During the past holiday season, President Obama signed a new bill that provides broad direction for the federal budget through 2015, alleviating some of the sequester cuts. The Bipartisan Budget Act restores roughly $63 billion in discretionary funding to the Department of Defense and to some domestic agencies in 2014 and 2015. It also includes $85 billion in deficit reduction.
The National Association for Music Education, a member of the Committee for Education Funding (CEF), is pleased that some of these monies will be made available for education funding. The sequester cuts have taken a great toll on national support for education, however, and the damage is still very severe. As such, CEF sent key appropriations staff a letter, which NAfME signed, asking them to work to restore the sequester cuts to education funding.
As Congress resumes, lawmakers will still need to approve legislation authorizing spending through the end of the fiscal year, and NAfME will continue to advocate on behalf of education funding during those conversations, as well. Thank you for your continued support, and happy new year!
