 1099b) is further amended by amending sub-15
section (k) to read as follows: 16
‘‘(k) R
ELIGIOUSINSTITUTIONRULE.— 17
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—Notwithstanding subsection 18
(j), the Secretary shall allow an institution that has 19
had its accreditation withdrawn, revoked, or other-20
wise terminated, or has voluntarily withdrawn from 21
an accreditation agency, to remain certified as an in-22
stitution of higher education under section 102 and 23
subpart 3 of this part for a period sufficient to allow 24
such institution to obtain alternative accreditation, if 25
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the Secretary determines that the withdrawal, rev-1
ocation, or termination— 2
‘‘(A) is related to the religious mission or 3
affiliation of the institution; and 4
‘‘(B) is not related to the accreditation cri-5
teria provided for in this section. 6
‘‘(2) A
DMINISTRATIVE COMPLAINT FOR FAIL -7
URE TO RESPECT RELIGIOUS MISSION .— 8
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.— 9
‘‘(i) I
NSTITUTION.—If an institution 10
of higher education believes that an ad-11
verse action of an accrediting agency or as-12
sociation fails to respect the institution’s 13
religious mission in violation of subsection 14
(a)(4)(B), the institution— 15
‘‘(I) may file a complaint with 16
the Secretary to review the adverse 17
action of the agency or association; 18
and 19
‘‘(II) prior to filing such com-20
plaint, shall notify the Secretary and 21
the agency or association of an intent 22
to file such complaint not later than 23
30 days after— 24
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‘‘(aa) receiving the adverse 1
action from the agency or asso-2
ciation; or 3
‘‘(bb) determining that dis-4
cussions with or the processes of 5
the agency or association to rem-6
edy the failure to respect the reli-7
gious mission of the institution 8
will fail to result in the with-9
drawal of the adverse action by 10
the agency or association. 11
‘‘(ii) A
CCREDITING AGENCY OR ASSO -12
CIATION.—Upon notification of an intent 13
to file a complaint and through the dura-14
tion of the complaint process under this 15
paragraph, the Secretary and the accred-16
iting agency or association shall treat the 17
accreditation status of the institution of 18
higher education as if the adverse action 19
for which the institution is filing the com-20
plaint had not been taken. 21
‘‘(B) C
OMPLAINT.—Not later than 45 days 22
after providing notice of the intent to file a 23
complaint, the institution shall file the com-24
plaint with the Secretary (and provide a copy to 25
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the accrediting agency or association), which 1
shall include— 2
‘‘(i) a description of the adverse ac-3
tion; 4
‘‘(ii) how the adverse action fails to 5
respect the institution’s religious mission 6
in violation of subsection (a)(4)(B); and 7
‘‘(iii) any other information the insti-8
tution determines relevant to the com-9
plaint. 10
‘‘(C) R
ESPONSE.— 11
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—The accrediting 12
agency or association shall have 30 days 13
from the date the complaint is filed with 14
the Secretary to file with the Secretary 15
(and provide a copy to the institution) a 16
response to the complaint, which response 17
shall include— 18
‘‘(I) how the adverse action is 19
based on a violation of the agency or 20
association’s standards for accredita-21
tion; and 22
‘‘(II) how the adverse action does 23
not fail to respect the religious mis-24
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sion of the institution and is in com-1
pliance with subsection (a)(4)(B). 2
‘‘(ii) B
URDEN OF PROOF.— 3
‘‘(I) I
N GENERAL.—The accred-4
iting agency or association shall bear 5
the burden of proving that the agency 6
or association has not taken the ad-7
verse action as a result of the institu-8
tion’s religious mission, and that the 9
action does not fail to respect the in-10
stitution’s religious mission in viola-11
tion of subsection (a)(4)(B), by show-12
ing that the adverse action does not 13
impact the aspect of the religious mis-14
sion claimed to be affected in the 15
complaint. 16
‘‘(II) I
NSUFFICIENT PROOF .— 17
Any evidence that the adverse action 18
results from the application of a neu-19
tral and generally applicable rule shall 20
be insufficient to prove that the action 21
does not fail to respect an institu-22
tion’s religious mission. 23
‘‘(D) A
DDITIONAL INSTITUTION RE -24
