Author: BelieveAgain

The Trump administration’s long-threatened plan to punish Democrat-led states with broad cuts to federal funding could next affect K-12 schools—though the extent and legality of the cuts under consideration remain unclear and in flux.Top federal officials have recently discussed halting “formula funds” that flow from the U.S. Department of Education to California’s schools and education agencies, an unnamed administration official told Politico on June 10. The White House has deputized staffers for the Department of Government Efficiency to coordinate a wide range of grant cuts across agencies, the Washington Post reported on June 7.And Education Secretary Linda McMahon, speaking to…

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The U.S. Department of Education was already working behind the scenes to move two key programs to other federal agencies before a court order halted the work, according to a new legal filing.Even though Congress hadn’t approved transferring oversight of student loans and career-technical and adult education grants out of the Education Department—and despite the Trump administration’s assertion that it’s not dismantling the department without Congress’ OK—the filing shows the agency was testing the waters for shifting its portfolio of programs elsewhere in the federal government in the event of its closure.The Education Department had penned agreements with the U.S.…

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The U.S. Department of Education has hired a Project 2025 author whose chapter of the conservative policy document proposed dismantling the federal agency, phasing out Title I funding for schools, and scaling back other federal involvement in education.Lindsey Burke will join the Education Department as deputy chief of staff for policy and programs, the department announced late last week. Burke arrives after 17 years at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that published the 900-page Project 2025 policy blueprint that became a major source of debate during the 2024 presidential campaign.As director of the group’s center for education policy,…

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Education savings accounts, tax-credit scholarships, vouchers, charter schools, hybrid home-schooling, tutoring, course choice, dual degrees, and microschools are transforming K–12 in profound ways. In “Talking Choice,” Ashley Berner and I seek to help make sense of the shifting landscape. Berner directs Johns Hopkins’ Institute for Education Policy, works on high-quality curriculum and civic preparation, is the author of Educational Pluralism and Democracy, and may be the nation’s leading authority on “educational pluralism.” Whatever you think of educational choice, our aim is to provide a more concrete, constructive discussion of what it means for students, families, and educators.—RickRick: Ashley, I’m delighted…

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The Trump administration has capped off an agonizing and tumultuous period of funding instability for K-12 schools with a budget proposing to eliminate dozens of longstanding funding streams and slash billions of dollars in education investments.The administration is aiming to eliminate roughly $7 billion in funding for K-12 schools in its budget for fiscal 2026, which starts Oct. 1. Much of it is currently geared toward supporting special student populations including English learners, migrants, students experiencing homelessness, Native students, and students in rural schools.Longstanding federal programs that support training for the educator workforce; preparing students for postsecondary education as early…

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The Trump administration on Friday filed an emergency application asking the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in the lawsuit challenging the layoffs of roughly 1,400 U.S. Department of Education employees.The administration asked the high court to undo a May 22 preliminary injunction by a federal district judge in Massachusetts ordering the department to reverse the layoffs and reinstate all affected employees. The injunction came in a pair of lawsuits brought by New York and 20 other Democratic-led states, two Massachusetts school districts, and the American Federation of Teachers along with other unions.After a federal appeals court this week declined to…

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Benja Luke knew she needed a job that would be flexible as she completed student teaching—and she wanted one that would help her be even better prepared when she stepped into a classroom.It brought her to an AmeriCorps position through Communities In Schools of Georgia, a nonprofit focused on dropout prevention. For 20 hours a week, she tutored children who needed additional help with reading.That was almost two decades ago. Now, Luke is the principal of Ben Hill Elementary School in rural south-central Georgia, in the district where she started out as an AmeriCorps-funded volunteer. But the program that helped…

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The U.S. Department of Education won’t cut loose more than a thousand employees next week, as originally planned in its March reduction in force, but the affected staff have not yet returned to work, according to an email sent out to the employees Friday.The message is the latest, but most significant, step the agency has taken to date to comply with a federal judge’s order last month that directed the department to reinstate the staff it shed through layoffs. Laid-off staff were initially placed on administrative leave, during which they’ve received pay and benefits. That leave period was scheduled to…

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The nominee for the U.S. Department of Education’s No. 2 spot stopped short of a full-throated endorsement of closing the federal agency during her confirmation hearing Thursday—but, leaning on her time as a state education chief, stressed that states should be further empowered to spend federal funds largely as they see fit.“A department or an agency in the federal government is not going to change the outcomes of students,” Penny Schwinn told U.S. senators on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee. “What we need to do is ensure that we have created a system that is going to drive…

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To the Editor:Michael V. McGill misses the mark in his May 1 opinion essay, “We’re All to Blame for What Has Become of the U.S. Dept. of Education.”McGill conflates public education with public schools. But education can—and increasingly does—happen anywhere. When states began to mandate education in the 1800s, travel and communication were difficult. Given those challenges, it’s understandable that states assigned kids to schools based on where they lived—and that education and schooling were treated as synonyms.There’s no reason for these limitations today. Recognizing that public schools are not the only—or necessarily the best—way to educate the public opens…

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