This letter to the editor by Assistant Secretary Sally Stroup appeared in The New York Times on November 2, 2003.
Regarding "Punishing the Pell Grant Program" (editorial, Oct. 29):
The grant program continues to grow, not shrink, both in financing and in the number of recipients. That's because the Bush administration has invested more money than ever before in helping the economically disadvantaged attend college—$11 billion this year and a proposed $12.7 billion in 2004.
All told, a record 5.1 million students are expected to receive Pell grants in 2004, an increase of 283,000 from the year before.
Every student who is eligible under the Higher Education Act will receive a grant for the 2004-5 award year.
For the record, the Higher Education Act, when reauthorized in 1992 under a Democratic Congress, required the department to update the tables of state and other tax allowances used in calculating awards. The department updated these tables in May 2003, using the most up-to-date Internal Revenue Service data available.
Sally Stroup
Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education
U.S. Department of Education
####
 |
||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||
| |
||||||||||||
