Title 20 › Chapter 55— EDUCATION OF THE DEAF › Subchapter II— GENERAL PROVISIONS › § 4357
Allows Gallaudet University and the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (NTID) to create permanent federal endowment funds to help them become more financially independent. The Secretary and each school’s board can make the fund and sign agreements to run it. The Secretary will pay into each fund from money Congress provides. Each year the Secretary will match, dollar for dollar, non‑Federal donations actually given that fiscal year (but not transfers from the school’s other endowment funds), if money is available. The federal part and the fund’s income must be invested in certain low‑risk ways (like through approved cooperative service organizations or investments allowed for regulated insurance companies in the school’s State). The schools must act prudently when investing. They may not buy real estate with the fund, invest in companies controlled by certain officials, or encumber the fund without written permission. The schools may not spend the fund’s corpus, and may only use income for necessary school expenses (operations, staff, building work, student and community services, research, etc.), not for commercial purposes. They must keep income records. Normally they may spend up to 50% of the income earned in the current fiscal year; the Secretary can allow more or allow corpus use in cases of financial emergency, life‑threatening disaster or arson, or other urgent situations. Money matched in a given year is no longer subject to the special investment limits after 10 fiscal years following the fiscal year in which the funds are matched, and income from that money is then free of those investment and withdrawal limits. After notice and a hearing, the Secretary may recover Federal payments if a school misuses funds, breaks the investment rules, or fails to account for the fund. Key terms: corpus = Federal payments + non‑Federal gifts + capital gains and reinvested income; Federal endowment fund = the fund set up under these rules to produce income for the school; income = interest and dividends from the corpus; institution involved = Gallaudet or NTID. Congress authorized "such sums as may be necessary" for these purposes for each fiscal year 2009 through 2014, and those amounts remain available until spent. These rules take effect as if they were part of the law on August 4, 1986.
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Legislative History
Reference
Citation
20 U.S.C. § 4357
Title 20 — Education
Last Updated
Apr 5, 2026
Release point: 119-73not60