The 70/70 Rule

Workforce Pell Grants — created by P.L. 119-21, § 83002 (July 4, 2025) and implemented by the final rule at 91 FR 29254 (May 19, 2026) — extend Pell to short-term workforce programs of at least 8 but under 15 weeks of instruction and 150 to under 600 clock hours. To be and stay eligible, a program must demonstrate, among other requirements:

• a completion rate of at least 70%, measured within 150% of the program's normal time; and
• a job placement rate of at least 70%, measured as employment during the second quarter after completion, from state wage records.

For driver training, this is the largest funding-access change since ELDT itself — and it converts your completion and placement records from paperwork into the asset that keeps grant money flowing. We watched the same dynamic in 2009–2014, when 90/10 and Gainful Employment reporting reshaped which vocational schools thrived. The schools that owned their numbers won.

An eligible workforce program (34 CFR 690.92) must clear all of these:

• Length: at least 8 but under 15 weeks of instruction, and 150–<600 clock hours (or 4–<16 semester/trimester hours, or 6–<24 quarter hours). The 8-week floor binds on its own — an accelerated 3–4-week CDL program is ineligible regardless of clock hours.
• Governor approval (34 CFR 690.93), after consultation with the state workforce board: alignment with high-skill, high-wage, or in-demand occupations; employer hiring requirements; a stackable, portable credential; transferable credit.
• Secretary determination (34 CFR 690.94), including at least one year of operating history before application.
• The 70/70 rates, certified by the Governor through AY 2028-29, then measured under 34 CFR 668.8(f) and occupation-matched wage records.
• The value-added earnings test (34 CFR 690.95), with Secretary determinations starting AY 2029-30.
• Not delivered by correspondence, study abroad, or direct assessment; institution clean of Title IV enforcement actions for five years.

No program category is automatically eligible. CDL and driver training programs are strong candidates — high-demand occupations, clock-hour structures that fit the band — but each program earns its own approval.

Threshold: at least 70% of students complete within 150% of the program's normal time. A 10-week program's window is 15 weeks. Four exclusions apply to both numerator and denominator: death, total disability, military service over 30 days, incarceration.

Threshold: at least 70% of completers employed during the second calendar quarter after exit, per state administrative data (UI wage records). A June completer's measurement quarter is October–December. Through AY 2028-29, any employment counts and the Governor calculates the rate; after AY 2028-29, employment must be in the trained-for occupation (by SOC code) or a comparable high-skill, high-wage, or in-demand occupation.

Practical consequences for a driver-training program:

• Your placement follow-up needs employer, start date, and occupation — not just "got hired."
• Wage records lag; the student you can't find in the data is a placement you don't get credit for. Collect where graduates went at graduation and verify later.
• 1099 owner-operators may not appear in UI wage records — a structural issue for trucking placement rates worth raising with your state's process early.

From award year 2029-30, the Secretary computes each program's value-added earnings: median earnings of working Pell-recipient completers (regionally price-adjusted) minus 150% of the single-person poverty line. Your published tuition and fees may not exceed that number. Zero or negative VAE means ineligibility plus a liability for Pell disbursed in the measured year (34 CFR 690.95–.96). Cohorts pool by six-digit CIP code and need 30 completers sent / 16 matched earnings records to compute.

Until then, the Governor certifies having weighed program cost against expected occupational wages. Translation: your tuition-to-outcomes story is now a federal eligibility variable — price accordingly.