HF3638 Summary

• Appropriates $6 million to higher education agencies in fiscal years 2018-2019, including $500,000 to the Office of Higher Education for state grants, agricultural loan forgiveness, and student loan debt counseling programs, and $5.5 million to Minnesota State Colleges and Universities for cyber security and workforce development scholarships.

• Expands sexual assault victim protections at postsecondary institutions by requiring comprehensive victim rights policies including confidentiality protections, support services, campus disciplinary procedures with victim participation, and annual reporting of sexual assault incident statistics.

• Establishes a student loan debt counseling grant program under the Office of Higher Education to provide individualized repayment counseling to Minnesota borrowers through a qualified nonprofit organization, with a goal of providing two counseling sessions to 75 percent of participants.

• Modifies the regent selection process by renaming the "Regent Candidate Advisory Council" to "Legislative Commission on Regent Selection" and changing its composition to eight legislative members (four from each chamber) instead of 24 general members.

• Makes clarifying changes to loan repayment terms for SELF loans, creates special revenue accounts for loan forgiveness programs, and requires colleges to develop plans for affordable textbook use by January 15, 2020.