II 117TH CONGRESS 1ST SESSION S. 883 To modify the Federal TRIO programs. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES MARCH 22, 2021 Ms. COLLINS (for herself, Mr. TESTER, Mrs. CAPITO, and Ms. BALDWIN) in- troduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Com- mittee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions A BILL To modify the Federal TRIO programs. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 1 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Educational Oppor- 4 tunity and Success Act of 2021’’. 5 SEC. 2. PROGRAM AUTHORITY AND AUTHORIZATION OF AP- 6 PROPRIATIONS FOR FEDERAL TRIO PRO- 7 GRAMS. 8 (a) MINIMUM GRANTS.—Section 402A(b)(3) of the 9 Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a– 10 11(b)(3)) is amended— 11 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 2 •S 883 IS (1) by striking ‘‘$200,000’’ and inserting 1 ‘‘$220,000’’; and 2 (2) by striking ‘‘$170,000’’ and inserting 3 ‘‘$190,000’’. 4 (b) PROCEDURES FOR AWARDING GRANTS AND CON- 5 TRACTS.—Section 402A(c) of the Higher Education Act 6 of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(c)) is amended— 7 (1) in paragraph (2)(A)— 8 (A) in the subparagraph heading, by strik- 9 ing ‘‘PRIOR EXPERIENCE’’ and inserting 10 ‘‘PRIOR SUCCESS’’; 11 (B) in the first sentence, by striking ‘‘prior 12 experience of high quality service delivery’’ and 13 inserting ‘‘prior success in achieving high qual- 14 ity service delivery’’; and 15 (C) in the second sentence— 16 (i) by striking ‘‘prior experience shall 17 not’’ and inserting ‘‘prior success in 18 achieving high quality service delivery shall 19 not’’; and 20 (ii) by striking ‘‘shall not be given 21 prior experience consideration’’ and insert- 22 ing ‘‘shall not be given such consider- 23 ation’’; and 24 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 3 •S 883 IS (2) by striking paragraph (8) and inserting the 1 following: 2 ‘‘(8) REVIEW AND NOTIFICATION BY THE SEC- 3 RETARY.— 4 ‘‘(A) GUIDANCE.—Not less than 90 days 5 before the commencement of each competition 6 for a grant under this chapter, the Secretary 7 shall issue nonregulatory guidance regarding 8 the rights and responsibilities of applicants with 9 respect to the application and evaluation proc- 10 ess for programs and projects assisted under 11 this chapter, including applicant access to peer 12 review comments. The guidance shall describe 13 the procedures for the submission, processing, 14 and scoring of applications for grants under 15 this chapter, including the information de- 16 scribed in subparagraph (B). 17 ‘‘(B) TECHNICAL COMPONENTS OF APPLI- 18 CATIONS.— 19 ‘‘(i) ESTABLISHMENT AND TREAT- 20 MENT OF NONSUBSTANTIVE TECHNICAL 21 COMPONENTS OF APPLICATIONS.—With re- 22 spect to any competition for a grant under 23 this chapter, the Secretary may only estab- 24 lish voluntary page limit and formatting 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 4 •S 883 IS requirements for grant applications and 1 may not reject grant applications that do 2 not meet those voluntary requirements. 3 The Secretary may suggest page limits and 4 formatting standards, (including with re- 5 spect to font size, font style, font type, line 6 spacing, paragraph justification, and page 7 margins), but may not use noncompliance 8 with these suggested requirements as a 9 basis to reject or penalize grant applica- 10 tions. 11 ‘‘(ii) IDENTIFICATION AND TREAT- 12 MENT OF TECHNICAL BUDGET ERRORS IN 13 APPLICATIONS.— 14 ‘‘(I) IN GENERAL.—With respect 15 to any competition for a grant under 16 this chapter, the Secretary may not 17 reject or penalize grant applications 18 on the basis of a typographical or 19 rounding error in a proposed budget 20 until the Secretary has given the ap- 21 plicant an opportunity for correction 22 in accordance with subclause (II). 23 ‘‘(II) NOTICE AND OPPORTUNITY 24 FOR CORRECTION.—The Secretary 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 5 •S 883 IS shall provide notice and identification 1 of an error described in subclause (I) 2 by email and phone to the applicant 3 before awarding grants for each com- 4 petition. During a period of not fewer 5 than 14 days, the Secretary shall 6 allow the applicant to submit a re- 7 vised application that corrects the 8 identified error. 9 ‘‘(III) TREATMENT OF REVISED 10 APPLICATIONS.—The Secretary shall 11 treat the revised application in the 12 same manner as a timely submitted 13 application. 14 ‘‘(IV) FAILURE TO CORRECT.