On Friday, the Office of Management and Budget at the White House released a new report that examines how federal funding might be impacted by sequestration. As required by the Sequestration Transparency Act of 2012, the Administration was tasked with providing greater detail on how the across-the-board cuts will affect federal programs. Without congressional intervention, sequestration is scheduled to go into effect on January 2, 2013. According to the report, all non-defense discretionary (NDD) programs that are not exempt from sequestration will be cut 8.2 percent. This means that the Perkins stands to lose approximately $92 million in Fiscal Year 2013 alone! This is a potentially devastating cut to an important education and workforce training program that has already seen large reductions in funding in recent years. Total funding for the Department of Education will be reduced by over $4 billion, with $142 million coming from the Office of Vocational and Adult Education (the agency that oversees Perkins and Adult Education programs).
ACTE is working with a large coalition of organizations representing health care, education, transportation, law enforcement and other NDD programs who are urging Congress to prevent these drastic cuts. This coalition has fought to bring education to the forefront of the discussion over sequestration, but we can’t do it alone. Let your Senators and Representative know how important Perkins funding is to your school. Tell them to stop sequestration now!
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