White House Requires Immediate Public Access to All U.S.-funded Research Papers by 2025
A decadeslong battle over how best to provide public access to the fruits of research funded by the U.S. government has taken a major turn. President Joe Biden’s administration announced yesterday that, by the end of 2025, federal agencies must make papers that describe taxpayer-funded work freely available to the public as soon as the final peer-reviewed manuscript is published. Data underlying those publications must also be made freely available “without delay.” Many details of the new policy, including exactly how the government will fund immediate public access, remain to be decided. But it significantly reshapes and expands existing—and fiercely contested—U.S. access rules that have been in place since 2013. Most notably, the White House has substantially weakened, but not formally eliminated, the ability of journals to keep final versions of federally funded papers behind a subscription paywall for up to 1 year. ( Science Magazine - Aug. 26, 2022)
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Report Urges Expanding Data on NASA-funded Researchers
The National Academies released a report last week to help NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD) assess the “health and vitality” of research communities it supports and inform future decadal surveys’ assessments of the “state” of those communities. It identifies six key attributes that should be tracked: clear scientific goals, a diverse workforce, engagement with broader society, sufficient funding, the ability to adapt to new challenges, and shared standards of conduct. It specifically recommends NASA collect data on “demographic aspects beyond race and gender,” such as the type of higher education institutions its researchers attended, to better understand “cultural and opportunity differences” that they faced. To facilitate assessments of the funding available within a field, the report recommends creating a “dashboard of annual priorities and budget allocations” to enable “at-a-glance” assessments of program progress. ( American Institute of Physics - Aug. 29, 2022)
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New Bill Targets Endowments
The latest bill targeting wealthy colleges and universities would require those with endowments over $1 billion—around 136 public and private colleges nationwide—to cover a certain percentage of all students’ cost of attendance. The Changing Our Learning, Loans, Endowments, and Graduation Expectations (COLLEGE) Act was introduced in the Senate at the beginning of August by Republican senator Rick Scott from Florida. A spokesperson for Scott said that the bill would require wealthy colleges to “have some skin in the game” by using their endowments to help cover the cost of attendance for all students. Many higher education experts called the bill bad policy. They say it fails to recognize that colleges must follow strict rules when spending endowment funding. Higher education experts also say the bill is not an efficient way to ensure college affordability to those who need it most, since the bill would require colleges to cover the same amount of aid for both low-income and higher-income students. ( Inside Higher Ed - Aug. 30, 2022)
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How Biden Finally Got to ‘Yes’ on Canceling Student Debt
For months after he had entered office, President Joe Biden had punted on his campaign promise of forgiving up to $10,000 in student loans. And as the debate over what to do lingered, aides began to take steps to try and manage internal deliberations. On Wednesday, Biden finally signed off on his highly anticipated student loan assistance package. The process by which the president came to this policy was contentious and often confusing, filled with high stakes negotiations, pleas from outside stakeholders, internal disagreements, and last-ditch lobbying efforts from key Democratic lawmakers. And in many ways, it grew to echo the governing style that has defined Biden’s tenure in elected office: deliberativeness that can frustrate those around him, a policy platform that seeks consensus, but a late-lean toward progressivism that ends up surprising his liberal critics. ( Politico - Aug. 25, 2022)
***See also, the following related news items:
- Student-loan Relief Poised for Big Impact on Historically Black Colleges - The Wall Street Journal - Aug. 27, 2022
- Five Lingering Questions on Biden’s Student Loan Forgiveness Plan - The Hill - Aug. 25, 2022
- Biden’s Student Loan Forgiveness Could Test Legal Powers - The Wall Street Journal - Aug. 25, 2022
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Plan to Ease GI Bill Reporting Rules for Colleges Signed into Law
President Joe Biden on Friday signed into law a measure to ease reporting requirements for GI Bill benefits at schools, an effort supporters say will help schools focus their resources less on bureaucratic paperwork and more on helping student veterans. The Ensuring the Best Schools for Veterans Act easily advanced through Congress with bipartisan support earlier this summer. Now that it has become law, the provisions will go into effect for schools immediately, providing some relief for the fall semester. At issue are changes made to the GI Bill benefit in 2021. Veterans Affairs officials at that time updated a series of definitions and accounting methods surrounding the 85-15 rule, which requires that institutions of higher education receive at least 15% of their income from non-government sources. The new law is designed to simplify the rules, ensuring that schools—especially institutions with limited staff and few veteran enrollees—can verify eligibility without overwhelming administrative effort. Schools can be exempted from detailed breakdowns completely if less than 35% of their students are not receiving GI Bill benefits. ( MilitaryTimes - Aug. 29, 2022)
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White House, CDC Meet with College Presidents on Monkeypox
College leaders met with the White House and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Thursday to discuss how colleges can help stop the spread of monkeypox and COVID-19 as students return to campus. The virtual meeting was hosted by the American College Health Association and the American Council on Education and included more than 1,000 stakeholders in higher education, including college presidents, campus health officials and student affairs leadership. White House monkeypox response deputy coordinator Dr. Demetre Daskalakis was also present at the meeting. At the meeting, college leaders asked questions on how to identify and respond to monkeypox cases on campus and protocol for testing, vaccination and treatment. The CDC also created a new webpage with recommendations for college health centers and administrators on best practices to prevent monkeypox outbreaks. ( Inside Higher Ed - Aug. 26, 2022)
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U.S. to Clear Another $1.5B in Debt for Westwood College Students
The Education Department said Tuesday it will grant full, automatic cancellation of $1.5 billion in education debt held by former students of the defunct for-profit chain Westwood College. The move covers 79,000 people who were enrolled at Westwood from Jan. 1, 2002, to Nov. 17, 2015, when it ceased enrolling new borrowers in advance of its 2016 closure. Former students are not required to submit an application and will receive a letter from the Education Department informing them of the pending discharge. The Biden administration has been working through scores of petitions from former students of for-profit schools requesting the department cancel their debt under a statute known as “borrower defense to repayment.” ( The Washington Post - Aug. 30, 2022)
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Immigrant Advocates Pan Scope of Eligibility for New ‘Dreamers’ Rule
Immigrant advocates criticized the Biden administration’s new rule to fortify the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which aims to preserve the embattled program amid legal challenges but does not expand eligibility to younger immigrants. During a press call Thursday, advocates from immigrant groups condemned the administration’s decision to leave in place eligibility requirements laid out in the original 2012 Homeland Security Department memo creating the program. But the rule requires DACA applicants to have arrived in the U.S. before June 2007 to qualify, which bars young immigrants who arrived in the past 15 years. Applicants also must have been younger than 16 when they entered. According to a report published in May by the advocacy group FWD.us, most of the 100,000 undocumented high school students who graduated this year are ineligible. ( Roll Call - Aug. 26, 2022)
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