What happens when the federal institution in charge of public education is dismantled? That’s a very good question. The answer? No one knows.
Recently, President Donald Trump signed an executive order seeking to “begin eliminating the federal Department of Education, ” (whitehouse.gov). This would mean that jurisdiction over education would be turned completely over to the states – a move that would require complete restructuring of funding allocation within public schooling.
While this sounds alarming, the DOE has only existed for 46 years, and the push to eliminate it is not a new one.
“The Department of Education has been on the chopping block as a target for Republicans for a long time. They believe that decisions about education should be handled by the states, not by policy created by the federal government,” AP US Government teacher Amy Cooke said.
Regardless of the political landscape or ideology behind this decision, the impact the Department had was a positive one.
“The Department of Education was designed to address the specific problem of leaving people with disabilities without opportunities that other citizens had,” LRC II teacher Nicholas Brown said.
According to the Executive Director of Finance and Budget Moriah Banasick, the Issaquah School District received over $9 million in federal funding for the 2024-25 school year, with most of the money going towards Title I, II, III, and IV programs, which support fair student opportunity, professional development, English language learners, and student safety respectively. A significant portion also supports special education programming and Child Nutrition programs.
The use of federal money at Liberty therefore greatly aligns with the goal of the creation of the DOE – to ensure all students have an opportunity to learn and thrive in our public education system.
Now that the Department may be disappearing, there is a question as to what consequences these programs will face – both at Liberty and at all public schools across the nation.
“If we’re going to say that we don’t need to fund special education, we’re saying that some citizens will not have the same access to our public institutions like education. There are kids and families that are going to slip through the cracks,” Brown said.
The act of minimizing the DOE is one that sends a powerful message about the value our current administration places on diversity and inclusion. The loss of these programs won’t only negatively impact students with disabilities though.
“Without LRC II, it would look like a more homogenized population of students being educated. Students with disabilities are not going to be in class with their typically developing peers, and we’ll lose out on that experience or the knowledge of that experience, and that’s also a disservice to our general ed student population,” Brown said.
The idea of loss of diversity extends beyond special education programming as well. Low-income students that rely on school to receive food and outside support will no longer be able to access those resources while pursuing an education. In turn, the dismantling of the DOE could lead to higher dropout rates as more students become unsupported in the school environment.
The loss of student support that will come with the dismantling of the DOE does not end after high school either. The DOE is also in charge of the Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA).
“One of the first things we tell students looking to fund post-secondary schooling is to fill out the FAFSA, or the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. The government takes financial information from the student and their families and comes up with a Student Aid Index (SAI),” College and Career advisor Becky Watchman describes, “this index is what the government feels the student can afford to pay for college. That number is then looked at by colleges and universities to decide how to divide the money they have.”
This process is one that the majority of seniors are familiar with, and one that many schools require for both need-based and merit-based aid.
“Through the FAFSA, students could see possible Pell Grants, which is free money from the federal government, they could see scholarships from the school, or be given school work study options, where you can work on campus to pay for tuition. There are also loans through the federal government and through the school offered with FAFSA,” Watchman said.
These options make college a reality for numerous students, and now that The DOE may be reduced, the future of paying for postsecondary education is uncertain. Federal funding would instead be either eliminated or reallocated to the states to distribute themselves, creating a disjointed process that would make college even more unattainable for lower income students.
By allowing states to fully control education, the standards that require equality and opportunity in education would not be universal.
“Curriculum is determined at a state level; that’s why Texas is allowed to be Texas and teach certain things,” Cooke said.
While curriculum has never been controlled at a federal level, eliminating the DOE in coordination with the simultaneous push for doing away with DEI, sets the precedent for removing topics like diversity, equality, race, political viewpoints, etc. from the classroom in states that align themselves with President Donald Trump.
“There’s a conspiracy out there right now with AP teachers, not necessarily me, that a lot of the materials available on the College Board site have been yanked for editing, and coincidentally, they’re things about civil rights and stuff like that. I’m not sure if national policy or our current climate is influencing that,” Cooke said.
The idea of topics typically deemed ‘controversial’ being eliminated from the classroom is a scary one. While liberal states like Washington will likely continue teaching about more difficult topics, it is hard to have an educated voter base and build a country of critical thinkers when only some students are being taught about important elements of our nation’s past and present.
“People should have intellectual conversations about controversial topics, not necessarily arguing or debating, but having conversations – as long as I, as a teacher, am facilitating a balanced discussion and not telling you what to believe. People need to be able to have well rounded conversations about issues with multiple perspectives,” Cooke said.
Ultimately, the cuts to, and potential elimination of, the DOE, perpetuates the dialogue that our federal government cares more about serving a privileged few than lifting up all citizens, which at the end of the day, will cause more harm than progress.
“The erosion of our public institutions is going to mean more kids stay home. It’s going to mean more kids don’t know how to interact with their peers, which means more kids will struggle to find a job, which means that down the line, they’re either going to go without, or there will be an even greater burden created in order to care for people that didn’t have the opportunity to grow into the best version of themselves,” Brown said.
