Home AdvocacyPolicyWashington Notes1999 Dec

• Results of the FY2000 Appropriations Battle
• ESEA: Proposed Reauthorization Amendments
• E-Rate Update
• Groups Urge Congress to Act on Distance Learning Report

Results of the FY2000 Appropriations Battle

On November 29, President Clinton signed the FY2000 budget bill that Congress submitted 10 days earlier. Clinton vetoed an earlier version, citing the lack of commitment to his educational priorities. Compromise was finally reached that included Congress’s agreement to earmark education funds for the express purpose of hiring new teachers and lowering class sizes. The budget was a mini-omnibus bill, titled H.R. 3194, which included five other bills, including H.R. 3424, the FY2000 Labor HHS-Education bill. Department of Education funding increased 6.8% from last year’s total, for a final total of $38 billion for FY 2000.

The FY2000 budget proposal includes approximately $250 million within the Education Department’s budget for earmarked members’ projects, primarily for technology programs, the Fund for the Improvement of Education and the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education. Title III and Technology Challenge Grants received $14.3 million and $33.7 million funding increases, respectively.

Educational groups vigorously opposed an earlier House budget proposal as it froze funding at or below inflation level increases for many programs, including Title III strengthening institutions. The earlier version, vetoed by President Clinton, also funded significant education programs, notably including class size reduction and teacher training in technology programs, below FY99 levels.

As part of the compromise between the Administration and congressional leaders, the FY2000 bill includes a 0.38% across-the-board cut at the department/agency level for all appropriations. No individual program will be cut more than 15%. This means a $112 million cut from the Education Department’s budget, to be made before the President submits his FY2001 budget proposal (expected around February 7, 2000). The implementation of the cut is at the discretion of the President’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and Secretary of Education Richard Riley.

Joel Packer, president of CEF (Committee for Education Funding), predicts that cuts in Title VI, possibly up to $57 million, will provide the bulk of the $112 million cut, leaving at least $55 million to be cut from other, as yet unknown, areas. It is highly unlikely that current Administration priorities, such as programs reducing class size or educational technology, will suffer cuts.

The link to the entire FY2000 appropriations bill, H.R. 3194, can be found at: (This link has been moved. No forwarding information.)

The Labor-HHS-Education bill, H.R. 3424, is available through The Library of Congress online at http://thomas.loc.gov

ESEA: Proposed Reauthorization Amendments

As the first session of the 106^th Congress came to a close, a number of bills proposing to reauthorize ESEA have been introduced or proposed in the Senate. Most importantly Health, Education and Labor Committee Chairman Jeffords (R-VT) has released a discussion outline of a reauthorization bill. In that draft, the current Title III programs are included in a new Title V. The outline is generally quite supportive of federal educational technology programs, leaving most programs largely unchanged with generous funding. As written, however, the outline does not include an authorization for the Preparing Tomorrow’s Teachers to Use Technology (PT³) program. Instead, that program is eliminated and incorporated into the National Challenge Grants for Technology. While priority is given to projects that promote professional development under this section, there is concern that the lack of a separate program will likely diminish the national attention and leadership paid to professional development in educational technology.

Editor’s note: ISTE staff members are currently analyzing the potential effects of this proposal on our PT³ program, which includes the NETS for Teachers Project. (To read more about the NETS Project, go to Standards Projects.)

View Summary of Proposed ESEA Title V Appropriations

Senator Bingaman (D-NM), a long-standing supporter of educational technology programs, has also introduced an ESEA reauthorization amendment (S. 1604) aimed specifically at promoting professional development for new and current teachers in the area of educational technology, particularly at the local level.

One of Senator Bingaman’s objectives is to improve the performance of students in low-performing, high-poverty schools by providing technical training and educational technology to teachers and students. To this end, his bill keeps the existing Technology Literacy Challenge Fund program, but includes language to increase funding channeled to technology-poor schools with a high proportion of low-income students.

The bill also includes provisions for the professional development of new and current teachers in educational technology, with particular focus on training programs provided through schools of education. The bill also includes provisions to establish the Next-Generation Technology Innovation Awards, meant to foster research into innovative teaching and learning techniques using advanced technologies, such as voice recognition, virtual reality, and modeling software, to help students attain State academic content and performance standards. The entire bill, S.1604, can be downloaded from the Library of Congress (http://thomas.loc.gov). ]

E-Rate Update

Notice to all E-Rate applicants. The Year 3 window for E-rate funding, opened by the Schools and Libraries Division (SLD) of the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC) on November 10, will close January 19, 2000.

