The Obama administration wants to consolidate federal science programs for minority-serving institutions into a single competitive grant program, a plan that is drawing questions on Capitol Hill.

The president’s 2011 budget would take separate small programs for historically Black colleges and universities, tribal colleges and Hispanic-serving institutions, and re-channel them into a single program, which administration officials said would still be aimed at students of color.

With minorities representing a steadily growing percentage of the U.S. population, “We have to find a way to accelerate growth,” said Dr. Arden Bement, Jr., National Science Foundation (NSF) director, to the House Research and Science Education Subcommittee.

“We felt a consolidated approach is far better than a fragmented approach,” added Bement.

Programs affected by the plan include the HBCU Undergraduates program (HBCU-UP); the Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation; the tribal colleges and universities undergraduate program (TCUP) and Hispanic-serving institutions program. In their place, the administration would create the Comprehensive Broadening Participation of Undergraduate Institutions in STEM.

Administration officials said the plan would increase funding. The consolidated program would receive $103 million in the president’s budget, while the existing small programs received $87 million in fiscal year 2009, Bement said.

While saving administrative costs, the director said the new approach would promote partnerships among MSIs and majority institutions. It would “help build sustainable partnerships and alliances among institutions with strong track records in producing underrepresented STEM graduates,” he said.

NSF faced detailed questioning about the plan from lawmakers such as Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Texas, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. While Johnson did not specifically criticize the plan at the hearing, she released a statement raising questions about the idea.