SPONSE.—The institution shall have 30 days 25
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from the date on which the agency or associa-1
tion’s response is filed with the Secretary to— 2
‘‘(i) file with the Secretary (and pro-3
vide a copy to the agency or association) a 4
response to any issues raised in the re-5
sponse of the agency or association; or 6
‘‘(ii) inform the Secretary and the 7
agency or association that the institution 8
elects to waive the right to respond to the 9
response of the agency or association. 10
‘‘(E) S
ECRETARIAL ACTION.— 11
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—Not later than 30 12
days of receipt of the institution’s response 13
under subparagraph (D) or notification 14
that the institution elects not to file a re-15
sponse under such subparagraph— 16
‘‘(I) the Secretary shall review 17
the materials to determine if the ac-18
crediting agency or association has 19
met its burden of proof under sub-20
paragraph (C)(ii)(I); or 21
‘‘(II) in a case in which the Sec-22
retary fails to conduct such review— 23
‘‘(aa) the Secretary shall be 24
deemed as determining that the 25
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adverse action fails to respect the 1
religious mission of the institu-2
tion; and 3
‘‘(bb) the accrediting agency 4
or association shall be required to 5
reverse the action immediately 6
and take no further action with 7
respect to such adverse action. 8
‘‘(ii) R
EVIEW OF COMPLAINT .—In re-9
viewing the complaint under clause (i)(I)— 10
‘‘(I) the Secretary shall consider 11
the institution to be correct in the as-12
sertion that the adverse action fails to 13
respect the institution’s religious mis-14
sion and shall apply the burden of 15
proof described in subparagraph 16
(C)(ii)(I) with respect to the accred-17
iting agency or association; and 18
‘‘(II) if the Secretary determines 19
that the accrediting agency or associa-20
tion fails to meet such burden of 21
proof— 22
‘‘(aa) the Secretary shall no-23
tify the institution and the agen-24
cy or association that the agency 25
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or association is not in compli-1
ance with subsection (a)(4)(B), 2
and that such agency or associa-3
tion shall carry out the require-4
ments of item (bb) to be in com-5
pliance with subsection (a)(4)(B); 6
and 7
‘‘(bb) the agency or associa-8
tion shall reverse the adverse ac-9
tion immediately and take no fur-10
ther action with respect to such 11
adverse action. 12
‘‘(iii) F
INAL DEPARTMENTAL AC -13
TION.—The Secretary’s determination 14
under this subparagraph shall be the final 15
action of the Department on the complaint. 16
‘‘(F) R
ULE OF CONSTRUCTION .—Nothing 17
in this paragraph shall prohibit— 18
‘‘(i) an accrediting agency or associa-19
tion from taking an adverse action against 20
an institution of higher education for a 21
failure to comply with the agency or asso-22
ciation’s standards of accreditation as long 23
as such standards are in compliance with 24
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•HR 6951 IH
subsection (a)(4)(B) and any other appli-1
cable requirements of this section; or 2
‘‘(ii) an institution of higher education 3
from exercising any other rights to address 4
concerns with respect to an accrediting 5
agency or association or the accreditation 6
process of an accrediting agency or asso-7
ciation. 8
‘‘(G) G
UIDANCE.— 9
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—The Secretary 10
may only issue guidance under this para-11
graph that explains or clarifies the process 12
for providing notice of an intent to file a 13
complaint or for filing a complaint under 14
this paragraph. 15
‘‘(ii) C
LARIFICATION.—The Secretary 16
may not issue guidance, or otherwise deter-17
mine or suggest, when discussions to rem-18
edy the failure by an accrediting agency or 19
association to respect the religious mission 20
of an institution of higher education re-21
ferred to in subparagraph (A)(i)(II)(bb) 22
have failed or will fail. 23
‘‘(3) R
ELIGIOUS MISSION DEFINED .—In this 24
Act, the term ‘religious mission’— 25
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‘‘(A) means a published institutional mis-1
sion that is approved by the governing body of 2
an institution of higher education and that in-3
cludes, refers to, or is predicated upon religious 4
tenets, beliefs, or teachings; and 5
‘‘(B) may be reflected in any of the institu-6
tion’s policies, decisions, or practices related to 7
such tenets, beliefs, or teachings (including any 8