The new FCC Form 471 is available to file online. Applicants should act quickly with respect to FCC Form 470, so that they can select their winning bidder, sign contracts for services, and submit their Form 471 well before January 19, 2000. All properly completed applications received by the SLD at that time will be treated as if they arrived on the same day. Applications received by the SLD after this date will be treated on a first-come, first-served basis. Both forms should be filed electronically. The online Form 471 is, in particular, a critical tool for swift and successful processing. This year the electronic Form 471 features new, user-friendly features: it is compatible with PC and Mac platforms, any browser type at 4.0 and above can be used, and many of the calculations are now automated.

Applicants will need to have posted requests for services (Form 470) for 28 days before submitting and signing their Form 471. If Form 470 is not posted by mid-December, applicants will be hard-pressed to meet the January 19, 2000 deadline for in-the-window Form 471 funding requests. The Year 3 FCC Forms 470 and 471 may be filed online through the SLD Web site (select the “Apply Online/View Forms” button on the home page) or downloaded from (This link has been moved. No forwarding information.). They also are available by mail by calling SLD Client Service Bureau at 888.203.8100.

Waves 18 and 20 for Year 2. On November 8, SLD released wave 18 of E-rate funding commitment letters, surpassing last year’s totals in issued commitments. In this wave, the Schools and Libraries Division mailed letters to nearly 1,250 applicants, confirming funding for Year Two of the program.

Also, on November 15, wave 20 of E-rate funding commitment letters was released. Nearly 740 applicants will receive information on their funding commitment for internal networking connections, telecommunications, and Internet access under the FCC’s Universal Service program. With this latest wave of $75.7 million, the cumulative amount of E-Rate funding commitments for Year 2 is now $1.92 billion.

In an earlier wave (wave 17 of Year Two), applicants seeking discounts on internal connections down to the 20% discount level were eligible to be funded for the first time. Beginning in wave 17, every eligible school or library that submitted an application within the filing “window” that ended on April 6, 1999, will receive discounts because the $2.25 billion funding cap approved by the FCC supports all such requests. This is particularly significant because in Year One SLD was unable to fund internal connection projects below the 70% discount level.

Kate Moore, president of SLD, said:

This is truly an historic time for the program. The digital divide grows ever narrower as we continue to reach the most needy schools and libraries in the nation. We will continue to work toward our goals in both outreach and program administration, to ensure every eligible entity has an opportunity to participate. The fact that our second year funding reserve exceeds the requirements of the neediest of our nation’s schools, means that funding can continue to be extended to all those who qualify. Our hope from the onset has been that there would be enough for every qualified applicant, but we have had to prioritize according to those with the greatest need. Last week’s [wave 18] announcement means no one will be left out.

Form 470 Applications Filing in Year 2 for Year 3 Services. In order to comply with state or local procurement regulations requiring a multi-month competitive bidding process, some E-rate applicants filed Year 2 Form 470 applications for Year 3 services. Information on the applicants who submitted Form 470 between June and October, 1999, can be viewed at ftp://ftp.sl.universalservice.org/2for3.txt. This file is saved as a delimited text file, which can be opened using a spreadsheet application or imported into a database.

Groups Urge Congress to Act on Distance Learning Report

On November 1, a coalition of more than 30 major education and library organizations, including ISTE, sent a letter to Senate and House Judiciary members asking the committees to take up the issue of digital distance learning exemption to the Copyright Act. The Senate Judiciary committee held a hearing on May 25 to discuss the report by the U.S. Copyright office, titled “Report on Copyright and Digital Distance Education,” which concluded that changes in the law were needed to facilitate distance learning online.

The report proposed to update the current copyright law exemptions for distance education, while containing safeguards to respond to the proprietor concerns. These modest changes would provide a proper balance between the rights of content owners and society’s need to disseminate knowledge. The 30 groups are urging the Senate to adopt the recommendations set forth in the report. Prompt action will ensure that there will be open access to online information for future generations. The report received general support from the attending senators, but there has been no legislative activity since the hearing.

Prepared by Leslie Harris, Jee Hang Lee, and Ghani Raines
On behalf of the International Society for Technology in Education.