Calif. colleges sue ED over CARES grants – Community College Daily
Five community college districts in California and the state’s community college system filed a lawsuit in federal court on Monday against the U.S. Education Department (ED), charging that its decision to deny emergency aid to hundreds of thousands of students violates the intent of the government’s stimulus aid package.
“The Department of Education ignored the intent of the CARES Act to give local colleges discretion to aid students most affected by the pandemic, and instead has arbitrarily excluded as many as 800,000 community college students,” according to California Community Colleges Chancellor Eloy Ortiz Oakley.
The plaintiffs include Foothill-De Anza, Los Rios, Los Angeles, State Center, and San Diego community college districts.
DACA students excluded
The suit states that when Congress passed the Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund (HEERF), which is part of the CARES Act, colleges were given discretion on how to allocate the funds to students.