Educational Opportunity and Success Act of 2023

II 118TH CONGRESS 1ST SESSION S. 1397 To modify the Federal TRIO programs. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES MAY 2, 2023 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 2023’’. 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 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 2 •S 1397 IS (1) by striking ‘‘$200,000’’ and inserting 1 ‘‘$220,000’’; and 2 (2) by striking ‘‘$170,000’’ and inserting 3 ‘‘$190,000’’. 4 (b) PROCEDURES FOR AWARDING GRANTS AND CON- 5 TRACTS.—Section 402A(c) of the Higher Education Act 6 of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(c)) is amended— 7 (1) in paragraph (2)(A)— 8 (A) in the subparagraph heading, by strik- 9 ing ‘‘PRIOR EXPERIENCE’’ and inserting 10 ‘‘PRIOR SUCCESS’’; 11 (B) in the first sentence, by striking ‘‘prior 12 experience of high quality service delivery’’ and 13 inserting ‘‘prior success in achieving high qual- 14 ity service delivery’’; and 15 (C) in the second sentence— 16 (i) by striking ‘‘prior experience shall 17 not’’ and inserting ‘‘prior success in 18 achieving high quality service delivery shall 19 not’’; and 20 (ii) by striking ‘‘shall not be given 21 prior experience consideration’’ and insert- 22 ing ‘‘shall not be given such consider- 23 ation’’; 24 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 3 •S 1397 IS (2) in paragraph (3)(A) by striking ‘‘prior expe- 1 rience’’ and inserting ‘‘prior success’’; 2 (3) in paragraph (4)(A), in the second sentence, 3 by inserting ‘‘as well as first-generation college grad- 4 uates’’ after ‘‘readers’’; and 5 (4) by striking paragraph (8) and inserting the 6 following: 7 ‘‘(8) REVIEW AND NOTIFICATION BY THE SEC- 8 RETARY.— 9 ‘‘(A) GUIDANCE.—Not less than 90 days 10 before the commencement of each competition 11 for a grant under this chapter, the Secretary 12 shall issue nonregulatory guidance regarding 13 the rights and responsibilities of applicants with 14 respect to the application and evaluation proc- 15 ess for programs and projects assisted under 16 this chapter, including applicant access to peer 17 review comments. The guidance shall describe 18 the procedures for the submission, processing, 19 and scoring of applications for grants under 20 this chapter, including the information de- 21 scribed in subparagraph (B). 22 ‘‘(B) TECHNICAL COMPONENTS OF APPLI- 23 CATIONS.— 24 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 4 •S 1397 IS ‘‘(i) ESTABLISHMENT AND TREAT- 1 MENT OF NONSUBSTANTIVE TECHNICAL 2 COMPONENTS OF APPLICATIONS.—With re- 3 spect to any competition for a grant under 4 this chapter, the Secretary may only estab- 5 lish voluntary page limit and formatting 6 requirements for grant applications and 7 may not reject grant applications that do 8 not meet those voluntary requirements. 9 The Secretary may suggest page limits and 10 formatting standards, (including with re- 11 spect to font size, font style, font type, line 12 spacing, paragraph justification, and page 13 margins), but may not use noncompliance 14 with these suggested requirements as a 15 basis to reject or penalize grant applica- 16 tions. 17 ‘‘(ii) IDENTIFICATION AND TREAT- 18 MENT OF TECHNICAL BUDGET ERRORS IN 19 APPLICATIONS.— 20 ‘‘(I) IN GENERAL.—With respect 21 to any competition for a grant under 22 this chapter, the Secretary may not 23 reject or penalize grant applications 24 on the basis of a typographical or 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 5 •S 1397 IS rounding error in a proposed budget 1 until the Secretary has given the ap- 2 plicant an opportunity for correction 3 in accordance with subclause (II). 4 ‘‘(II) NOTICE AND OPPORTUNITY 5 FOR CORRECTION.—The Secretary 6 shall provide notice and identification 7 of an error described in subclause (I) 8 by email and phone to the applicant 9 before awarding grants for each com- 10 petition. During a period of not fewer 11 than 14 days, the Secretary shall 12 allow the applicant to submit a re- 13 vised application that corrects the 14 identified error. 15 ‘‘(III) TREATMENT OF REVISED 16 APPLICATIONS.—The Secretary shall 17 treat the revised application in the 18 same manner as a timely submitted 19 application. 20 ‘‘(IV) FAILURE TO CORRECT.