Pell Grants open a lot of doors, but they rely on a solvent government.

Food Stamps helped keep me from going hungry, and Pell grants helped me go to college.

Funding and maintaining programs from Head Start to Pell Grants must be a high priority.

Pell Grants aren't 'welfare,' they are a gateway to opportunity for some of our nation's best and brightest students.

That's how the Pell Grant system works, in that you get a flat dollar amount, and you can use it for tuition or room and board.

Pell Grants are, and have been, critically important tools in making higher education a possibility for lower- and middle-income students.

So you can go to college on Pell Grants - maybe I should not be telling anybody this because it's turning out to be the welfare of the 21st century.

We simply can't keep providing money from the federal government in the form of subsidized or actual loans and Pell Grants when we don't have the money.

The Republicans claim they are for strengthening Pell grants when the truth is that over the last four years, their legislation has done the exact opposite.

Any cut to Pell Grants means low-income must take out additional loans or work longer hours - risk factors that increase their odds of dropping out of school.

For millions of Americans, federally subsidized student loans and Pell Grants are an important resource for us to get ahead so we can achieve the American dream.

I've met students across Rhode Island who rely on Pell Grants. They work hard, play by rules, and are doing everything they can to get the education they need for the jobs of tomorrow.

The Pell Grant is more than a financial aid program for college students in need. It is the right thing to do for America's college students, and it is the right thing to do for America's economy.

What happens once you get a felony conviction? Now you are entering this American caste system where you can't get a job, you can't get a loan, you can't get a Pell grant, you can't get public housing.

Immortality awaits the legislator fortunate enough to have a significant law named after him. Think of Pell grants or Stafford loans for students, Sarbanes-Oxley to regulate Wall Street, or the Hyde Amendment on abortions.

Pell grants are the foundation of Federal student aid. As someone who attended college with the help of Pell grants and as chairman of the Pell Grant Caucus, I know how important they are for our Nation's low-income students.

When Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell first proposed the grants that now bear his name, he envisioned a way to help students attend our country's wonderful colleges and universities, so they could share in the American Dream.

I am disappointed that Senator Ayotte has voted repeatedly for deep cuts in Pell Grants that would make college more expensive for thousands of New Hampshire students and voted against allowing young people to refinance their student loans.

In my family, there was one cardinal priority - education. College was not an option; it was mandatory. So even though we didn't have a lot of money, we made it work. I signed up for financial aid, Pell Grants, work study, anything I could.

Given the best of all possible worlds, I would make a few changes. I would place emphasis on increasing the amount of funding that goes into programs like Pell Grants, that purely and simply award funds to students who really cannot afford full tuition.

Pell grants are critical tools for lower- and middle-income students to access higher education, and by expanding access to year-round courses, we can help non-traditional students complete their education sooner, allowing them to start their careers and pay off their loans.

I am here to give the American people some straight talk about higher education. Some have said we might have cut financial aid for college students. The truth is we have expanded access to college for our neediest students through the record growth of the Pell grant program.

It is important for women to have a choice, to have an opportunity to plan their families, because if they don't, the Republicans have said this is an ownership society. You are on your own, and they're going to begrudge that child everything, from WIC to a Pell Grant to health insurance.

The higher amount you put into higher education, at the federal level particularly, the more the price of higher education rises. It's the dog that never catches its tail. You increase student loans, you increase grants, you increase Pell grants, Stafford loans, and what happens? They raise the price.

The difficulty is, Pell Grants are an attempt to do the right thing, and that is to give the low-income student an opportunity to access higher education, and that's a good thing. And welfare was an attempt to help those most in need. The difficulty is, often times a program is so successful that it grows and grows and grows and grows.

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