Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) pressured President Joe Biden to forgive $50,000 of student loan debt Thursday.

“College, which has always been a ladder up, can now be an anchor that weighs you down because of the enormous amount of student debt that so many have,” Schumer said . “Debt is just up to people’s neck and maybe even worse.”

Schumer seems to be following Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D-MA) lead on the initiative, who tweeted on April 12, “I graduated from a state school that cost $50 a semester. That opportunity is simply not out there today. Two out of every three people who go to a state school today have to borrow money to graduate. That is not how we build a future.”

In the House, Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), who is black, also joined calls to forgive loans. “Canceling student debt by executive action is one of the most effective ways President Biden can provide sweeping relief to millions of families while helping to reduce the racial wealth gap and to lay the groundwork for an equitable and just long-term recovery,” she said .

Pressley has also said the “crisis” is a manufactured one. “The student debt crisis is not naturally occurring. This crisis was crafted in these hallowed halls. Policy decisions were made that ensnared generations in the student debt trap,” Pressley testified during a United States Senate Committee hearing on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs which Warren hosted.

According to a study, “Only a quarter of college students born into the bottom half of the income distribution will get a bachelor’s degree by age 24; meanwhile, 90% of those in the top quartile will get their degree.”

Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC) believes “The promise of canceling mass amounts of student loan creates a significant moral hazard,” he said Friday. And “does nothing for the 200 million Americans that do not have student loan debt, and never attended college.”

Burr continued to say canceling student debt will establish a dangerous precedent, whereby future students will expect their loans to be forgiven and will cause injustice to those who have faithfully repaid their loans.

Even so, Pressley argued , “If President Biden is serious about closing the racial wealth gap, then he must use his executive authority to issue broad-based, across the board student debt cancellation.”

Sens. Mitt Romney (R-UT) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) have introduced a bill to forgive student debt of “low-income” individuals. The legislation proposes that “funds can be used to pay for tuition, books, and other education-related expenses that might otherwise prevent them from attending,” Breitbart News reported .

National Offer Day lans on April 16 this year.

That means hundreds of thousands of families across England are anxiously waiting to hear whether their child has been offered their first choice of primary school.

Official data shows that 90.2% of pupils last year were offered their first choice of primary school, which was down slightly from 90.6% in 2019.

Hopefully the majority of families will this year find out that their children have been accepted by their Primary school of choice.

But if you’re unhappy with the decision you might be considering appealing. Here is what you can do as a parent.

What to do if your child doesn’t get offered their school of choice

The most important thing is not to worry. If your child hasn’t been offered their school of choice, you are entitled to appeal the decision.

You’ll be sent a letter about the decision, and it will usually tell you how to appeal.

Keep in mind that you have to appeal each rejection separately, and you can only appeal once against each.

The first thing you should do if find out who to appeal to, this will depend on the type of school.

The appeals form is provided by the local authority, or should be submitted to the school itself, if they aren’t run by a local authority.

Then check the admissions policy of the school by referring to their website, or local authority website.

Ensure you have followed their appeal policy correctly.

Filling in the appeals form is your opportunity to make a strong case.

You don’t need to go into great detail at this stage, but outline the main grounds for the appeal.

You can include any supporting documentary such as a letter from your GP or child psychologist.

When is the deadline to appeal?

If you do want to go ahead and appeal, you should do this as soon as you receive a refusal letter.

The appeal should be submitted no later than 5pm on Friday, May 14.

The admission authority for the school have to allow at least 20 school days to appeal.

If you submit anything after the deadline it might not be considered, resulting in delays to your hearing.

What will happen after I appeal?

You should receive confirmation of receipt of your form within a week, and then be notified when the appeals panel hearing will take place.

After you’ve sent in your appeals form you will have the chance to present your case in front of a panel.

This will be very different this year.

Last year, the Department for Education (DfE) changed its rules amid the coronavirus pandemic so that parents unhappy with their school place would not have to make an appeal in person.

The temporary change has been extended until the end of September 2021 due to restrictions.

Appeal panel hearings will be able to take place “either in person, by telephone, video conference or through a paper-based appeal”.

It’s helpful to bring any documentary that supports the statements you made in your form.

SINGAPORE – Mr Manogaran Suppiah, 61, learnt Tamil only from a tutor at home for three years when he was in primary school.

But that did not deter the Anderson Serangoon Junior College principal and chairman of the Tamil Language Council from honing his interest in the language.

Today, he believes that the language has a more vibrant future here, thanks to the efforts of a high-level committee. His views, and that of other educators and community leaders, are featured in a book published by the Tamil Language Learning and Promotion Committee (TLLPC) to mark its 15th year.

Titled Naavil Thamizh Naalum Thamizh (Speak Tamil, Speak it Everyday) the book was launched at the Umar Pulavar Tamil Language Centre on Friday (April 16) by Minister for Communications and Information S. Iswaran, who chaired the TLLPC from 2006 to 2016. Also at the event was the current TLLPC chairman, MP for Sembawang GRC Vikram Nair.

