House Democrats Have a Plan for Higher Ed. Here’s What’s in It.

The Democratic-controlled House of Representatives announced a plan on Tuesday touted as a “comprehensive overhaul” of America’s higher-education system, a decade after the last reauthorization of the Higher Education Act.

The bill, dubbed the College Affordability Act, focuses on lowering the price of college but is markedly more moderate than the higher-education proposals that have animated supporters of progressive 2020 presidential contenders like Sen. Elizabeth A. Warren and Sen. Bernie Sanders.

The bill is unlikely to gain any traction in the Republican-controlled Senate or from the Trump administration, which released its own proposal to reauthorize the Higher Education Act in March.

According to a news release from the House Committee on Education and Labor, the plan would tackle rising tuition costs by restoring state and federal spending on public colleges and universities in an effort to shift the financial burden away from students and their families. The bill also aims to expand higher-education access to low- and middle-income students by increasing the value of Pell Grants and making them available for short-term academic programs.

As with any authorizing legislation, the bill would set policy, but Congress would have to enact separate appropriations bills to provide the funds.

The bill would also crack down on colleges and universities that produce poor outcomes, particularly for-profit colleges that the committee says “defraud” students, veterans, and taxpayers.

Also in the cross hairs of the committee’s plan is Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’s Title IX policy, which has bolstered the rights of students accused of sexual misconduct and lessened liability for colleges. The committee says it would block the policy’s “survivor blaming” rules and hold colleges more accountable for tracking and preventing sexual assault, sexual harassment, and hazing.

Instead of canceling student-loan debt or making college free, the plan would create “more generous” loan-repayment plans, lower student-loan interest rates, and expand the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.

The plan would also increase and permanently reauthorize funding for minority-serving institutions, including historically black colleges and universities.

“This legislation achieves all of these important goals, while spending a fraction of the cost of the GOP tax cut,” said Rep. Bobby C. Scott of Virginia, chair of the Committee on Education and Labor, in the news release. “The College Affordability Act is a proposal that members across the political spectrum should be able to support. It is a necessary and sensible response to the challenges that students and families are facing every day.”

Lauren Fisher is an editorial intern at The Chronicle. Follow her on Twitter @lauren__fisher, or email her at lfisher@chronicle.com.