Kline, Alexander Respond to Administration’s College Ratings Proposal

WASHINGTON, D.C., Dec. 19 – House Education and the Workforce Committee Chairman John Kline (R-MN) and Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Ranking Member Lamar Alexander (R-TN) issued the following statements after the Department of Education released the framework for an unprecedented college ratings system:

“The same administration that created the HealthCare.gov debacle, now wants to arbitrarily grade and rank our nation’s diverse system of colleges and universities,” said Chairman Kline. “The Department of Education seems to believe it is a better judge of what students need rather than the students themselves. After working for more than a year on this unprecedented scheme, the department clearly hasn’t begun to figure it out. We should be looking for opportunities to empower students and families with information that allows them to make informed decisions. This should be done through commonsense reforms of the law, and there is already strong bipartisan support for such an effort. This so-called college ratings system is a fool’s errand and the secretary should stop it immediately.”

Alexander said: “Trying to create yet another complicated, federal system—this time for grading our country's 6,000 colleges and universities—is every bit as impossible and unnecessary as it sounds and is sure to fall flat on its face. Making sure students have access to the information they need to pick the right school is important and something we will discuss during the next reauthorization of the Higher Education Act, but I can’t support letting Washington bureaucrats use taxpayer dollars to fund a higher education popularity contest.”

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For access to this release and Ranking Member Alexander’s other statements, click here.