WASHINGTON – The Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday adopted a proposal by Sen. Olympia J. Snowe, R-Maine, to encourage welfare recipients to attend college or vocational schools.

The program is based on Maine’s Parents as Scholars program, which Snowe called a “complete and unqualified success” in helping welfare recipients find full-time, higher-paying jobs.

“It’s worked extremely well in Maine and I know it will on a national level as well,” Snowe said. “Education can break the cycle of dependency.”

The Maine program has helped 90 percent of its graduates get off welfare rolls permanently and increase their income an average of 50 percent, she said.

The Snowe proposal would let individual states offer the schooling option to their welfare recipients so they could count their education toward their work requirements under federal welfare law.

With no discussion and on a voice vote, the Finance Committee approved her amendment to a reauthorization of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act.

Under the 1996 law, recipients must work at least 30 hours a week to be eligible for benefits; parents with children younger than 6 years old must work at least 20 hours.

The Senate bill, written by Finance Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, calls for increasing those work requirements to 34 and 24 hours, respectively. It was approved Wednesday afternoon on a 9-8 vote, and now goes to the Senate floor.

Under the Snowe amendment, participants would still need to work at least six hours a week in their first year of post-secondary or vocational school, eight hours in the second year, 10 hours in the third and 12 hours in the fourth.