In addition to the political turmoil with US House of Representatives recently, there are a number of important federal issues happening with related to community colleges.
Better FAFSA
Recently, ACCT joined a coalition letter asking the Department of Education's Office of Federal Student Aid to release the date of when they plan to launch the new FAFSA so that institutions, students, and other organizations can plan ahead and prepare. The full letter is here and urges action: "With the traditional launch date of October 1 in the past, it is imperative now that you finalize and announce the form’s release date. Stakeholders are hard at work planning for the release, but there is a limit to how much they can do without knowing exactly when the form will become available. Because the timeline for completing the FAFSA will be much shorter than it has been in recent years, every day counts when it comes to supporting students and families through the new process."
Overtime Rules
The US Department of Labor has proposed regulations that would move the salary for exempt positions for overtime significantly. They are accepting comments through November 7, 2023. We have been gathering information from Iowa's community college on the impact of this change and plan to submit comments.