The book includes a foreword by Senior Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam, and highlights the work of stakeholders such as educators, young people and members of the community. It also details future plans of TLLPC.

Speaking at the event, which was livestreamed, Mr Iswaran said that for Tamil to continue thriving as a living language in Singapore, lessons for students should be designed impactfully to cultivate a lifelong love for it.

He added that the recent announcement by the Ministry of Education about introducing Higher Tamil language in Primary 3 and 4 will also create opportunities for students to sharpen their language proficiency and deepen understanding from a young age.

Said senior teacher Baskaran Ganga, 47, from Choa Chu Kang Secondary School: “I am very proud of 15 years of TLLPC. The Government provides us huge financial support to run programmes for students.”

The book launch also included cultural and dance performances and a poetry recital by student Ahila Anbazhagan, 17, from Yishun Innova Junior College.

She said: “(Young people) must start speaking Tamil from home as practice makes perfect, and cultivate a habit of reading literature books. It is extremely important to speak Tamil as it is an aspect of our identity in a multiracial country.”

About 96 per cent of all students took part in the month of full home-based learning, said Second Minister for Education Indranee Rajah in Parliament yesterday.

“The few who did not participate were largely on medical leave, and those who did not participate persistently were encouraged to return to school,” she said, in response to Ms Rahayu Mahzam (Jurong GRC), who asked how schools assessed whether students have the necessary support at home.

During this period of full home-based learning, about 3,300 primary school pupils and 700 secondary school students returned to school daily for several reasons, said Ms Indranee.

Ms Rahayu had also asked if there were requests from parents for students to attend school, which could not be acceded to.

Said Ms Indranee: “Requests from parents for their children to return to school were met, as long as there were genuine needs.

“The challenge has in fact been the opposite, where schools invite the student to come back to school, but the parents were reluctant over various reasons. But schools will continue to try.”

Full home-based learning, which started on April 8 and ended yesterday, was implemented in line with Singapore’s circuit breaker measures aimed at curbing the spread of the coronavirus.

Ms Indranee said schools had also identified a proportion of students who would benefit from returning to school during this period, based on their understanding of the student and his/her family circumstances, parents’ requests, and referrals from social workers.

These include students whose parents are in essential services and do not have alternative care-giving arrangements. These students can also access limited services offered by school-based student care centres.

Schools also reached out to students who face significant challenges learning at home, as well as those who require face-to-face support, said Ms Indranee.

“Schools proactively identified these students and encouraged them to return to school, by providing a welcoming environment and additional small-group activities, such as non-contact sports and enrichment modules, while practising safe distancing,” she added.

“This has helped them to stay connected and engaged, and maintain a school-going routine.”

Another group of students who needed more support were those who lacked digital devices or Internet access at home for learning.

Ms Indranee said that schools have loaned more than 20,000 computing devices and 1,600 Internet-enabling devices to date, with some corporate support.

“The numbers coming back to schools for this purpose have dropped significantly since, to a small group whose parents do not wish to (take up the) loan for personal reasons,” she added.

The period of full home-based learning has been a learning process for families as well as schools, said Ms Indranee in response to Ms Rahayu’s question on the challenges that parents and teachers had faced.

“Certainly the first week, there was quite a lot of adjustment and learning that had to take place, but a couple weeks on… things have more or less stabilised,” said Ms Indranee. “It has gone on much better than we had hoped, but not without challenges.”

These challenges include parents learning how to use software while handling their work from home, and supporting multiple children, some with special needs.

“No two children are exactly alike. Some have taken to home-based learning very well. Some others need more offline learning,” she said, adding that teachers have tried to maintain contact with parents and find solutions together.

For students who need support beyond lessons, school counsellors and social welfare officers have also reached out to them, through phone or video calls, or e-mails, she said.

The Education Ministry is starting to look at the feedback it has received, she said.

More than a month after LSU released the report by the law firm Husch Blackwell on the university’s past failures in handling complaints of sexual misconduct and dating violence on campus, LSU’s Title IX coordinator has been reassigned, and a few other employees have seen their job duties change.

The changes come as the turmoil surrounding LSU has spread to the Capitol, where some lawmakers have chided university administrators for not doing more — especially firing people — over the problems Husch Blackwell highlighted. The Senate Select Committee on Women and Children has repeatedly expressed frustration to Tom Galligan, the university’s interim president, over how LSU has handled the report, and House Appropriations Chairman Jerome “Zee” Zeringue told Galligan this week to relay a message that lawmakers are disappointed in LSU’s Board of Supervisors over its “lack of action.”

Galligan has maintained it would be unfair to fire LSU employees who were unsure how to report or to whom they should report instances of sexual misconduct. He said LSU is drilling down with training to make reporting rules clearer, including that all LSU employees — with the exception of a few counselors and advisers bound by confidentiality — are required to report allegations of sexual misconduct on campus to Title IX. He also said LSU is drafting a policy to make it clear that employees can be fired if they fail to do so.

