On March 18, 1998 House Resolution 379 was referred to the House Rules Committee. It was introduced by Representatives Druce, Stairs, Cowell, Lynch, Masland, Fichter, McCall, Waugh, Herman, Hennessey, Battisto, Pippy, Saylor, Vance, Melio, Geist, Nailor, Staback, Dent, Schroder, Kaiser, Youngblood, Olasz, Rubley, Pesci, Maitland, Shaner, Colafella, Hershey, McNaughton, Trello, Miller, Argall, Browne, Schuler, Laughlin, M. Cohen, Dally, E.Z. Taylor, Orie, Seyfert, Benninghoff, and Wilt. HR379 directed the Subcommittee on Higher Education of the Committee on Education to study the increasing student cost of postsecondary education. The Subcommittee Members included Representatives Carone, Druce, Flick, Herman, Krebs, Major, Stevenson, and Stairs with Representative Carone as Chairman of the Majority Members. Representatives Robinson, Curry, Santoni, Steelman, Williams and Cowell with Representative Robinson as Chairman of the Minority Members. The Subcommittee held various committee and informational meetings around the Commonwealth as well as here at the Capitol. The Resolution also resolved that the subcommittee was to publish and submit its findings and list of recommendations to the House of Representatives no later than November 30, 1998, at which time the duties of the Subcommittee expired unless otherwise extended by a vote of the House of Representatives. The House of Representatives adopted House Resolution 379 on March 30, 1998. The Resolution directed the Subcommittee to conduct a thorough study of student costs to attend the Commonwealth’s institutions of postsecondary education: public, private, not-for-profit and proprietary institutions and credit and noncredit programs. The Subcommittee also studied the trends, which have an impact upon those factors that serve to increase and decrease those costs, including the effect of State statutes and regulations governing higher education, student financial aid and financial support for institutions; evaluated the missions of the various postsecondary sectors as areas of priority funding; and forecast the adequacy of the State’s current financial support to keep the cost of acquiring a postsecondary education affordable. House Resolution 379 required the Subcommittee to hold discussions with business and labor leaders, representatives of the postsecondary education community including administrators, faculty, students and their families, and the public. The Subcommittee adopted the various recommendations in regards to: Statewide Coordination, Funding, Sponsorship, Geographic Access, Collaboration and Articulation, and Workforce Development. This collection is organized chronologically by date. The audiotapes of the meetings were removed and placed with the Special Media Collection of the House Records and Archives Center with its own finding aid. The collection of audiotapes from this Special and Select Committee filled up two and a half audiotape boxes.