—If 21 an applicant has received a notice and 22 opportunity for correction of a typo- 23 graphical or rounding error in a pro- 24 posed budget in accordance with sub- 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 6 •S 1397 IS clause (II) and the applicant fails to 1 correct the error and submit a revised 2 application before the deadline de- 3 scribed in that subclause, the Sec- 4 retary may reject or penalize that 5 grant application. 6 ‘‘(C) REVIEW.— 7 ‘‘(i) REQUEST FOR REVIEW.—With 8 respect to any competition for a grant 9 under this chapter, an applicant may re- 10 quest a review if the applicant— 11 ‘‘(I) has evidence that a specific 12 technical, administrative, or scoring 13 error was made by the Department, 14 an agent of the Department, or a peer 15 reviewer, with respect to the scoring 16 or processing of a submitted applica- 17 tion; and 18 ‘‘(II) has otherwise met all of the 19 requirements for submission of the 20 application. 21 ‘‘(ii) ERROR MADE BY THE DEPART- 22 MENT.—In the case of evidence of error by 23 the Department or an agent of the Depart- 24 ment, other than a peer reviewer, the Sec- 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 7 •S 1397 IS retary shall review any evidence submitted 1 by the applicant and provide a timely re- 2 sponse to the applicant. All applicants, re- 3 gardless of score, shall have this right of 4 review. If the Secretary determines that an 5 error was made by the Department or an 6 agent of the Department, other than a 7 peer reviewer, the Secretary shall correct 8 the error and accordingly adjust the appli- 9 cant score. 10 ‘‘(iii) ERROR MADE BY A PEER RE- 11 VIEWER.— 12 ‘‘(I) IN GENERAL.—In the case 13 of evidence of error by a peer re- 14 viewer, a secondary review panel shall 15 automatically and promptly evaluate 16 the application for consideration in 17 the applicable grant competition upon 18 receipt of a request by any such appli- 19 cant. The Department shall allow this 20 right of review to any applicant that 21 scored five points or less below the 22 cut-off score. Examples of errors war- 23 ranting secondary review may in- 24 clude— 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 8 •S 1397 IS ‘‘(aa) points withheld for 1 criteria not required in statute, 2 regulation, or guidance governing 3 a program under this chapter or 4 the application for a grant for 5 such program; or 6 ‘‘(bb) information pertaining 7 to selection criteria that was in- 8 correctly determined to be miss- 9 ing from an application. 10 ‘‘(II) TIMELY REVIEW AND RE- 11 PLACEMENT SCORE.—The secondary 12 review panel described in subclause (I) 13 shall conduct a secondary review in a 14 timely fashion, and the score resulting 15 from the secondary review shall re- 16 place the score from the initial peer 17 review. 18 ‘‘(III) COMPOSITION OF SEC- 19 ONDARY REVIEW PANEL.—The sec- 20 ondary review panel shall be composed 21 of reviewers each of whom— 22 ‘‘(aa) did not review the ap- 23 plication in the original peer re- 24 view; 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 9 •S 1397 IS ‘‘(bb) is a member of the co- 1 hort of peer reviewers for the 2 grant program that is the subject 3 of such secondary review; and 4 ‘‘(cc) to the extent prac- 5 ticable, has conducted peer re- 6 views in not less than 2 previous 7 competitions for the grant pro- 8 gram that is the subject of such 9 secondary review. 10 ‘‘(IV) FINAL SCORE.—The final 11 peer review score of an application 12 subject to a secondary review under 13 this clause shall promptly be adjusted 14 appropriately using the score awarded 15 by the secondary review panel, so as 16 not to interfere with the timely award- 17 ing of grants for the applicable grant 18 competition. 19 ‘‘(iv) FINALITY.— 20 ‘‘(I) IN GENERAL.—A determina- 21 tion by the Secretary under clause (ii) 22 shall not be reviewable by any officer 23 or employee of the Department other 24 than the Secretary. 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00009 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 10 •S 1397 IS ‘‘(II) SCORING.—The score 1 awarded by a secondary review panel 2 under clause (iii) shall not be review- 3 able by any officer or employee of the 4 Department other than the Secretary. 5 ‘‘(v) FUNDING OF APPLICATIONS 6 WITH CERTAIN ADJUSTED SCORES.—Appli- 7 cations with scores that are adjusted up- 8 ward under clause (ii) or (iii) that equal or 9 exceed the minimum cut-off score for the 10 applicable grant competition shall be fund- 11 ed by the Secretary using general or ad- 12 ministrative funds available to the Sec- 13 retary other than those funds appropriated 14 or allocated for the programs authorized 15 by this chapter.’’