Senator Murray convened a number of meetings and roundtables in Washington state during the last two weeks in March to bring together representatives from education, workforce, business, and labor to discuss regional workforce needs, education issues, and multiple pathways to student success. She heard from high school students pursuing a variety of course options, high school and college educators, business leaders, community activists, workforce development councils and labor representatives at both the Sno-Isle Skills Center in Snohomish County and the New Market Skills Center in Tumwater.

Senator Murray also spoke with business leaders from Greater Spokane Inc. and their partners about the region’s business, workforce, and education needs. Last November in Seattle, she held a field hearing of her Senate Subcommittee on Employment where she heard from key stakeholders about similar needs in the Puget Sound region.

Acting on what's she heard across our state, Senator Murray continues to use her leadership roles in the Senate to close the gap between what students learn in the classroom and workforce demands. During this Congressional session alone, she's advocated for more federal funding for critical job training programs, a summer jobs program for teens, and a new focus on connecting students to the world of work.

On February 27th, Senator Murray introduced the Financial Literacy Improvement Act Of 2008 (S. 2671), a bill to strengthen financial literacy education and innovative programs in K-12 education and to support and expand financial literacy courses at colleges across the nation. Half of the $250 million in funds will go to support classes in local colleges that students, working adults, and seniors can access to learn crucial financial basics. Another $125 million will go toward K-12 schools to teach financial literacy, help teachers incorporate financial lessons into other subjects, set new financial literacy standards, and develop innovative afterschool programs.

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On April 3rd, Senator Murray helped introduce the Strengthening Student Aid for All Act (S. 2815) to expand federal aid for college students and help lenders and schools offer affordable aid to students with Senators Kennedy (D-MA), Dodd (D-CT), Levin (D-MI), Reed (D-RI), Sanders (I-VT).

The bill:

• Reduces low-income families’ reliance on loans by increasing the maximum Pell Grant for the lowest-income Pell grant recipients by up to $750 above the maximum award ($4731 for the 2008-09 school year);

• Reduces the need for students to take out expensive private loans by increasing access to guaranteed low interest Federal student loans. To accomplish this, the bill would increase federal loan limits by $1000 annually for dependent undergraduate students, and by $2000 annually for independent undergraduate students and students whose parents can’t obtain federal parent loans because of poor credit;

• Provides better options for parents who borrow for their children’s college education by allowing repayment of federal parent PLUS loans to be deferred while the student is enrolled in college;

• Eases the ability of colleges to find new lenders for large numbers of students by requiring the Secretary of Education to designate guaranty agencies as “lenders of last resort” on a college-wide basis, rather than on a student-by-student basis, and by clarifying the Secretary’s authority to provide these lenders with capital to make the loans;

• Ensures that existing lenders can continue to make new federal student loans by allowing the Department of Education to serve as a “secondary market of last resort” that would buy Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP) loans from lenders that need new capital in order to stay in business and continue their service to students.