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CE NEWS


ISSUE 6: JUNE 2014

Inside This Issue
Advocacy Means Relationships
The Education Committees of Congress
ConnectED Developments
Social Media Campaign to Raise the E-Rate Cap
Resources
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Executive Director
 
Advocacy Means Relationships
 

This past week as the Catholic Church in our country has been celebrating the Fortnight for Freedom, Archbishop George Lucas, Chairman of the Committee on Catholic Education for the USCCB visited with select members of the House Education and Workforce Committee and the Senate HELP Committee. Archbishop Lucas reiterated the important work of Catholic schools across the country and the need to support them with appropriate legislation.  The members of Congress appreciated meeting Archbishop Lucas and exchanging ideas about providing quality education to children and young people in our country.

 

In addition to visits on Capitol Hill, Archbishop Lucas spent time with Kathy Knight, Associate Director of Public Policy and Lucas Swanepoel, Associate Director of Government Relations to discuss federal policy issues that are directly affecting Catholic schools.  

 

Associate Director of Public Policy

 
The Education Committees of Congress
 

I thought you would like to know who I have been meeting with on the Hill regarding those public policy issues affecting Catholic Education. Here are the membership lists of the House and Senate education committees as they exist now-but they are moving pieces. Congressman George Miller (Ranking Democrat on the House Education & Workforce Committee) and Senator Tom Harkin (Chair of the Senate HELP Committee) have both announced their retirements. That means Democrats will lose their two strongest congressional leaders on education issues at the end of this year. In addition, there is the possibility that the Republicans will take control of the Senate after mid-term elections in November. This could mean a positive environment for Congressional action on ESEA reauthorization in 2015. If you would like more information on the history and purpose of each committee, just go to these links:

For the House: http://edworkforce.house.gov/  

For the Senate: http://www.help.senate.gov/  

 

House Education and the Workforce Committee

 

 

Republicans Democrats 

John Kline, MN (Chairman)

Thomas E. Petri, WI

Howard P. "Buck" McKeon, CA

Joe Wilson, SC

Virginia Foxx, NC

Tom Price, GA

Kenny Marchant, TX

Duncan Hunter, CA

David P. Roe, TN

Glenn Thompson, PA

Tim Walberg, MI

Matt Salmon, AZ

Brett Guthrie, KY

Scott DesJarlais, TN

Todd Rokita, IN

Larry Bucshon, IN

Lou Barletta, PA

Joseph J. Heck, NV

Mike Kelly, PA

Susan W. Brooks, IN

Richard Hudson, NC

Luke Messer, IN

Bradley Byrne, AL

George Miller, CA(Ranking)

Robert C. "Bobby" Scott, VA

Rub�n Hinojosa, TX

Carolyn McCarthy, NY

John Tierney, MA

Rush Holt, NJ

Susan A. Davis, CA

Ra�l M. Grijalva, AZ

Timothy H. Bishop, NY

David Loebsack, IA

Joe Courtney, CT

Marcia L. Fudge, OH

Jared Polis, CO

Gregorio Sablan, Northern Mariana Islands

Frederica S. Wilson, FL

Suzanne Bonamici, OR

Mark Pocan, WI

Mark Takano, CA

 

 

 

Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee

 

 
Democrats
Republicans

Tom Harkin, IA (Chairman)

Barbara Mikulski, MD

Patty Murray, WA

Bernard Sanders, VT (I)

Robert Casey, PA

Kay Hagan, NC

Al Franken, MN

Michael Bennet, CO

Sheldon Whitehouse, RI

Tammy Baldwin, WI

Christopher Murphy, CT

Elizabeth Warren, MA 

 Lamar Alexander, TN (Ranking)

Michael Enzi, WY

Richard Burr, NC

Johnny Isakson, GA

Rand Paul, KY

Orrin Hatch, UT

Pat Roberts, KS

Lisa Murkowski, AK

Mark Kirk, IL

Tim Scott, SC 

 

ConnectED Developments

            

Earlier this year, President Obama announced substantial commitments of goods and services to his ConnectED initiative by a number of major corporations. These commitments will provide "cutting edge technologies to classrooms" in the form of goods and services. Except for the commitment from Apple and Esri, it was never clear that these initiatives would extend in an equitable way to students and teachers in private schools. The corporations that did not commit to include private schools are Adobe, AT&T, Autodesk, Microsoft, O'Rielly Media, Prezi, Sprint and Verizon.

 

I met with officials from the U.S. Department of Education in April to urge them to encourage the corporations involved to treat all schools equitably.  When that did not produce the desired result, I developed a list of those corporate contacts and wrote to them directly urging that they reconsider private school participation in the ConnectED commitments. CAPE and NCEA also wrote letters and State CAPE's were asked to do the same.

 

Most of the corporations have uploaded applications or registration forms for their goods and services to the White House ConnectED website. I encourage as many individual private schools as possible to write letters to these corporations and to apply/register for participation in these commitments. Go to:

The more they hear from us the better. Together we can make a difference!

Social Media Campaign to Raise the E-Rate Cap

 

Have you tweeted the FCC using the new hashtag #RaiseTheErateCap? See our June 20, 2014 Action Alert issue of the CE News for all the details.