. 16 (c) OUTREACH.—Section 402A(d)(3) of the Higher 17 Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(d)(3)) is 18 amended by adding at the end the following: ‘‘The Sec- 19 retary shall also host at least one virtual, interactive train- 20 ing using telecommunications technology to ensure that 21 interested applicants have access to technical assistance.’’. 22 (d) DOCUMENTATION OF STATUS AS A LOW-INCOME 23 INDIVIDUAL.—Section 402A(e) of the Higher Education 24 Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(e)) is amended— 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00010 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 11 •S 1397 IS (1) in paragraph (1)— 1 (A) in subparagraph (C), by striking ‘‘or’’ 2 after the semicolon; 3 (B) in subparagraph (D), by striking the 4 period at the end and inserting a semicolon; 5 and 6 (C) by adding at the end the following: 7 ‘‘(E) documentation that the student has 8 been determined to be eligible for a Federal Pell 9 Grant under section 401; or 10 ‘‘(F) for grants authorized under section 11 402B and 402F of this chapter, documentation 12 that a student is attending a school that had a 13 percentage of enrolled students who are identi- 14 fied students (as defined in section 15 11(a)(1)(F)(i) of the Richard B. Russell Na- 16 tional School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 17 1759a(a)(1)(F)(i))) that meets or exceeds the 18 threshold described in section 11(a)(1)(F)(viii) 19 of that Act during the school year prior to the 20 first year of the period for which such grant is 21 awarded.’’; and 22 (2) in paragraph (2)— 23 (A) in subparagraph (C), by striking ‘‘or’’ 24 after the semicolon; 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00011 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 12 •S 1397 IS (B) in subparagraph (D), by striking the 1 period at the end and inserting a semicolon; 2 and 3 (C) by adding at the end the following: 4 ‘‘(E) documentation that the student has 5 been determined to be eligible for a Federal Pell 6 Grant under section 401; or 7 ‘‘(F) for grants authorized under section 8 402B and 402F of this chapter, documentation 9 that a student is attending a school that had a 10 percentage of enrolled students who are identi- 11 fied students (as defined in section 12 11(a)(1)(F)(i) of the Richard B. Russell Na- 13 tional School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 14 1759a(a)(1)(F)(i))) that meets or exceeds the 15 threshold described in section 11(a)(1)(F)(viii) 16 of that Act during the school year prior to the 17 first year of the period for which such grant is 18 awarded.’’. 19 (e) OUTCOME CRITERIA.—Section 402A(f) of the 20 Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a–11(g)) 21 is amended— 22 (1) in paragraph (1)— 23 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 13 •S 1397 IS (A) in the paragraph heading, by striking 1 ‘‘PRIOR EXPERIENCE’’ and inserting ‘‘PRIOR 2 SUCCESS’’; 3 (B) by striking ‘‘January 1, 2009’’ and in- 4 serting ‘‘the date of enactment of the Edu- 5 cational Opportunity and Success Act of 2023’’; 6 and 7 (C) by striking ‘‘prior experience of’’ and 8 inserting ‘‘prior success in achieving’’; and 9 (2) in paragraph (3)— 10 (A) in subparagraph (A)— 11 (i) in clause (iv), by striking ‘‘that will 12 make such students eligible for programs 13 such as the Academic Competitiveness 14 Grants Program’’ and inserting ‘‘that in- 15 cludes at least 4 years of mathematics, 3 16 years of science, and 2 years of a foreign 17 language’’; 18 (ii) by redesignating clauses (v) and 19 (vi) as clauses (vi) and (vii), respectively; 20 and 21 (iii) inserting after clause (iv), the fol- 22 lowing: 23 ‘‘(v) the completion of financial aid 24 applications, including the Free Applica- 25 VerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 May 10, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S1397.IS S1397 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with $$_JOB 14 •S 1397 IS tion for Federal Student Aid described in 1 section 483(a) and college admissions ap- 2 plications’’; 3 (B) in subparagraph (B)— 4 (i) in the matter preceding clause (i), 5 by inserting ‘‘except in the case of pro- 6 grams that are specifically designed for 7 veterans,’’ after ‘‘402C’’; 8 (ii) in clause (v), by striking ‘‘that will 9 make such students eligible for programs 10 such [Text truncated for display. 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