Omnibus Bill Funding Levels for STEM Education

As we noted here, the House and Senate both passed a behemoth omnibus bill this week. The President has said he expects to sign the law by the middle of next week. In the meantime, a fourth CR was signed into law today to fund government operations through Dec. 31st. The final omnibus bill number is HR 2764 (formerly the State and Foreign Operations spending bill), and has been dubbed the “Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2008.” Within it, each appropriations bill is placed in its own “division;” each division includes an “explanatory statement,” which notes any departures from the last spending levels set by the House and Senate. If not otherwise noted, the last available House and/or Senate levels are maintained (however, please see note [3] on the Commerce-Justice-Science (CJS) chart for a more specific explanation on how some funding levels were determined). Below is a list of the divisions that the three STEM education-related appropriations bills we have been following fall into, along with a link to the corresponding explanatory statements, which are still in draft form with handwritten notes. Beneath each division heading are charts laying out final funding levels for each of these three areas of appropriations, along with some helpful quotes in the CJS section on NSF.

- Division B: Commerce-Justice-Science (provides funding for NSF, NASA, NOAA, etc.; PDF draft of explanatory statement available at http://www.rules.house.gov/110/text/omni/jes/jesdivb.pdf)

*Click on chart to enlarge
Also, here are a few helpful notes from the text of the NSF Education and Human Resources (EHR) section in the explanatory statement of the omnibus bill:

Regarding STEM education in general -- “NSF not only includes research, but also shares in the responsibility for promoting quality math and science education as intertwining objectives at all levels of education across the United States. Math and science educators play a major role in keeping the U.S. competitive in the 21st century. Increasing the number of highly qualified K-12 math and science teachers is critical to the creation of a new generation of innovators.”

Regarding the Math and Science Partnership program -- “The Math and Science Partnership program remains a high priority of the Committees. The Math and Science Partnership program provides for the collaboration between pre-college and college to promote excellence in teaching and learning.”

Regarding other STEM education programs at NSF -- “The Committees are strongly supportive of the following programs and urge the Foundation to provide funding at the requested level for these programs: the Undergraduate/Graduate Student Support account and the Graduate Teaching Fellowships in K12, the NSF Academies for Young Scientists, Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), the HBCU Undergraduate Program, the Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP), the Tribal Colleges and Universities Program (TCUP) and the STEM Talent Expansion program.”

- Division C: Energy and Water (provides funding for Department of Energy Office of Science, etc.; PDF draft of explanatory statement available at http://www.rules.house.gov/110/text/omni/jes/jesdivc.pdf)

*Click on chart to enlarge

- Division G: Labor-HHS-Education (provides funding for education, including Math and Science Partnerships within No Child Left Behind; PDF draft of explanatory statement available at http://www.rules.house.gov/110/text/omni/jes/jesdivg.pdf)

*Click on chart to enlarge
As a final note for readers, there will not be any new updates until at least the 2nd of January, when we will return from the holidays. Happy Holidays to all those reading!

Update: The President did sign the bill into law on December 26, and released this statement, providing an overview of the Administration’s position on the omnibus package; the Senate Majority leader released this statement.