Jared C. Bass is the senior director for Higher Education at American Progress. Prior to this role, Bass was a professional staff member on the House Appropriations Committee, where he helped shape COVID-19 relief legislation, including the CARES Act, Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act, and the American Rescue Plan.
He has also served as senior counsel for education and strategy in the Education Policy program at New America; the federal director at the Postsecondary National Policy Institute; a senior policy adviser within the Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development at the U.S. Department of Education; and the lead higher education staffer on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce—Democratic Staff.
Before coming to Washington, D.C., Bass shaped policy at the state and local levels of American government. He worked as a research fellow in the Office of the Philadelphia City Council President and served as a legislative fellow in the Delaware House of Representatives. Bass attended the James E. Beasley School of Law at Temple University, where he was a Rubin-Presser Public Interest Scholar. He holds a master’s degree from the Joseph R. Biden Jr. School of Public Policy and Administration at the University of Delaware, where he was awarded the Outstanding Master’s Student Award and the Pauline E. Loessner Memorial Award. Bass received his bachelor’s degree from Eastern University.
Jared Bass discusses what the U.S. Congress must do next to address the root causes of the student debt crisis.
Jared Bass discusses why President Joe Biden’s student debt cancellation plan was a meaningful step in what should be a broader mission of upholding the promise of higher education.
Student debt cancellation is a bold step for the higher education system—and one that will benefit a wide cross-section of people and communities throughout the country.
Student debt cancellation would help people of all ages, reduce the racial wealth gap, and help borrowers weather turmoil in the student loan system.
Meeting the urgency of the college affordability and student debt crisis will require bold action to restore the promise of opportunity for all Americans.
The recent rash of bomb threats against historically Black colleges and universities is just one of the numerous signs that America is at risk of winding the clock backward when it comes to opportunities for Black students in higher education.
