Congressman Doggett Passes Amendment To Streamline Student Aid Process

Congressman Lloyd Doggett earlier this week successfully offered an amendment to streamline the student aid application process. On a bipartisan basis, the House adopted Doggett’s amendment to H.R. 4137, the College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007.

“The current financial aid application is unnecessarily complex and more complicated than an IRS form. To fill out the current form students need Accounting 101 before even setting foot in a college classroom,” said Rep. Doggett, a senior member of the House Ways and Means Committee. “The Doggett amendment cuts government red tape that currently ties up access to student aid and lets students focus on learning, not filling out forms.”

The Doggett Amendment gives students and parents the power to instruct the Internal Revenue Service to provide their income information directly to the Department of Education. This simplifies filing the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) by reducing number of questions on the form and the instructions necessary to complete it. Each year, 1.5 million students are deterred from even applying for the assistance for which they qualify, and the federal government loses about $350 million from overpayments caused by inaccurate forms.

The Doggett Amendment would also strengthen student privacy by eliminating the need for school-based verification of income information submitted on the FAFSA. By getting this information directly from the IRS, colleges and universities would no longer have to stockpile sensitive financial information on our nation’s campuses.

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