—If 15 an applicant has received a notice and 16 opportunity for correction of a typo- 17 graphical or rounding error in a pro- 18 posed budget in accordance with sub- 19 clause (II) and the applicant fails to 20 correct the error and submit a revised 21 application before the deadline de- 22 scribed in that subclause, the Sec- 23 retary may reject or penalize that 24 grant application. 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 6 •S 883 IS ‘‘(C) REVIEW.— 1 ‘‘(i) REQUEST FOR REVIEW.—With 2 respect to any competition for a grant 3 under this chapter, an applicant may re- 4 quest a review if the applicant— 5 ‘‘(I) has evidence that a specific 6 technical, administrative, or scoring 7 error was made by the Department, 8 an agent of the Department, or a peer 9 reviewer, with respect to the scoring 10 or processing of a submitted applica- 11 tion; and 12 ‘‘(II) has otherwise met all of the 13 requirements for submission of the 14 application. 15 ‘‘(ii) ERROR MADE BY THE DEPART- 16 MENT.—In the case of evidence of error by 17 the Department or an agent of the Depart- 18 ment, other than a peer reviewer, the Sec- 19 retary shall review any evidence submitted 20 by the applicant and provide a timely re- 21 sponse to the applicant. If the Secretary 22 determines that an error was made by the 23 Department or an agent of the Depart- 24 ment, other than a peer reviewer, the Sec- 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 7 •S 883 IS retary shall correct the error and accord- 1 ingly adjust the applicant score. 2 ‘‘(iii) ERROR MADE BY A PEER RE- 3 VIEWER.— 4 ‘‘(I) IN GENERAL.—In the case 5 of evidence of error by a peer re- 6 viewer, a secondary review panel shall 7 automatically and promptly evaluate 8 the application for consideration in 9 the applicable grant competition upon 10 receipt of a request by any such appli- 11 cant. Examples of errors warranting 12 secondary review may include— 13 ‘‘(aa) points withheld for 14 criteria not required in statute, 15 regulation, or guidance governing 16 a program under this chapter or 17 the application for a grant for 18 such program; or 19 ‘‘(bb) information pertaining 20 to selection criteria that was in- 21 correctly determined to be miss- 22 ing from an application. 23 ‘‘(II) TIMELY REVIEW AND RE- 24 PLACEMENT SCORE.—The secondary 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 8 •S 883 IS review panel described in subclause (I) 1 shall conduct a secondary review in a 2 timely fashion, and the score resulting 3 from the secondary review shall re- 4 place the score from the initial peer 5 review. 6 ‘‘(III) COMPOSITION OF SEC- 7 ONDARY REVIEW PANEL.—The sec- 8 ondary review panel shall be composed 9 of reviewers each of whom— 10 ‘‘(aa) did not review the ap- 11 plication in the original peer re- 12 view; 13 ‘‘(bb) is a member of the co- 14 hort of peer reviewers for the 15 grant program that is the subject 16 of such secondary review; and 17 ‘‘(cc) to the extent prac- 18 ticable, has conducted peer re- 19 views in not less than 2 previous 20 competitions for the grant pro- 21 gram that is the subject of such 22 secondary review. 23 ‘‘(IV) FINAL SCORE.—The final 24 peer review score of an application 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 9 •S 883 IS subject to a secondary review under 1 this clause shall promptly be adjusted 2 appropriately using the score awarded 3 by the secondary review panel, so as 4 not to interfere with the timely award- 5 ing of grants for the applicable grant 6 competition. 7 ‘‘(iv) FINALITY.— 8 ‘‘(I) IN GENERAL.—A determina- 9 tion by the Secretary under clause (ii) 10 shall not be reviewable by any officer 11 or employee of the Department other 12 than the Secretary. 13 ‘‘(II) SCORING.—The score 14 awarded by a secondary review panel 15 under clause (iii) shall not be review- 16 able by any officer or employee of the 17 Department other than the Secretary. 18 ‘‘(v) FUNDING OF APPLICATIONS 19 WITH CERTAIN ADJUSTED SCORES.—Appli- 20 cations with scores that are adjusted up- 21 ward under clause (ii) or (iii) that equal or 22 exceed the minimum cut-off score for the 23 applicable grant competition shall be fund- 24 ed by the Secretary using general or ad- 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00009 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 10 •S 883 IS ministrative funds available to the Sec- 1 retary other than those funds appropriated 2 or allocated for the programs authorized 3 by this chapter.’’. 4 (c) OUTREACH.—Section 402A(d)(3) of the Higher 5 Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(d)(3)) is 6 amended by adding at the end the following: ‘‘The Sec- 7 retary shall also host at least one virtual, interactive train- 8 ing using telecommunications technology to ensure that 9 interested applicants have access to technical assistance.’’