Norton Says DCTAG Results Have Earned Confidence of President & Business Leaders (3/27/07)

At DCTAG Markup Norton Says Bill’s Results Have
Earned Confidence of the President and Business Leaders
March 27, 2007

Washington, DC— The District’s highly popular and successful D.C. Tuition Assistance Grant Program (DCTAG) moved a step closer to being extended this afternoon when Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) got her bill that created the program passed in the D.C. subcommittee of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee. At a markup in the Federal Workforce, Postal Service and the District of Columbia Subcommittee today, H.R. 1124, the District of Columbia College Access Act was reauthorized for another five years. Although it is scheduled to expire at the end of the fiscal year, Norton is confident that the bill, cosponsored with Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA) and Subcommittee Chairman Danny K. Davis (D-IL), will be passed by the full committee and signed by the President before the program expires because DCTAG has enjoyed strong bipartisan support since it was created in 1999. Moreover, the President indicated his confidence in the program by including $35 million for DCTAG in his FY 08 budget request, $2 million more than current funding.

“The DC Tuition Assistance Grant Program has sharply escalated college attendance for student residents in the District of Columbia, by an astonishing 60 percent over five years,” Norton said. “Its continuation is essential, not only for D.C. families and students, but also for the future of the city and the region’s upscale economy.”

DCTAG acts as a proxy and a substitute for a state university system for the District, which has an indispensable open admissions state university, the University of the District of Columbia (UDC). But unlike every state, the District has no unified system of several colleges and universities. This bill provides wide higher education access to young people in the District by granting up to $10,000 annually, which covers state college tuition at most public colleges, or provides up to $2,500 annually to attend private institutions in the city and region. In 1999, Norton also got Historically Black College and University funding status for UDC, which now receives an annual payment.

Norton said that the College Access Act is already returning dividends for the federal investment. For the 2005-2006 school year, almost 5,000 students received funding from DCTAG to enroll in 646 universities and colleges in 47 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Most of these students are the first in their families to attend college. She cited the impressive college graduation rate. For example, of the 1,091 DCTAG freshmen in 2001-2002, 73 percent returned as sophomores. Of that group, 79 percent returned as juniors, 82 percent as seniors and 77 percent of the seniors graduated. Norton said, “These documented results represent the most important progress the District has made toward developing a workforce that can meet the increasing education requirements for employment at average wages in this region.”

The Congresswoman said that DCTAG has gotten a “vote of confidence” from regional business leaders, who have established the D.C. College Access Program (CAP) that complements DCTAG, providing essential support before and during college. Norton said that Donald Graham, Chairman of The Washington Post, who was instrumental in helping to get DCTAG passed, did not stop there, but has continued to lead in raising millions for CAP. She also praised the D.C. State Education Office for solid administration of the program. Norton urged continued bipartisan congressional support for “this vital, immensely successful federal educational assistance program that has proven itself by many measures.”