Gillermina Martinez Retention Counselor STAAR Program CSU, Bakersfield 9001 Stockdale Hwy. Bakersfield CA, 93311 (661) 654.2281 [log in to unmask] ----- Original Message ----- Hi Everyone! Please make sure that this message is sent on your Chapter listservs as well. Thank you and have a great weekend! Tomasa Mauricio, M.S. Director, Service Learning Pre-College Institute College of Education San Diego State University Phone: (619)594-1899 Fax: (619)594-7821 -----Original Message----- From: [log in to unmask] on behalf of Stephen Domingues Sent: Fri 1/23/2009 1:07 PM To: WESTOP Subject: [WESTOP] A Time-Sensitive Congressional Action Request Hi Everyone, The national economic stimulus package is working its way quickly through Congress, and there is an opportunity for additional funding for TRIO and GEAR UP. The "attachment" retains my fancy formatting, but I'm also including the text below (possibly with hilarious and indecipherable symbols, depending on your email program) in case you have a server that gets paranoid about attachments (!). There is a very specific -- and remarkably easy! -- action request at the end. Please help. Stephen Domingues Chair, WESTOP Legislation and Education Committee January 23, 2009 To: WESTOP From: Stephen Domingues, Chair, WESTOP Legislation and Education Committee RE: TIME-SENSITIVE ACTION REQUEST Hi Everyone. Here's the executive summary of "what you really need to know" with respect to TRIO and the economic stimulus package in Congress, called the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act" in the House of Representatives. There is a time-sensitive action request at the end. It won't hurt my feelings if you want to "cut to the chase," skip the details, go straight to the Action Request, and get this over in less than two minutes (!). Still here? OK, here are the basics: Congress is working on a REALLY BIG stimulus package to keep the economy from tanking any further: $825 billion (yup, that's "b" for billion!) - and possibly more. The House "draft" stimulus bill has passed the House Appropriations Committee, and it likely will be taken up by the full House this coming week. There are 38 mind-numbing pages in the House bill relating to Education. There's something for almost everyone, including over $16.1 billion for Student Financial Assistance and Student Aid Administration under Title IV of the Higher Education Opportunity Act, e.g. $15.6 billion to increase Pell Grant maximums from $4850 to $5350 an extra $490 million for College Work-Study an extra $50 million for Student Aid Administration. So far so good, but THERE'S NO DOUGH FOR TRIO OR GEAR UP!! Here's the Action Request: Email, call, or fax your Congressional Representative and Senators today. Email might be the easiest, since I imagine we aren't the only folks exercising that "First Amendment" right to petition government (!). Specifically ask that TRIO and GEAR UP funding be added to the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act." Don't know how to email your Representative or Senators? Problem solved! Click on these links: https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml for the House, or http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm for the Senate, and you're there! Don't know what to write in the electronic "comment" box? No problem. Cut and paste something like this: "I am writing as a constituent to urge you to support the addition of $780 million to the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act" for Federal TRIO and GEAR UP programs. These funds will accomplish two goals: 1) ensuring that other Title IV funds for students will result in successful college graduates, and 2) adding immediately approximately 16,000 new full-time jobs for educators and counselors, many of whom will be recent college graduates." Special Tip to Policy Seminar Veterans: You might want to "cc" that Education Aide you've seen in recent years. Note: Please remember "safe lobbying" practices, since you can't use Federal funds to lobby Congress, and you probably aren't authorized by your college to speak on its behalf. Most importantly, use a personal email address, e.g., Yahoo, Hotmail, AOL; never use your college email address for stuff like this. I promise this won't take much time, and this REALLY BIG economic stimulus package provides a unique opportunity for our programs. Thanks.