[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 1803 Introduced in Senate (IS)]

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116th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                S. 1803

                  To modify the Federal TRIO programs.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                             June 12, 2019

  Ms. Collins (for herself, Ms. Baldwin, Mrs. Capito, and Mr. Tester) 
introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the 
          Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
                  To modify the Federal TRIO programs.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Educational Opportunity and Success 
Act of 2019''.

SEC. 2. FEDERAL TRIO PROGRAMS AMENDMENTS.

    (a) Review and Notification by the Secretary.--Section 402A(c) of 
the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a-11(c)) is amended by 
striking paragraph (8) and inserting the following:
            ``(8) Review and notification by the secretary.--
                    ``(A) Guidance.--Not less than 90 days before the 
                commencement of each competition for a grant under this 
                chapter, the Secretary shall issue nonregulatory 
                guidance regarding the rights and responsibilities of 
                applicants with respect to the application and 
                evaluation process for programs and projects assisted 
                under this chapter, including applicant access to peer 
                review comments. The guidance shall describe the 
                procedures for the submission, processing, and scoring 
                of applications for grants under this chapter, 
                including the information described in subparagraph 
                (B).
                    ``(B) Technical components of applications.--
                            ``(i) Establishment and treatment of 
                        nonsubstantive technical components of 
                        applications.--With respect to any competition 
                        for a grant under this chapter, the Secretary 
                        may only establish voluntary page limit and 
                        formatting requirements for grant applications 
                        and may not reject grant applications that do 
                        not meet those voluntary requirements. The 
                        Secretary may suggest page limits and 
                        formatting standards, (including with respect 
                        to font size, font style, font type, line 
                        spacing, paragraph justification, and page 
                        margins), but may not use noncompliance with 
                        these suggested requirements as a basis to 
                        reject or penalize grant applications.
                            ``(ii) Identification and treatment of 
                        technical budget errors in applications.--
                                    ``(I) In general.--With respect to 
                                any competition for a grant under this 
                                chapter, the Secretary may not reject 
                                or penalize grant applications on the 
                                basis of a typographical or rounding 
                                error in a proposed budget until the 
                                Secretary has given the applicant an 
                                opportunity for correction in 
                                accordance with subclause (II).
                                    ``(II) Notice and opportunity for 
                                correction.--The Secretary shall 
                                provide notice and identification of an 
                                error described in subclause (I) by 
                                email and phone to the applicant before 
                                awarding grants for each competition. 
                                During a period of not fewer than 14 
                                days, the Secretary shall allow the 
                                applicant to submit a revised 
                                application that corrects the 
                                identified error.
                                    ``(III) Treatment of revised 
                                applications.--The Secretary shall 
                                treat the revised application in the 
                                same manner as a timely submitted 
                                application.
                                    ``(IV) Failure to correct.--If an 
                                applicant has received a notice and 
                                opportunity for correction of a 
                                typographical or rounding error in a 
                                proposed budget in accordance with 
                                subclause (II) and the applicant fails 
                                to correct the error and submit a 
                                revised application before the deadline 
                                described in that subclause, the 
                                Secretary may reject or penalize that 
                                grant application.
                    ``(C) Review.--
                            ``(i) Request for review.--With respect to 
                        any competition for a grant under this chapter, 
                        an applicant may request a review if the 
                        applicant--
                                    ``(I) has evidence that a specific 
                                technical, administrative, or scoring 
                                error was made by the Department, an 
                                agent of the Department, or a peer 
                                reviewer, with respect to the scoring 
                                or processing of a submitted 
                                application; and
                                    ``(II) has otherwise met all of the 
                                requirements for submission of the 
                                application.
                            ``(ii) Error made by the department.--In 
                        the case of evidence of error by the Department 
                        or an agent of the Department, other than a 
                        peer reviewer, the Secretary shall review any 
                        evidence submitted by the applicant and provide 
                        a timely response to the applicant. If the 
                        Secretary determines that an error was made by 
                        the Department or an agent of the Department, 
                        other than a peer reviewer, the Secretary shall 
                        correct the error and accordingly adjust the 
                        applicant score.
                            ``(iii) Error made by a peer reviewer.--
                                    ``(I) In general.--In the case of 
                                evidence of error by a peer reviewer, a 
                                secondary review panel shall 
                                automatically and promptly evaluate the 
                                application for consideration in the 
                                applicable grant competition upon 
                                receipt of a request by any such 
                                applicant. Examples of errors 
                                warranting secondary review may 
                                include--
                                            ``(aa) points withheld for 
                                        criteria not required in 
                                        statute, regulation, or 
                                        guidance governing a program 
                                        under this chapter or the 
                                        application for a grant for 
                                        such program; or
                                            ``(bb) information 
                                        pertaining to selection 
                                        criteria that was incorrectly 
                                        determined to be missing from 
                                        an application.
                                    ``(II) Timely review and 
                                replacement score.--The secondary 
                                review panel described in subclause (I) 
                                shall conduct a secondary review in a 
                                timely fashion, and the score resulting 
                                from the secondary review shall replace 