policies or decisions concerning housing, em-9
ployment, curriculum, self-governance, or stu-10
dent admission, continuing enrollment, or grad-11
uation).’’. 12
(i) I
NDEPENDENT EVALUATION.—Section 496(n)(3) 13
(20 U.S.C. 1099b(n)(3)) is amended by striking the last 14
sentence. 15
(j) R
EGULATIONS.—Section 496(o) (20 U.S.C. 16
1099b(o)) is amended by inserting before the period at 17
the end the following: ‘‘, or with respect to the policies 18
and procedures of an accreditation agency or association 19
described in paragraph (2) or (5) of subsection (c) or how 20
the agency or association carries out such policies and pro-21
cedures’’. 22
(k) R
ISK-BASEDREVIEWPROCESSES OR PROCE-23
DURES; WAIVER.—Section 496 (20 U.S.C. 1099b) is fur-24
ther amended— 25
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(1) by striking subsections (p) and (q); and 1
(2) by adding at the end the following: 2
‘‘(p) R
ISK-BASED OR DIFFERENTIATED REVIEW 3
P
ROCESSES ORPROCEDURES.— 4
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—Notwithstanding any other 5
provision of law (including subsection (a)(4)(A)), an 6
accrediting agency or association shall establish risk- 7
based processes or procedures for assessing compli-8
ance with the accrediting agency or association’s 9
standards (including policies related to substantive 10
change and award of accreditation statuses) under 11
which the agency or association— 12
‘‘(A) creates a system for designating each 13
institution of higher education and program of 14
study that the agency or association evaluates, 15
such as through using peer benchmarking to 16
understand an institution’s or program of 17
study’s performance in comparison with its 18
peers (which may include past performance 19
with respect to meeting the accrediting agency 20
or association’s standards, including the stand-21
ards relating to the student achievement out-22
comes described in subclauses (I) through (IV) 23
of subsection (a)(5)(A)); 24
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‘‘(B) requires for each institution and pro-1
gram of study designated as high-risk, in ac-2
cordance with the accrediting agency or associa-3
tion’s system in subparagraph (A), to submit 4
the annual plans described in subsection 5
(c)(2)(B) to the agency or association that ad-6
dress the performance issues of such institution 7
or program of study that resulted in such des-8
ignation; 9
‘‘(C) with respect to institutions or pro-10
gram of study meeting or exceeding perform-11
ance as described in subparagraph (A), reduces 12
any compliance requirements with the stand-13
ards of accreditation of the agency that are not 14
assessing an institution or program of study 15
under subsection (a)(5), such as on-site inspec-16
tions; and 17
‘‘(D) may require an institution or pro-18
gram of study that has declining performance 19
(such as an institution or program of study 20
with a high-risk designation under subpara-21
graph (B)), which has not improved as required 22
by the annual plan submitted under subsection 23
(c)(2)(B), to take actions to avoid or minimize 24
the risks that may lead to revocation of accredi-25
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tation (such as limiting certain program of 1
study enrollment or recommending to the Sec-2
retary to limit funds under this title for such an 3
institution or program). 4
‘‘(2) P
ROHIBITION.—Any risk-based review 5
process or procedure established pursuant to this 6
subsection shall not discriminate against, or other-7
wise preclude, institutions of higher education based 8
on institutional sector or category, including an in-9
stitution of higher education’s tax status.’’. 10
(l) T
OTALPRICEDEFINED.—Section 496 (20 U.S.C. 11
1099b) is further amended by adding at the end the fol-12
lowing: 13
‘‘(q) T
OTALPRICEDEFINED.—For purposes of this 14
section, the term ‘total price’ has the meaning given such 15
term in section 454(d)(3).’’. 16
SEC. 312. NATIONAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON INSTITU-17
TIONAL QUALITY AND INTEGRITY (NACIQI). 18
Section 114 (20 U.S.C. 1011c) is amended— 19
(1) in subsection (b)— 20
(A) in paragraph (2), by redesignating 21
subparagraphs (A) through (C) as clauses (i) 22
through (iii), respectively, and adjusting the 23
margins accordingly; 24
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(B) by striking ‘‘Individuals’’ and inserting 1
the following: 2
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—Individuals’’; 3
