WASHINGTON– U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, M.D. (R-LA) today announced U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN), chairman of the Senate’s education committee, is throwing his weight behind the College Transparency Act (CTA). Cassidy’s bill is garnering broad bipartisan support with 27 senators cosponsoring the legislation.
“Chairman Alexander’s support is invaluable for the CTA to become law and provide our students with the transparency they deserve when choosing a school,” said Dr. Cassidy, a member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
“The College Transparency Act will help students and families better compare how students performed in particular programs at specific colleges and universities,” said Senator Alexander. “There is substantial bipartisan support for this bill in both the House and Senate, and Congress should pass it to help students know that their degree will be worth their time and money.”
Read a one-pager of the College Transparency Act (CTA) here.
CTA modernizes the college reporting system for postsecondary data. It ensures accurate reporting on student outcomes, such as enrollment, completion, and post-college success across colleges and majors, while protecting the privacy of individual students.
Students can use this information to compare how others with their backgrounds have succeeded at an institution. This can steer them toward schools and programs of study best suited to their unique needs and desired outcomes. Institutions of learning and policymakers can also use this data to improve our country’s postsecondary education system.
The current college reporting system is overly burdensome on institutions, yet provides little practical information for students and families due to significant gaps in college data reporting. Under the proposed updated system, institutions would securely report privacy-protected, student-level data to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). NCES would be responsible for securely storing student information, working with relevant federal agencies to generate post-college outcomes reports, and presenting the summary information on a user-friendly website for students and families.
Chairman Alexander (R-TN) joins Dr. Cassidy and U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Tim Scott (R-SC), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), John Cornyn (R-TX), Tammy Baldwin (D-MN), Joni Ernst (R-IA), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Cory Gardner (R-CO), Bob Casey (D-PA), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Maggie Hassan (D-NH), David Perdue (R-GA), Doug Jones (D-AL), Pat Roberts (R-KS), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Mitt Romney (R-UT), Chris Murphy (D-CT), Thom Tillis (R-NC), Pat Toomey (R-PA), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Dan Sullivan (R-AK), and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) in support of CTA.
Representatives Paul Mitchell (R-MI), Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL), Elise Stefanik (R-NY), and Josh Harder (D-CA) introduced a companion bill in the U.S. House of Representatives, which has now garnered the support of 80 representative.
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