“The most difficult thing will be the cultural changes that we need to see,” Galligan said in an interview with The Advocate | The Times-Picayune. “And it may be in America, but at LSU, at least, that sexual assault and violence is not tolerated. And so if I’m in a position as a person where I realize I’m approaching a line with another person, it needs to be innate that I stop. If I know something, it needs to be innate that I can’t sleep at night until I report it to the Title IX coordinator.”

LSU’s Title IX coordinator, Jennie Stewart, has been reassigned; she is now the coordinator responsible for ensuring that LSU complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act. ADA compliance had been among Stewart’s job duties since 2018, according to the Husch Blackwell report. But the change means that Stewart will focus only on ADA compliance, and will no longer will oversee Title IX reporting.

In the Title IX coordinator role, Stewart was in charge of how the university handled investigations into complaints that students were sexually assaulted or victimized by domestic violence. Her decision-making came under fire repeatedly: Some students who went through the investigative process said Stewart seemed dismissive of their complaints, and others have called on her to resign.

Husch Blackwell found that while LSU’s Title IX office under Stewart bungled some cases, Stewart also repeatedly warned LSU that the office was understaffed and needed more resources. The firm said “it is hard to see how someone could be successful with all of these roles” assigned to Stewart.

LSU is hiring a consultant to temporarily handle Stewart’s past Title IX coordinator role until a permanent replacement is found. The university is also hiring additional staff to beef up the Title IX office. Overall, LSU expects to spend $1 million this year on those changes and to hire around 18 specialists.

Job duties have also changed for Senior Associate Athletic Director Miriam Segar, who recently returned to campus after a 21-day suspension based on Husch Blackwell’s findings.

For years, Segar had been the point person in the LSU Athletic Department for anyone who had a complaint of sexual misconduct, domestic violence or a similar encounter. LSU employees told Husch Blackwell that they believed Segar to be the “Athletics Title IX Coordinator.” Former LSU Athletics Director Joe Alleva created a departmentwide policy that instructed employees to report misconduct to Segar.

The law firm found Segar made a mistake in 2016 by keeping former star running back Derrius Guice’s name off a report of rape from a member of LSU’s swimming and diving team.

“Because of this omission, when Guice was accused of subsequent misconduct by other students … this initial report was not considered or revisited,” Husch Blackwell attorneys wrote.

Guice has been accused of sexual misconduct by four women during his time at LSU. His attorney has denied he did anything wrong.

Since she has returned to work, Segar is no longer the point person for reports of sexual assault within LSU Athletics. Segar still has other Title IX duties in the Athletic Department,  including gender equity.

Segar’s attorney, Mary Olive Pierson, has said that Segar’s job duties were “misrepresented” in the Husch Blackwell report.

“Ms. Segar has dutifully reported all complaints received by her to the proper departments for further action,” Pierson wrote in a recent letter to the Senate committee, declining its request for Segar to testify.

“There was only one time that Ms. Segar did not directly report a complaint to the affected department and that was the occasion when she actually drove the complaining party to Campus Police to file a police report and Campus Police had a responsibility to forward the report to the proper department,” Pierson continued.

LSU’s Associate Dean of Students Jonathan Sanders is also no longer overseeing decision-making about how to punish Title IX offenders, among other students found responsible for violating university policies. LSU announced earlier this month that Sanders was under “a review that includes checking facts in recent media articles as well as the Husch Blackwell report.”

Sanders has been reassigned to a role overseeing special projects in LSU’s Student Affairs office.

Several students have complained that even after their perpetrators were found responsible for violating Title IX or other LSU policies, Sanders doled out light punishments. Among those were “deferred suspensions,” where students would remain on campus and only be suspended if they committed another violation.

USA Today found that LSU expelled just one student for rape, dating violence or other similar misconduct from 2016 through 2020, despite finding 46 students responsible for those offenses.

Though LSU’s Executive Deputy Athletic Director Verge Ausberry was also suspended for a month after the release of the Husch Blackwell report, Galligan said that Ausberry’s job duties have remained the same upon his return to work. Ausberry failed to report a text message that he received in 2018 from a football player who admitted to hitting his girlfriend. Ausberry said he called the football player after receiving it, and that he recanted his confession.

He wrote in a recent letter to the Senate Select Committee on Women and Children that he looked “forward to working with the University to implement the recommendations of Husch Blackwell.”

LSU has named Senior Vice Provost Jane Cassidy as the university’s interim vice president for Civil Rights and Title IX as the university releases updates on its progress on 18 recommendations from Husch Blackwell.

Some that LSU has checked off: Changing the reporting line for the Title IX coordinator, who was moved under Cassidy’s purview; creating targeted training for athletics; and finalizing a memorandum of understanding between LSUPD and the campus.

Galligan said LSUPD is now sharing reports of sexual assault and domestic violence with the Title IX office. Husch Blackwell faulted LSUPD for previously not sharing those reports, saying the department was misinterpreting state law.