When Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell first proposed the grants that now bear his name, he envisioned a way to help students attend our country's wonderful colleges and universities, so they could share in the American Dream.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Pell Grants are, and have been, critically important tools in making higher education a possibility for lower- and middle-income students.
Pell grants are the foundation of Federal student aid. As someone who attended college with the help of Pell grants and as chairman of the Pell Grant Caucus, I know how important they are for our Nation's low-income students.
Pell Grants aren't 'welfare,' they are a gateway to opportunity for some of our nation's best and brightest students.
Pell Grants open a lot of doors, but they rely on a solvent government.
Funding and maintaining programs from Head Start to Pell Grants must be a high priority.
The Republicans claim they are for strengthening Pell grants when the truth is that over the last four years, their legislation has done the exact opposite.
The difficulty is, Pell Grants are an attempt to do the right thing, and that is to give the low-income student an opportunity to access higher education, and that's a good thing. And welfare was an attempt to help those most in need. The difficulty is, often times a program is so successful that it grows and grows and grows and grows.
I am disappointed that Senator Ayotte has voted repeatedly for deep cuts in Pell Grants that would make college more expensive for thousands of New Hampshire students and voted against allowing young people to refinance their student loans.
We simply can't keep providing money from the federal government in the form of subsidized or actual loans and Pell Grants when we don't have the money.
So you can go to college on Pell Grants - maybe I should not be telling anybody this because it's turning out to be the welfare of the 21st century.