By Michelle Anstett

Four provisions that may have a lasting impact on the Galesburg area were added to the Higher Education Act by Rep. Phil Hare, D-Rock Island.

The bill, which reauthorized the Higher Education Act, adds portions to assist students living in rural areas in gaining access to a high-quality education.

“When we do these bills, we can’t always think that every school district is the same,” Hare said of Congress. “We’ve got about 55 million people that live in rural communities in this country (and) about 10 million kids in rural schools. We don’t give them the tools that they need” to assure success in the future.

Three of the four provisions are aimed directly at students in rural high schools.
The first, which would provide incentives to colleges of education to teach skills new teachers need to work in rural schools and to encourage their students to complete their student teaching in rural schools. “We want to recruit teachers to go out into the rural communities and go out and teach,” the Congressman explained. The provision “helps attract them maybe into teaching in a rural school.”

His second provision expands Teacher Quality Partnership Grants to prepare students, current teachers, former military personnel and other qualified individuals to serve as school administrators in rural areas.

The grants would be provided to colleges and universities so they could attract more rural-focused administration students — likely through scholarships and grants — to study. Many who seek an advanced administrative degree are lured to larger cities, Hare said, by the promise of larger salaries and quicker repayment of college loans.

The College and University Rural Education Act, the third provision, will award grants to rural-serving colleges and universities who partner with local educational agencies, regional employers and other organizations for the purpose of increasing enrollment of rural high school graduates in colleges.

“Fewer rural high school graduates continue on to higher education than in suburban” districts, Hare said. The CURE Act, he added, “gives them a fighting chance” in the admission process.

A final provision, which may directly impact many displaced workers in the Galesburg area, will allow displaced workers, such as those from the Maytag, Butler and Carhartt plants that have closed in half-dozen years, to more accurately note their employment situation on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. The new changes may help those potential college students gain more financial aid, therefore increasing their ability to enroll.

Many displaced workers, Hare explained, need new training in order to be able to return to the workforce, and much of the training must be found in institutions of higher learning. “We’re giving them the opportunity to go back out into the workforce,” he said.
All these provisions are meant to give rural communities “a place at the table in terms of higher education,” the Congressman stated.

“If we don’t do anything, we’re going to continue to see a real hemorrhaging in rural communities. All these are really, really good provisions in the Higher (Education) Act that, if people take advantage of, you’ll see a real boost in higher education.”