(C) in clause (ii), as so redesignated, by 4
striking ‘‘and training’’ and inserting ‘‘skills de-5
velopment’’; 6
(D) by adding at the end the following: 7
‘‘(B) D
ISQUALIFICATION.—No individual 8
may be appointed as a member of the Com-9
mittee if such individual has a significant con-10
flict of interest, such as being a current regu-11
lator (such as a State authorizer) that would 12
require the individual to frequently be recused 13
from serving as a member of the Committee.’’; 14
and 15
(E) in paragraph (3), by striking ‘‘Except 16
as provided in paragraph (5), the term’’ and in-17
serting ‘‘The term’’; 18
(2) in subsection (c)— 19
(A) in paragraph (4), by adding ‘‘and’’ at 20
the end; 21
(B) in paragraph (5), by striking ‘‘; and’’ 22
at the end and inserting a period; and 23
(C) by striking paragraph (6); 24
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(3) in subsection (d)(2), by inserting at the end 1
the following: ‘‘The name of any member of the 2
Committee who has been recused with respect to an 3
agenda item of the meeting shall be included in such 4
agenda.’’; 5
(4) in subsection (e)(2)(D), by striking ‘‘, in-6
cluding any additional functions established by the 7
Secretary through regulation’’; and 8
(5) in subsection (f), by striking ‘‘September 9
30, 2021’’ and inserting ‘‘September 30, 2028’’. 10
SEC. 313. ALTERNATIVE QUALITY ASSURANCE EXPERI-11
MENTAL SITE INITIATIVE. 12
Section 487A of the Higher Education Act of 1965 13
(20 U.S.C. 1094a) is amended— 14
(1) by redesignating subsection (c) as sub-15
section (d); and 16
(2) by inserting after subsection (b) the end the 17
following: 18
‘‘(c) A
LTERNATIVEQUALITYASSURANCEEXPERI-19
MENTALSITEINITIATIVE.— 20
‘‘(1) E
XPERIMENTAL SITE AUTHORIZED .—The 21
Secretary shall select, in accordance with paragraph 22
(4), eligible entities that voluntarily seek to partici-23
pate in an Alternative Quality Assurance experi-24
mental site initiative for a duration of 5 years and 25
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receive the waivers or other flexibility described in 1
paragraph (5) to evaluate whether the eligible enti-2
ties, during such 5-year period, can maintain high 3
student achievement outcomes while participating in 4
programs under this title without being accredited 5
by an accrediting agency or association recognized 6
under section 496. 7
‘‘(2) E
LIGIBLE ENTITY DEFINED .—For pur-8
poses of this subsection, an eligibility entity means— 9
‘‘(A) an institution of higher education (as 10
defined in section 102); or 11
‘‘(B) an educational provider that— 12
‘‘(i) is not an institution of higher 13
education; 14
‘‘(ii) does not receive funding under 15
this Act; 16
‘‘(iii) is not accredited by an accred-17
iting agency or association for the pur-18
poses of this title; and 19
‘‘(iv) is authorized to operate in the 20
State in which the provider is located. 21
‘‘(3) A
PPLICATION.— 22
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—Each eligible entity 23
desiring to participate in the experimental site 24
initiative under this subsection shall submit an 25
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application to the Secretary, at such time and 1
in such manner as the Secretary may require, 2
which shall contain the information described in 3
subparagraph (B). The Secretary may not re-4
quire any information in such an application 5
that is not described in subparagraph (B). 6
‘‘(B) C
ONTENTS.—Each application under 7
paragraph (1) shall include— 8
‘‘(i) a description of which program of 9
study offered at the eligible entity will be 10
included in the experimental site initiative, 11
including— 12
‘‘(I) in the case of an eligible en-13
tity that is an institution of higher 14
education, an attestation that such 15
program meets the standards of ac-16
creditation of the institution’s accred-17
iting agency or association described 18
in clauses (i) through (iv) of section 19
496(a)(5)(A) (including the standard 20
requiring that the median value-added 21
earnings of students who complete the 22
program are greater than the median 23
total price charged to students for the 24
program); and 25
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‘‘(II) in the case of an eligible en-1
tity defined in paragraph (2)(B), doc-2
umentation and verified administra-3
tive data that the program meets 4
standards similar to the standards of 5
accreditation referenced in subclause 6
(I); 7
‘‘(ii) a justification of the reason why 8
the eligible entity seeks to receive the waiv-9
