For the first time since 2003, Congress voted Wednesday to increase the maximum award for one of the most essential pieces of federal aid funding.
Contained within a $464 billion budget, the measure will allow eligible students to draw down a maximum of $4,310 a year for Pell Grants for the 2007 to 2008 year. That’s a $260 increase from the previous amount.
That’s a good move, according to Julie Mallette, director of the Office of Scholarships and Financial Aid.
“Of all the programs the federal government supports, Pell is the best,” she said.
In an interview last week, Mallette said “the pressure in Congress was building” to take action to reverse the declining value of the Pell Grant program.
Although the Pell Grant maximum had remained constant for the last three years, the increasing cost of tuition and fees due to campus initiated and system increases has driven down its effectiveness in covering the cost of education at N.C. State.
For this school year in fact, the maximum award covered less than 80 percent of the cost of tuition and fees. That doesn’t include the cost of books and supplies, rent, transportation and other personal expenses, which Mallette’s office estimates will cost about $11,189 for the 2007 to 2008 school year.
Based on next year’s tuition and fee figures, however, Wednesday’s vote will bring the maximum Pell award’s value back up to about 86 percent.
That’s not quite where it needs to be, according to Edward Kealy, executive director of the Committee for Education Funding, but he said the increase does represent a changing perspective in the new Democrat-controlled Congress.
“The outlook is good, particularly in higher education,” Kealy said in an interview last week. “Congress has already indicated that they were going to emphasize education.”
He said despite the fact that Congress has already indicated they would emphasize education, he said his organization is still concerned with the direction higher education funding will take.
“We expect to repeat that concern with members of Congress,” Kealy said.
And with the 2007 budget all wrapped up, the committee will get its chance.
With the joint resolution passed in the Senate 81 to 15, Congress will now be able to focus on the 2008 budget. The current proposal from the president’s office calls for an additional increase in the Pell, coupled with cuts to other supplemental programs.
