(WASHINGTON, D.C.) – U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash.) today succeeded in including a number of measures that will help high school students to reach graduation in the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee version of the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act. The Perkins Act is the primary federal legislation to provide funding for high schools.
The provisions that Murray included in the bill are parts of her Pathways for All Students to Succeed (PASS) Act, which focuses on individualized plans, intensive skills training and increased academic counseling as a way to ensure high school success.
“I am pleased to have provided an important new focus on our high schools in the Perkins Act. For too many students, graduation and college seem out of reach. Now the Perkins Act includes more of the tools needed to reach these students earlier and put them on a track to graduate,” Senator Murray said.
Murray succeeded in incorporating the following PASS Act provisions into the Perkins Act:
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Individualized graduation and career plans to help students work with teachers and counselors to ensure they are on a path to graduate -
Increased focus on academic and career counseling in high schools – to ensure that students understand what classes they need to graduate, get into college, and enter certain fields of work -
Increased focus on ensuring that students in the Perkins program (vocational education) earn a high school diploma
The Perkins Act will now go to the full Senate for consideration.
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