Increasing the Purchasing Power of Pell Grants: Authorizes and appropriates additional funding for the program for FY2008-FY2017 to increase the amount of the maximum Pell grant for which a student is eligible by $200 for each of the award years 2008-2009 and 2009-2010, $300 for award year 2010-2011, and $500 for each subsequent award year. Increases the authorized maximum Pell grant to $7,600 for academic year 2008-2009 and by $1,000 increments each academic year thereafter until it stands at $11,600 for academic year 2012-2013. Increases students' Pell grant eligibility by increasing the income protection allowance.
Making Student Loans More Affordable:Phases-in cuts in the interest rate charged undergraduate student borrowers under the Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) and Direct Loan (DL) programs, thereby reducing such rate from 6.8% in July 2006 to 3.4% in July 2012.
Rewarding Service in Repayment:Provides student loan forgiveness to borrowers under the FFEL or DL programs who serve full-time in areas of national need as: (1) early childhood educators in low-income communities; (2) nurses; (3) critical foreign language specialists who teach in elementary or secondary schools or use such knowledge as federal employees; (4) librarians; (5) highly qualified teachers who teach bilingual education or who teach in schools that enroll a high proportion of disadvantaged students; (6) child welfare workers; (7) speech language pathologists in elementary or secondary schools; (8) National Service participants; (9) school counselors in elementary and secondary schools that enroll a high proportion of disadvantaged students; and (10) public sector employees. Provides up to $1,000 of student loan forgiveness for each year of service, but limits forgiveness to $5,000 in the aggregate.
These are only part of this bill, which will help the people of our country gain the tools to get the jobs so many badly need. With the costs of tuition rising and student loans going through the roof this bill is a big breath of fresh air.
And Hoekstra voted no.