. 10 (d) DOCUMENTATION OF STATUS AS A LOW-INCOME 11 INDIVIDUAL.—Section 402A(e) of the Higher Education 12 Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(e)) is amended— 13 (1) in paragraph (1)— 14 (A) in subparagraph (C), by striking ‘‘or’’ 15 after the semicolon; 16 (B) in subparagraph (D), by striking the 17 period at the end and inserting a semicolon; 18 and 19 (C) by adding at the end the following: 20 ‘‘(E) documentation that the student has 21 been determined to be eligible for a Federal Pell 22 Grant under section 401; or 23 ‘‘(F) for grants authorized under section 24 402B and 402F of this chapter, documentation 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00010 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 11 •S 883 IS that a student is attending a school that had a 1 percentage of enrolled students who are identi- 2 fied students (as defined in section 3 11(a)(1)(F)(i) of the Richard B. Russell Na- 4 tional School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 5 1759a(a)(1)(F)(i))) that meets or exceeds the 6 threshold described in section 11(a)(1)(F)(viii) 7 of that Act during the school year prior to the 8 first year of the period for which such grant is 9 awarded.’’; and 10 (2) in paragraph (2)— 11 (A) in subparagraph (C), by striking ‘‘or’’ 12 after the semicolon; 13 (B) in subparagraph (D), by striking the 14 period at the end and inserting a semicolon; 15 and 16 (C) by adding at the end the following: 17 ‘‘(E) documentation that the student has 18 been determined to be eligible for a Federal Pell 19 Grant under section 401; or 20 ‘‘(F) for grants authorized under section 21 402B and 402F of this chapter, documentation 22 that a student is attending a school that had a 23 percentage of enrolled students who are identi- 24 fied students (as defined in section 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00011 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 12 •S 883 IS 11(a)(1)(F)(i) of the Richard B. Russell Na- 1 tional School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 2 1759a(a)(1)(F)(i))) that meets or exceeds the 3 threshold described in section 11(a)(1)(F)(viii) 4 of that Act during the school year prior to the 5 first year of the period for which such grant is 6 awarded.’’. 7 (e) OUTCOME CRITERIA.—Section 402A(f) of the 8 Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(g)) 9 is amended— 10 (1) in paragraph (1)— 11 (A) in the paragraph heading, by striking 12 ‘‘PRIOR EXPERIENCE’’ and inserting ‘‘PRIOR 13 SUCCESS’’; 14 (B) by striking ‘‘January 1, 2009’’ and in- 15 serting ‘‘the date of enactment of the Edu- 16 cational Opportunity and Success Act of 2021’’; 17 and 18 (C) by striking ‘‘prior experience of’’ and 19 inserting ‘‘prior success in achieving’’; and 20 (2) in paragraph (3)— 21 (A) in subparagraph (A)— 22 (i) in clause (iv), by striking ‘‘that will 23 make such students eligible for programs 24 such as the Academic Competitiveness 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 13 •S 883 IS Grants Program’’ and inserting ‘‘that in- 1 cludes at least 4 years of mathematics, 3 2 years of science, and 2 years of a foreign 3 language’’; 4 (ii) by redesignating clauses (v) and 5 (vi) as clauses (vi) and (vii), respectively; 6 and 7 (iii) inserting after clause (iv), the fol- 8 lowing: 9 ‘‘(v) the completion of financial aid 10 applications, including the Free Applica- 11 tion for Federal Student Aid described in 12 section 483(a) and college admissions ap- 13 plications’’; 14 (B) in subparagraph (B)— 15 (i) in the matter preceding clause (i), 16 by inserting ‘‘except in the case of pro- 17 grams that are specifically designed for 18 veterans,’’ after ‘‘402C’’; 19 (ii) in clause (v), by striking ‘‘that will 20 make such students eligible for programs 21 such as the Academic Competitiveness 22 Grants Program’’ and inserting ‘‘that in- 23 cludes at least 4 years of mathematics, 3 24 VerDate Sep 11 2014 04:52 Apr 19, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S883.IS S883 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 14 •S 883 IS years of science, and 2 years of a foreign 1 language’’; 2 (iii) by redesignating clauses (vi) and 3 (vii) as clauses (vii) and (viii), respectively; 4 and 5 (iv) inserting after clause (v), the fol- 6 lowing: 7 ‘‘(vi) the completion of financial aid 8 applications, including the Free Applica- 9 tion for Federal Student Aid described in 10 section 483(a) and colle [Text truncated for display. 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