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To:
Student Activists
From: Ellynne Bannon, State PIRGs Higher Education Advocate
Date: November 19, 2001
***Call
your Senators and Representatives today to protect the $4,000
Pell Grant maximum award***
Call
your representatives today and urge them to protect the new
$4,000 Pell Grant maximum, as promised in both the House and
Senate FY 2002 appropriations bills. Last week Congressional
members received hundreds of calls and letters from students
and citizens urging them to fully fund the $4,000 Pell Grant
maximum award. If you haven't called in to ask your representatives
to support the $4,000 maximum award please call today! It's
imperative that your representatives hear from you on this
issue.
This
month the Bush administration sent a letter to Senate leadership
showing that thousands more Pell-eligible students than expected
are attending college this year. This is good news- because
it means that an increasing number of poor students see a
college education as possible, and thousands of Americans
who have lost their jobs in the economic downturn are choosing
to improve their career options by going back to school.
However,
it also means that the Pell Grant program is facing a $1.7
billion shortfall. To solve this problem, the administration
has proposed reducing next year's planned increase in the
Pell Grant maximum from $4,000 to its current level of $3,750.
Reducing the maximum Pell Grant award is the wrong approach.
While Congress has worked to restore the value of the Pell
grant, the current economic climate may put us even further
behind. Decreasing the maximum award threatens to halt the
significant progress we have made in recent years to restore
the buying power of the Pell Grant program.
Action:
Call your Representatives and Senators and tell him/her that
students in his/her district are counting on them to fully
fund $4,000 Pell Grant maximum award.
Call
your Senators and Members of Congress by using the student
aid hotline: 1 (800) 574-4AID.
To
send a personalized emails to your representatives go to:
http://www.pirg.org/highered.
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