Insight into key CARES Act questions – Community College Daily
Congress and the president quickly approved the CARES Act in March to provide $14 billion in emergency funding to colleges and students to help them with challenges resulting from the coronavirus pandemic. The U.S. Education Department (ED) then issued a series of guidance on how colleges can use the funds, but there have been plenty of questions around those recommendations.
To help us better understand the legislation and guidance, Megan Coval, vice president of policy and federal relations at the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA), provides some insight into the legislation and ED’s guidance in the Q&A below.
Q: The CARES Act was a $2 trillion dollar stimulus bill. How much of those funds were for higher education, and how were they allocated?
Coval: The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act provided nearly $14 billion in funding for higher education through the creation of the Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund (HEERF). The amount was divided into three buckets: