The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday voted to pass along the 2011 budget bill that includes Education Department appropriations with no changes to the higher education provisions approved Tuesday by a subcommittee. As it stands, the bill keeps funding unchanged from 2010 levels for most financial aid and access programs, and boosts the National Institutes of Health's budget by $1 billion, to $32 billion. Also unchanged from the subcommittee bill is the absence of funding to make up for the $5.7 billion Pell Grant shortfall. The House of Representatives' appropriations bill included that money, but the Senate committee's Democratic members said that a means for addressing it would have to wait until it goes before the full Senate this fall, or when it is combined with the House measure in conference.