er described in paragraph (5)(A), including 10
estimates or documentation of the poten-11
tial savings to the entity of receiving such 12
waiver; and 13
‘‘(iii) a description of how the eligible 14
entity plans to share the financial risk with 15
the Secretary of receiving the waivers de-16
scribed in paragraph (5), such as by— 17
‘‘(I) providing matching non-Fed-18
eral funds to the Secretary to cover 19
the cost of at least half of the ex-20
pected disbursements under this title 21
to the students that enroll in such 22
program for the first year of the ex-23
periment; 24
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‘‘(II) providing a letter of credit 1
to the Secretary to cover the cost de-2
scribed in subclause (I); or 3
‘‘(III) requesting to be placed on 4
a reimbursement system of payment. 5
‘‘(4) S
ELECTION.—No later than 6 months 6
after the experimental site initiative is announced, 7
the Secretary shall select eligible entities to partici-8
pate in the initiative based on the applications sub-9
mitted under paragraph (3). In making such selec-10
tions, the Secretary— 11
‘‘(A) shall consider— 12
‘‘(i) the number and quality of appli-13
cations; 14
‘‘(ii) each applicant’s ability to effec-15
tively share the financial risk as required 16
under paragraph (3)(B)(iii); and 17
‘‘(iii) in the case of an applicant that 18
is an institution of higher education, the 19
applicant’s history of compliance with the 20
requirements of this Act; 21
‘‘(B) shall ensure that the selected eligible 22
entities represent a variety of eligible entities 23
with respect to size, mission, and geographic 24
distribution; 25
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‘‘(C) shall ensure that the number of eligi-1
ble entities selected that are institutions of 2
higher education described in paragraph (2)(B) 3
is equal to the number of eligible entities se-4
lected that are educational providers described 5
in paragraph (2)(B); and 6
‘‘(D) may not select any eligible entity 7
whose approval to operate in a State is at risk. 8
‘‘(5) W
AIVERS.—The Secretary is authorized to 9
waive, for any eligible entity participating in the ex-10
perimental site initiative under this subsection— 11
‘‘(A) any requirements conditioning an eli-12
gible entity’s eligibility to participate in pro-13
grams under this title to being accredited by an 14
accrediting agency or association recognized 15
under section 496; and 16
‘‘(B) any other requirements of this title 17
determined necessary by the Secretary to carry 18
out such initiative (including requirements re-19
lated to the award process and disbursement of 20
student financial aid, or other management pro-21
cedures or processes), except that the Secretary 22
shall not waive any provisions with respect to 23
award rules (other than an award rule related 24
to an experiment in modular or compressed 25
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schedules), grant and loan maximum award 1
amounts, and need analysis requirements, un-2
less the waiver of such provisions is authorized 3
by another provision under this title. 4
‘‘(6) R
EVIEW AND EVALUATION .— 5
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—The Secretary shall 6
review and evaluate the experimental site initia-7
tive conducted under this subsection, including 8
by evaluating, with respect to each participating 9
program of each participating eligible entity, 10
whether— 11
‘‘(i) the median value-added earnings 12
of students who complete the program of 13
study are greater than the median total 14
price charged to students for such pro-15
gram; and 16
‘‘(ii) the program of study is meeting 17
other student achievement outcomes (such 18
as outcomes based on standards of accredi-19
tation described in section 496(a)(5)(A)), 20
as appropriate for the program. 21
‘‘(B) R
ECOMMENDATIONS .—If, based on 22
such evaluation, the Secretary determines that 23
participating eligible entities were able to meet 24
the requirement of subparagraph (A)(i) and the 25
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other student achievement outcomes evaluated 1
by the Secretary under subparagraph (A)(ii), 2
the Secretary shall submit to the authorizing 3
committees recommendations regarding amend-4
ments to this Act that will streamline and en-5
hance the quality assurance process of institu-6
tions of higher education, and educational pro-7
viders described in paragraph (2)(B).’’. 8
PART B—STUDENT SUCCESS 9
SEC. 321. POSTSECONDARY STUDENT SUCCESS GRANTS. 10
Part B of title VII of the Higher Education Act of 11
1965 (20 U.S.C. 1138 et seq.) is amended— 12
(1) in section 741— 13
(A) by striking subsections (b), (c), (e), 14
and (f); 15
(B) by redesignating subsection (d) as sub-16
section (c); and 17
(C) by inserting after subsection (a) the 18
following: 19
‘‘(b) G
RANTS.— 20
‘‘(1) D
EFINITIONS.—In this subsection: 21
‘‘(A) C
OMPLETION RATE.—The term ‘com-22
pletion rate’ means— 23
‘‘(i) the percentage of students from 24
an initial cohort enrolled at an institution 25
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of higher education that is a 2-year institu-1
tion who have graduated from the institu-2
tion or transferred to a 4-year institution 3
of higher education; or 4
‘‘(ii) the percentage of students from 5
an initial cohort enrolled at an institution 6
of higher education in the State that is a 7
4-year institution who have graduated 8
from the institution. 9
‘‘(B) E
LIGIBLE ENTITY.—The term ‘eligi-10
ble entity’ means— 11
‘‘(i) an institution of higher education; 12
‘‘(ii) a partnership between a non-13
profit educational organization and an in-14
stitution of higher education; and 15
‘‘(iii) a consortium of institutions of 16
higher education. 17
‘‘(C) E
LIGIBLE INDIAN ENTITY .—The 18
term ‘eligible Indian entity’ means the entity re-19
sponsible for the governance, operation, or con-20
trol of a Tribal College or University. 21
‘‘(D) E
VIDENCE-BASED.—The term ‘evi-22
dence-based’ has the meaning given the term in 23
section 8101(21)(A) of the Elementary and 24
Secondary Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 25
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7801(21)(A)), except that such term shall also 1
apply to institutions of higher education. 2
‘‘(E) E
VIDENCE TIERS.— 3
‘‘(i) E
VIDENCE TIER 1 REFORM OR 4
PRACTICE.—The term ‘evidence tier 1 re-5
form or practice’ means a reform or prac-6
tice that prior research suggests has prom-7
ise for the purpose of successfully improv-8
ing student achievement or attainment for 9
high-need students. 10
‘‘(ii) E
VIDENCE TIER 2 REFORM OR 11
PRACTICE.—The term ‘evidence tier 2 re-12
form or practice’ means a reform or prac-13
tice described in clause (i), or other prac-14
tice meeting similar criteria, that measures 15
impact and cost effectiveness of student 16
success activities, and, through rigorous 17
evaluation (including through the use of 18
existing administrative data, as applicable), 19
has been found to be successfully imple-20
mented. 21
‘‘(iii) E
VIDENCE TIER 3 REFORM OR 22
PRACTICE.—The term ‘evidence tier 3 re-23
form or practice’ means a reform or prac-24
tice described in clause (ii), or other prac-25
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tice meeting similar criteria, that has been 1
found to produce sizable, important im-2
pacts on student success and— 3
‘‘(I) determines whether such im-4
pacts can be successfully reproduced 5
and sustained over time; and 6
‘‘(II) identifies the conditions in 7
which such reform or practice is most 8
effective. 9
‘‘(F) F
IRST GENERATION COLLEGE STU -10
DENT.—The term ‘first generation college stu-11
dent’ has the meaning given the term in section 12
402A(h) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 13
(20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(h)). 14
‘‘(G) H
IGH-NEED STUDENT .—The term 15
‘high-need student’ means— 16
‘‘(i) a student from low-income back-17
ground; 18
‘‘(ii) first generation college students; 19
‘‘(iii) caregiver students; 20
‘‘(iv) students with disabilities; 21
‘‘(v) students who stopped out before 22
completing; 23
‘‘(vi) reentering justice-impacted stu-24
dents; and 25
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‘‘(vii) military-connected students. 1
‘‘(H) S
ECRETARY.—The term ‘Secretary’ 2
means the Secretary of Education. 3
‘‘(I) T
RIBAL COLLEGE OR UNIVERSITY .— 4
The term ‘Tribal College or University’ has the 5
meaning given the term in section 316(b) of the 6
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 7
1059c(b)). 8
‘‘(2) R
ESERVATION OF FUNDS FOR ELIGIBLE 9
INDIAN ENTITIES.—From the total amount appro-10
priated to carry out this subsection for a fiscal year, 11
the Secretary shall reserve 2 percent for grants to 12
eligible Indian entities to increase participation and 13
completion rates of high-need students. 14
‘‘(3) A
UTHORIZATION OF POSTSECONDARY STU -15
DENT SUCCESS COMPETITIVE GRANTS .— 16
‘‘(A) G
RANT AUTHORIZATION .—For each 17
of fiscal years 2025 through 2030, the Sec-18
