From: Dr. Arnold Mitchem
Subject: URGENT ALERT ON FOXX AMENDMENT!!!! -- 7/29/05
PLEASE CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVE TO OPPOSE THE FOXX LANGUAGE IN HR 609
Dear Colleague:
I would like to bring to your attention a Dear Colleague sent out to ALL Members of the US House of Representatives asking for their support of language, introduced by Representative Virginia Foxx (Republican-NC), which would put unrealistic accountability measures in TRIO. While we support accountability in TRIO, this amendment would unfairly judge programs across the country by national standards and harm the TRIO community. It is important that you (and all of your TRIO colleagues, parents, friends, and students) contact your Representative immediately (as early as this afternoon) to express your concern about this language.
Specifically,
* The Foxx language would require a significant increase in the regulatory and reporting burden on colleges and agencies administering TRIO programs.
* The language replaces an accountability system which takes into account state and regional variation for one national system. This national system requires the Secretary to define one set of “expected program outcomes.”
Specifically, in five places, the amendment specifically requires the Secretary to include in these “expected program outcomes” the college going rates of participants served by the program. Since the college-going rates of young people from the South and West are lower than those of other sections of the country, the amendment has the potential to seriously disadvantage colleges and agencies located in Southern and Western states.
* The language attempts to apply accountability measures that have no relevance to the programs to which they are applied. For example, the amendment specifically requires the Secretary to evaluate two programs (Student Support Services and McNair) that can only serve individuals already enrolled in college by the “college-going rate of the participants.”
* The language in HR 609 establishes an all or nothing penalty for not meeting these standards. Furthermore, the monitoring and assessing of the performance of the TRIO programs would be entrusted to a Division within the Department that has been cited on at least two occasions in the last several years by the Inspector General for inaccuracies in data and failures in its monitoring.
* It also includes requirements that would make it impossible to verify the performance outcomes it seeks to impose. For example, it prohibits the reporting of any “personally identifiable information about an individual student” such as their name or Social Security number.
This is not a vote to aid TRIO. It is a vote against ALL TRIO programs and their success.
Sincerely,
Dr. Mitchem
PLEASE CLICK HERE TO REVIEW REP. FOXX'S DEAR COLLEAUGE LETTER