                                the score from the initial peer review.
                                    ``(III) Composition of secondary 
                                review panel.--The secondary review 
                                panel shall be composed of reviewers 
                                each of whom--
                                            ``(aa) did not review the 
                                        application in the original 
                                        peer review;
                                            ``(bb) is a member of the 
                                        cohort of peer reviewers for 
                                        the grant program that is the 
                                        subject of such secondary 
                                        review; and
                                            ``(cc) to the extent 
                                        practicable, has conducted peer 
                                        reviews in not less than 2 
                                        previous competitions for the 
                                        grant program that is the 
                                        subject of such secondary 
                                        review.
                                    ``(IV) Final score.--The final peer 
                                review score of an application subject 
                                to a secondary review under this clause 
                                shall promptly be adjusted 
                                appropriately using the score awarded 
                                by the secondary review panel, so as 
                                not to interfere with the timely 
                                awarding of grants for the applicable 
                                grant competition.
                            ``(iv) Finality.--
                                    ``(I) In general.--A determination 
                                by the Secretary under clause (ii) 
                                shall not be reviewable by any officer 
                                or employee of the Department other 
                                than the Secretary.
                                    ``(II) Scoring.--The score awarded 
                                by a secondary review panel under 
                                clause (iii) shall not be reviewable by 
                                any officer or employee of the 
                                Department other than the Secretary.
                            ``(v) Funding of applications with certain 
                        adjusted scores.--Applications with scores that 
                        are adjusted upward under clause (ii) or (iii) 
                        that equal or exceed the minimum cut-off score 
                        for the applicable grant competition shall be 
                        funded by the Secretary using general or 
                        administrative funds available to the Secretary 
                        other than those funds appropriated or 
                        allocated for the programs authorized by this 
                        chapter.''.
    (b) Outreach.--Section 402A(d)(3) of the Higher Education Act of 
1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a-11(d)(3)) is amended by adding at the end the 
following: ``The Secretary shall also host at least one virtual, 
interactive training using telecommunications technology to ensure that 
interested applicants have access to technical assistance.''.
    (c) Documentation of Status as a Low-Income Individual.--Section 
402A(e) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a-11(e)) is 
amended--
            (1) in paragraph (1)--
                    (A) in subparagraph (C), by striking ``or'' after 
                the semicolon;
                    (B) in subparagraph (D), by striking the period at 
                the end and inserting a semicolon; and
                    (C) by adding at the end the following:
                    ``(E) documentation that the student has been 
                determined to be eligible for a Federal Pell Grant 
                under section 401; or
                    ``(F) for grants authorized under section 402B and 
                402F of this chapter, documentation that a student is 
                attending a school that had a percentage of enrolled 
                students who are identified students (as defined in 
                section 11(a)(1)(F)(i) of the Richard B. Russell 
                National School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 
                1759a(a)(1)(F)(i))) that meets or exceeds the threshold 
                described in section 11(a)(1)(F)(viii) of that Act 
                during the school year prior to the first year of the 
                period for which such grant is awarded.''; and
            (2) in paragraph (2)--
                    (A) in subparagraph (C), by striking ``or'' after 
                the semicolon;
                    (B) in subparagraph (D), by striking the period at 
                the end and inserting a semicolon; and
                    (C) by adding at the end the following:
                    ``(E) documentation that the student has been 
                determined to be eligible for a Federal Pell Grant 
                under section 401; or
                    ``(F) for grants authorized under section 402B and 
                402F of this chapter, documentation that a student is 
                attending a school that had a percentage of enrolled 
                students who are identified students (as defined in 
                section 11(a)(1)(F)(i) of the Richard B. Russell 
                National School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 
                1759a(a)(1)(F)(i))) that meets or exceeds the threshold 
                described in section 11(a)(1)(F)(viii) of that Act 
                during the school year prior to the first year of the 
                period for which such grant is awarded.''.
    (d) Authorization of Appropriations.--Section 402A(g) of the Higher 
Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a-11(g)) is amended to read as 
follows:
    ``(g) Authorization of Appropriations.--For the purpose of making 
grants and contracts under this chapter, there are authorized to be 
appropriated $1,060,000,000 for fiscal year 2020 and such sums as may 
be necessary for each of the five succeeding fiscal years. Of the 
amount appropriated under this chapter, the Secretary may use no more 
than 1 percent of such amount to obtain additional qualified readers 
and additional staff to review applications, to increase the level of 
oversight monitoring, to support impact studies, program assessments, 
and reviews, and to provide technical assistance to potential 
applicants and current grantees.''.
    (e) Definitions.--Section 402A(h) of the Higher Education Act of 
1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a-11(h)) is amended by striking paragraph (4) and 
inserting the following:
            ``(4) Low-income individual.--The term `low-income 
        individual' means--
                    ``(A) an individual from a family whose adjustable 
                gross income for the preceding year did not exceed 150 
                percent of an amount equal to the poverty level 
                determined by using criteria of poverty established by 
                the Bureau of the Census;
                    ``(B) an individual from a family whose adjustable 
                gross income, as reported on the individual's most 
                recently completed Free Application for Federal Student 
                Aid, did not exceed 150 percent of an amount equal to 
                the poverty level determined by using criteria of 
                poverty established by the Bureau of the Census for 
                that year;
                    ``(C) an individual who has been determined to be 
                eligible for a Federal Pell Grant under section 401; or
                    ``(D) for grants authorized under section 402B and 
                402F of this chapter, a student who is attending a 
                school that had a percentage of enrolled students who 
                are identified students (as defined in section 
                11(a)(1)(F)(i) of the Richard B. Russell National 
                School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 1759a(a)(1)(F)(i))) that 
                meets or exceeds the threshold described in section 
                11(a)(1)(F)(viii) of that Act during the school year 
                prior to the first year of the period for which such 
                grant is awarded.''.
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