Education

Tough negotiation ahead as US free-college plan advances

From Times Higher Education: “The Senate voted 50 to 49 – in a full party-line vote of the chamber’s Democrats outnumbering its Republicans – to move ahead on a $3.5 trillion (£2.5 trillion) budget outline for 2022 that includes $285 billion for higher education. The major elements include Joe Biden’s campaign promise to make public two-year colleges essentially tuition-fee free; increased funding for the Pell Grant, the main federal student subsidy; and new assistance for minority-serving institutions. … The free-college idea also faces the prospect of dedicated pushback from private colleges, as the version set out by Mr. Biden and many other leading Democrats benefits only public institutions.”

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