Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act) Passes Senate, Pending House Action Note: This LAW Alert includes information as of March 26, 2020. Votes on the CARES Act are expected in the House of Representatives on Friday. After some delays, the Senate voted late last night 96 – 0 to pass the CARES Act. The bipartisan agreement was crafted after negotiations over the past five days. The bill now moves to the House of Representatives, where votes are expected as early as the morning of Friday, March 27th. The House is considering options for voting on the bill without risking exposure to COVID-19
for members, many of whom would have to travel across the country. Below are highlights of the bill, pertaining to higher education: - Establishes an Education Stabilization Fund and appropriates $30.75 billion to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus, domestically or internationally.
- Allocates approximately $14 billion for higher education emergency relief.
- Approximately $12.5 billion would be distributed to all colleges and universities using a formula based
on 75% of their Pell full-time equivalency (FTE) of students and 25% of non-Pell FTE.
- Approximately $1 billion would be set aside for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) & minority serving institutions (MSIs).
- Approximately $349 million would be set aside for the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE).
- Institutions would be able to use these funds to cover any costs associated with campus closures or significant changes to the delivery of instruction due to the coronavirus.
- At least 50% of funds would be required to provide emergency grants to students for expenses directly related to coronavirus and
the disruption of campus operations.
- Provides approximately $3 billion for states to use based on the needs of elementary and secondary schools, as well as institutions of higher education.
- Establish a maintenance of effort (MOE) requirement that states receiving this aid maintain their own educational funding this year and next year at least at the average level of the three preceding years. However, the Secretary of Education can waive this requirement.
Other proposed provisions in the bill include: - Waiving the institutional matching
requirement for campus-based aid programs.
- Allowing institutions to award additional supplemental education opportunity grant (SEOG) funds to students impacted by COVID-19.
- Allowing institutions to issue work-study payments to students who are unable to work due to work-place closures.
- Subsidized usage limits apply (SULA), satisfactory academic progress (SAP), and lifetime Pell eligibility calculations will not count terms impacted by COVID-19 for students.
- Waiving the Return of Title IV (R2T4) funds requirement for institutions and students as it relates to students who dropped out of school as a result of COVID-19.
- Allowing the Secretary of Education to waive many federal requirements under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, and the Higher Education Act.
- A six-month moratorium on federal Direct Loan payments, interest accrual, and collections.
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