Bush Increases Budget For Higher Ed

While President Bush’s $3.1 trillion-budget increases funding for higher education with an eye toward financial aid, the proposal freezes funding for the areas of scientific research that matter most to Harvard.

“This proposed increase in Pell Grant funding is welcome news,” said Kevin Casey, Harvard’s senior director of federal and state relations. “But I think the budget overall for higher education is a mixed bag.”

Casey cited the zero-increase in funding for the National Institute of Health (NIH)—which will mean a decrease after adjusting for inflation—as evidence that the budget is “an uneven overall package in terms of supporting higher education and its research purposes.”

Harvard currently receives about $400 million in federal funding annually, the vast majority of which is dedicated to scientific research and channeled to the University through the NIH.

For other areas of scientific funding, the effects of the budget were mixed: The National Science Foundation and basic Department of Energy research saw large increases, while both the basic and applied research programs of the Department of Defense saw cuts.

The administration’s budget was better for financial aid, proposing an 18.5 percent increase in spending on Pell Grants.

Overall, the budget allocates $2.6 billion more for the grants, which translated to an additional $69 awarded to each student receiving a grant. The maximum award allocation would increase to $4,800 in 2009 and $5,400 by 2012.

But even the administration’s record on increasing financial aid has come under fire, with Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of FinAid.org, calling it “too little, too late.”

Kantrowitz said that four of the past 10 years did not see an increase in Pell Grant funding.

“So the recent increases are barely keeping up with the inflation rate, let alone making up for lost time,” he said.

The FinAid.org publisher contrasted Harvard’s new financial aid initiative, which eliminates loans for all students, with Pell Grants, which require low-income students to take on debt.

Kantrowitz added that the only way for schools less well-endowed than Harvard to eliminate loans for low-income students would be through a massive increase in Pell Grant funding.

—Staff writer Alexandra Perloff-Giles can be reached at aperloff@fas.harvard.edu.