retary shall award, on a competitive basis, 19
grants to eligible entities to provide student 20
services to increase participation, retention, and 21
completion rates of high-need students. 22
‘‘(B) A
PPLICATION.—An eligible entity de-23
siring a grant under this section shall submit 24
an application to the Secretary at such time, in 25
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such manner, and containing the information 1
required under subparagraph (C). 2
‘‘(C) C
ONTENTS.—An application sub-3
mitted under this paragraph shall include the 4
following: 5
‘‘(i) A plan to increase, with respect 6
to all students enrolled at the institution of 7
higher education, attainment and comple-8
tion rates or graduation rates, including— 9
‘‘(I) a description of which evi-10
dence tiers would be met by the evi-11
dence-based reforms or practices; and 12
‘‘(II) a particular focus on serv-13
ing high-need students through stu-14
dent services and collaboration among 15
2-year programs, 4-year programs, 16
and workforce systems. 17
‘‘(ii) Annual benchmarks for student 18
outcomes with respect to evidence-based 19
reforms or practices. 20
‘‘(iii) A plan to evaluate the evidence- 21
based reforms or practices carried out pur-22
suant to a grant received under this sub-23
section. 24
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‘‘(iv) Rates of enrolled students who 1
received a Federal Pell Grant under sec-2
tion 401. 3
‘‘(v) Demographics of enrolled stu-4
dents, including high-need students. 5
‘‘(vi) A description of how the eligible 6
entity will, directly or in collaboration with 7
institutions of higher education or non-8
profit organizations, use the grant funds to 9
implement 1 or more of the following evi-10
dence-based reforms or practices: 11
‘‘(I) Providing comprehensive 12
academic, career, and student serv-13
ices, which may include mentoring, 14
advising, or case management serv-15
ices. 16
‘‘(II) Providing accelerated learn-17
ing opportunities, which may include 18
dual or concurrent enrollment pro-19
grams and early college high school 20
programs. 21
‘‘(III) Reforming course sched-22
uling or credit-awarding policies. 23
‘‘(IV) Improving transfer path-24
ways between the institution of higher 25
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education, or eligible Indian entity, 1
and other institutions of higher edu-2
cation. 3
‘‘(vii) A description of how the evi-4
dence-based reforms or practices carried 5
out pursuant to a grant under this sub-6
section will be sustained once the grant ex-7
pires. 8
‘‘(D) E
VIDENCE-BASED STUDENT SUCCESS 9
PROGRAMS.—From the total amount appro-10
priated to carry out this subsection for a fiscal 11
year and not reserved under paragraph (4), the 12
Secretary shall reserve not less than 20 percent 13
to award grants to eligible entities with applica-14
tions that propose to include reforms or prac-15
tices— 16
‘‘(i) at least 1 of which is a tier 3 re-17
form or practice; and 18
‘‘(ii) the rest of which are tier 1 or 19
tier 2 reforms or practices. 20
‘‘(E) R
EQUIRED USE OF FUNDS .—An eligi-21
ble entity that receives a grant under this sec-22
tion shall use the grant funds to carry out the 23
plans submitted pursuant to subparagraph (C) 24
and for evidence-based reforms or practices for 25
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improving retention and completion rates of 1
students that may include the following: 2
‘‘(i) Student services to support reten-3
tion, completion, and success, which may 4
include— 5
‘‘(I) faculty and peer counseling; 6
‘‘(II) use of real-time data on 7
student progress; 8
‘‘(III) improving transfer student 9
success; and 10
‘‘(IV) incentives for students to 11
re-enroll or stay on track. 12
‘‘(ii) Direct student support services, 13
including a combination of— 14
‘‘(I) tutoring, academic supports, 15
and enrichment services; and 16
‘‘(II) emergency financial assist-17
ance. 18
‘‘(iii) Efforts to prepare students for a 19
career, which may include— 20
‘‘(I) career coaching, career coun-21
seling and planning services, and ef-22
forts to lower student to advisor ra-23
tios; 24
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‘‘(II) networking and work-based 1
learning opportunities to support the 2
development of skills and professional 3
relationships; 4
‘‘(III) utilizing career pathways; 5
and 6
‘‘(IV) boosting experiences nec-7
essary to obtain and succeed in high- 8
wage, high-skilled, (as described in 9
section 122 of the Carl D. Perkins 10
