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• Investigate postsecondary institutions that fail to honor their Section 117 obligations and make appropriate referrals to DOJ.

• Work with Congress to amend the HEA to tie the HEA’s foreign source reporting requirements to an institution’s ability to receive federal financial assistance, particularly participation in programs funded under Titles IV and VI of the HEA.

Allowing Competency-Based Education to Flourish

Competency-based education is a promising approach that could provide a high-quality and affordable education to many students. Since the credit hour, which measures the time in the classroom, is inappropriate for such programs, the direct assessment method was introduced to allow competency-based programs to participate in the federal financial aid programs. However, overregulation has hampered the usage of direct assessment, with the leading competency-based university choosing to instead convert their courses into credit hours for compliance purposes. One of the leading obstacles is the requirement that courses include “regular and substantive” interaction between faculty and students.

• Newregulations should clarify the definition and requirements of regular and substantive interaction for competency-based education, as well as for online programs.

Reforming “Area Studies” Funding

• Congress should wind down so-called “area studies” programs at universities (Title VI of the HEA), which, although intended to serve American interests, sometimes fund programs that run counter to those interests.

• Inthe meantime, the next Administration should promulgate a new regulation to require the Secretary of Education to allocate at least 40 percent of funding to international business programs that teach about free markets and economics and require institutions, faculty, and fellowship recipients to certify that they intend to further the stated statutory goals of serving American interests.