Families and individuals today too often face tremendous financial burdens in order to pay the costs of a higher education, and for too many a higher education is simply unaffordable. Yet in today’s global economy, a college degree is more important to one’s success than ever before and constitutes an essential starting point for many career choices and vocations. For these reasons, one of my highest priorities is making college more affordable for Southwest Virginia’s students.

Throughout my service in Congress I have strongly supported measures to increase federal funding for student loan and grant programs. I was pleased to support the College Cost Reduction Act in 2007, which cuts in half by 2011 the interest rates on need-based federal student loans. I am also pleased to report that last week, the U.S. House of Representatives approved the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act with my support. The measure makes the single largest investment in aid to help students and families pay for college in history, and it accomplishes this at no cost to taxpayers.

The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA) will expand access to an affordable college education to more American students, transform early education opportunities, and enhance our outstanding community college system. The measure is also a major step toward achieving President Barack Obama’s initiative to make sure America once again leads the world in college graduates by 2020.

The passage of the SAFRA will help build a stronger, more competitive American economy for the future while saving taxpayers money. Enabling young people to attend college or obtain career training is an essential step toward rebuilding the American economy and ensuring our work force remains the most highly skilled, cutting-edge and effective in the world.

With the largest-ever investment in higher education, this bill will significantly increase government grant and loan assistance for college tuition payments. Pell Grants, already distributed to more than 7 million students, will increase to $6,900 by 2019 from $5,350 today. SAFRA also keeps interest rates low on government-subsidized loans, makes substantial investments in early childhood education, expands the Perkins low-cost loan program to every college in the United States, and simplifies the process of applying for student financial aid.

SAFRA will also reform the system of federal student loans to save the taxpayers $87 billion and will direct $10 billion back to the Treasury to reduce entitlement spending. SAFRA will change the way the student loan system functions by originating new loans through the government’s Direct Loan program but will maintain competition among private lenders and nonprofits to provide top-notch customer service for student borrowers.

This simple change will make college loans more reliable for students and families—and ensure that loans operate in the best interests of borrowers by reducing many of the potential conflicts of interest that exist in the current loan system.

Students are the key to our future, and we must prepare them for that future by ensuring college and career training programs remain affordable for our region’s families. I am pleased that the House has approved this significant investment in student aid.

Rick Boucher is Congressman for the 9th District of Virginia, which includes the New River Valley. You can catch his Capitol Commentary regularly at newrivervoice.com.