Career and Technical Education Act 11
of 2006 (20 U.S.C. 2342)) or in-de-12
mand sectors or occupations (as de-13
fined in section 3(23) of the Work-14
force Innovation and Opportunity Act 15
(29 U.S.C. 3102(23)). 16
‘‘(iv) Efforts to recruit and retain fac-17
ulty and other instructional staff. 18
‘‘(F) P
ERMISSIVE USE OF FUNDS .—From 19
the total amount appropriated to carry out this 20
subsection for a fiscal year, and not reserved 21
under paragraph (4) or subparagraph (D), the 22
Secretary may set aside— 23
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‘‘(i) not more than 5 percent for ad-1
ministration, capacity building, research, 2
evaluation, and reporting; and 3
‘‘(ii) not more than 2 percent for 4
technical assistance to eligible entities. 5
‘‘(G) E
VALUATIONS.— 6
‘‘(i) I
N GENERAL.—For the purpose 7
of improving the effectiveness of the evi-8
dence-based reforms or practices carried 9
out by eligible entities pursuant to a grant 10
under this subsection, the Secretary shall 11
make grants to or enter into contracts with 12
one or more organizations to— 13
‘‘(I) evaluate the effectiveness of 14
such reforms or practices; and 15
‘‘(II) disseminate information on 16
the impact of such reforms or prac-17
tices in increasing completion and re-18
tention activities of students, as well 19
as other appropriate measures. 20
‘‘(ii) I
SSUES TO BE EVALUATED .— 21
The evaluations required under clause (i) 22
shall measure the effectiveness of the evi-23
dence-based reforms or practices carried 24
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out by eligible entities pursuant to a grant 1
under this subsection in— 2
‘‘(I) whether such eligible entity 3
implemented the plans, and carried 4
out the activities, described in sub-5
paragraph (C); and 6
‘‘(II) comparing the completion 7
and retention rates of students who 8
participated in such reforms or prac-9
tices with the rates of students of 10
similar backgrounds who did not par-11
ticipate in such reforms or practices. 12
‘‘(iii) R
ESULTS.—Not later than 18 13
months after the date of the enactment of 14
this subsection, the Secretary shall submit 15
to the authorizing committees a final re-16
port. 17
‘‘(H) G
RANT LIMIT.—An institution with 18
branch campuses that is an eligible entity may 19
only receive a grant under this subsection for 1 20
campus of such institution at a time. 21
‘‘(4) A
UTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS .— 22
There are authorized to be appropriated to carry out 23
this subsection, $45,000,000, for each of fiscal years 24
2026 through 2031.’’; and 25
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(2) by striking sections 742 through 745. 1
SEC. 322. REVERSE TRANSFER EFFICIENCY ACT. 2
Section 444(b)(1) of the General Education Provi-3
sions Act (20 U.S.C. 1232g(b)(1)) is amended— 4
(1) in subparagraph (K)(ii), by striking ‘‘; and’’ 5
and inserting a semicolon; 6
(2) in subparagraph (L), by striking the period 7
at the end and inserting ‘‘; and’’; and 8
(3) by inserting after subparagraph (L) the fol-9
lowing: 10
‘‘(M) an institution of postsecondary edu-11
cation in which a student was previously en-12
rolled, to which records of postsecondary 13
coursework and credits are sent for the purpose 14
of applying such coursework and credits toward 15
completion of a recognized postsecondary cre-16
dential (as that term is defined in section 3 of 17
the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act 18
(29 U.S.C. 3102)), upon condition that the stu-19
dent provides written consent prior to receiving 20
such credential.’’. 21
SEC. 323. TRANSPARENT AND FAIR TRANSFER OF CREDIT 22
POLICIES. 23
Section 485(h) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 24
(20 U.S.C. 1092(h)) is amended— 25
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(1) in paragraph (1)(A), by inserting ‘‘, includ-1
ing with respect to the acceptance or denial of such 2
credit’’ after ‘‘higher education’’; 3
(2) by redesignating paragraph (2) as para-4
graph (3); and 5
(3) by inserting after paragraph (1) the fol-6
lowing: 7
‘‘(2) D
ENIAL OF CREDIT TRANSFER .—An insti-8
tution may not establish a transfer of credit policy 9
which denies credit earned at another institution 10
based solely on the source of accreditation of such 11
other institution, provided that such other institu-12
tion is accredited by an agency or association that 13
is recognized by the Secretary pursuant to section 14
496.’’. 15
Æ 
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