Tomorrow is election day! If you have not voted yet, read about why voting is important to ACTE’s Public Policy team on the CTE Policy Watch blog. In the lead up to the election, most official activity on Capitol Hill has slowed, but one extremely significant piece of business remained. On Monday, the Senate confirmed Justice Amy Coney Barrett as the 115th justice to serve on the Supreme Court. Barrett’s confirmation vote in the Senate fell largely on party lines. Since the House and Senate were out of session last week, there are only a couple of other notes from DC last week:
- 2019 Nation’s Report Card Math and Reading Results: Results from the 2019 Nation’s Report Card for mathematics and reading assessment scores for grade 12 students show that 40% of students were below basic in math and 30% were below basic in reading. The performance of the most disadvantaged and lowest-performing students decreased as well. Read Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos’s statement on the results.
- COVID-19 Stimulus Package Update: As COVID-19 cases continue to rise in the United States, congressional efforts to pass an additional relief package have remained at a stand still. Negotiations have been put on hold in the lead up to the election, with no date in sight for resuming talks. Some lawmakers are hopeful that they will be able to pass a stimulus relief bill after the election when both chambers are back in session, but there is no official date set for resuming these talks.
- Two Virtual Showcase Events: The Department of Education’s Office of Career, Technical, and Adult Education hosted two virtual showcases featuring Gateway Technical College in Kenosha, Wisconsin and Indian River State College in Fort Pierce, Florida. These virtual showcases highlighted each college’s hybrid models of in-person and online instruction, as well as how the programs are handling COVID-19, and the range of degree, technical and training programs each institution has to offer during the pandemic.
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