Trump signed today an order to close the Department of Education and return the education authority to the states. One of the given reasons was to improve the quality of the US school system.
Why does President Trump expect the closing the Department of Education and returning the education authority to the states expected will improve the quality of the school system in the USA?
Why is closing the Department of Education and returning the education authority to the states expected to improve the quality of the school system?
Closing the Department of Education isn't actually intended to return education authority to the state or to improve the quality of the school system. Few policy makers behind this proposal, who understand the department and what it does, actually believe this will happen, or even had that goal. These statements are purely window dressing.
Indeed, the Executive Order in question actually centralized authority over public education in the federal government to a completely unprecedented extent, after 46 years of minimally invasive department involvement in educational institutions that did not meaningfully impact their authority over the educational process.
This proposal is driven by ill-informed political symbolism and provides political red meat to a Republican base. This Republican base is skeptical that public education does any good, wants to advance factually false curricula to suit their political ideology, and wants to use the federal government to purge all tendencies that are perceived as liberal from both K-12 education and from higher education. Primarily, this Executive Order, in substance, is an effort to roll back decades of federal insistence that educational institutions protect the civil rights of their students.
The EO's focus on "ending DEI" which there is no legal authority for the President to enact, is trying to advance a pro-racist, pro-sexist, homophobic, and transphobic agenda in every education institution in the United States, with a longer term goal over undoing almost all of the accomplishments of the Civil Rights movements in the United States, and causing more students to develop politically conservative views.
This question is based upon a false premise. The states have always had authority over education and this didn't change when the Department of Education was created. The notion that the federal department of education has taken authority over education away from the states is sophistry and simply isn't true.
The fact that there is a federal Department of Education leaves some uninformed people with the false impression that the federal government has much greater authority over state and local school systems than it does.
The Department of Education primarily administers various federal scholarships, federally sponsored student loans, and federal grants for various programs at both the K-12 level (mostly for special education and low income students — the school lunch program is administered by the Department of Agriculture), and the higher education level. It also enforces federal civil rights and privacy laws that apply to educational institutions.
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About 13.7% of public school funding came from federal sources, 2021-22 school year, this is $2,500 per K-12 student came from federal funding (2021-2022 school year).
Incidentally, all ten of the U.S. states that rely most heavily on the federal government for public school funding (19.0% to 23.3%) are states that voted for President Trump in the 2024 election. All ten of the 100 largest school districts that rely most heavily on the federal government for school funding (23.2% to 48.6%) are also in states that voted for President Trump in the 2024 election.
Cuts to U.S. Department of Education programs are a notable example of ideology trumping traditional pork barrel budget politics that disproportionately hurts President Trump's base (much like his tariff policies).
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The Department of Education employed around 4,200 employees last September, according to the Office of Personnel Management, which accounted for about 0.2% of overall federal employment last year—the smallest staff of the 15 Cabinet agencies.
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About 1,500 of those employees administer a $1.6 trillion student loan debt portfolio. All of its other functions are performed by the Department of Education's remaining 2,700 employees.
But as noted below, about 2,000 of those employees have been laid off. Time will tell if these employees, like those in other agencies such as 6,000 Department of Agriculture employees, will be ordered to be reinstated by the courts. Also, some of those 2,000 employees left under illegally offered buy out offers which Congress has not authorized or funded.
The Department of Education itself is just a bureaucratic organization to administer federal programs that, before it was created in 1979, were administered by different federal agencies.
The important question is not really whether the Department of Education continues to exist. If the Department of Education were dissolved, but its programs were transferred to the Department of Health and Human Services and the Justice Department (which enforces other civil rights and privacy statutes outside of the education arena), this would be basically meaningless and purely symbolic.
What really matters is which, if any, of the laws and programs administered by the Department of Education will continue to exist, and which will be discontinued entirely.
For example:
Will the federal government continue to provide Pell Grants and other scholarships to low income college students?
Will the federal government continue to provide federally guaranteed or directly provided student loans to college students?
Will the federal government continue to provide special education aid to K-12 schools?
Will the federal government continue to provide grants to school districts with large numbers of low income students?
Will the federal government continue to provide English as a second language grants to K-12 schools?
Will the federal government continue to regulate educational privacy (a provision of law which President Trump has famously availed himself to keep his college transcripts and other educational records secret)?
Will federal civil rights laws applicable to educational institutions be repealed?
The President may have the authority to dissolve the Department of Education (although this isn't obvious as the Department of Education was established by a statute which the President doesn't have the authority to unilaterally repeal, and a Secretary of Education has been nominated and ratified by the U.S. Senate).
But the President certainly doesn't have the authority to repeal the programs that the Department of Education administers without Congressionally approved legislation. If the Department of Education is dissolved, the laws it is charged with administering have to be transferred to other government agencies until such time (if ever) that Congress repeals those programs.
Also, the situation is complicated by the fact that the President's Executive Order to shut down the Department of Education seems to contemplate laying off essentially all of its employees and makes no clear plans to transfer its responsibilities, that remain legal obligations of the federal government until Congress acts otherwise, to other agencies, although it does seem to acknowledge that the Department of Education can't be closed until this is addressed.
During the first two months of Trump's second term, the Department of Education has "already has shed around 2,000 staffers – nearly half its workforce – through layoffs and buyouts, and canceled dozens of research contracts."
Anti-impoundment orders from the courts in the last two months, however, across a wide variety of areas of federal government spending, have established that almost all of the research contracts cancelled have been cancelled illegally and will have to be reinstated.
The Executive Order itself states:
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and to enable parents, teachers, and communities to best ensure student success, it is hereby ordered:
Section 1. Purpose and Policy. Our Nation’s bright future relies on empowered families, engaged communities, and excellent educational opportunities for every child. Unfortunately, the experiment of controlling American education through Federal programs and dollars — and the unaccountable bureaucracy those programs and dollars support — has plainly failed our children, our teachers, and our families.
Taxpayers spent around $200 billion at the Federal level on schools during the COVID-19 pandemic, on top of the more than $60 billion they spend annually on Federal school funding. This money is largely distributed by one of the newest Cabinet agencies, the Department of Education, which has existed for less than one fifth of our Nation’s history. The Congress created the Department of Education in 1979 at the urging of President Jimmy Carter, who received a first-ever Presidential endorsement from the country’s largest teachers’ union shortly after pledging to the union his support for a separate Department of Education. Since then, the Department of Education has entrenched the education bureaucracy and sought to convince America that Federal control over education is beneficial. While the Department of Education does not educate anyone, it maintains a public relations office that includes over 80 staffers at a cost of more than $10 million per year.
Closing the Department of Education would provide children and their families the opportunity to escape a system that is failing them. Today, American reading and math scores are near historical lows. This year’s National Assessment of Educational Progress showed that 70 percent of 8th graders were below proficient in reading, and 72 percent were below proficient in math. The Federal education bureaucracy is not working.
Closure of the Department of Education would drastically improve program implementation in higher education. The Department of Education currently manages a student loan debt portfolio of more than $1.6 trillion. This means the Federal student aid program is roughly the size of one of the Nation’s largest banks, Wells Fargo. But although Wells Fargo has more than 200,000 employees, the Department of Education has fewer than 1,500 in its Office of Federal Student Aid. The Department of Education is not a bank, and it must return bank functions to an entity equipped to serve America’s students.
Ultimately, the Department of Education’s main functions can, and should, be returned to the States.
Sec. 2. Closing the Department of Education and Returning Authority to the States. (a) The Secretary of Education shall, to the maximum extent appropriate and permitted by law, take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure of the Department of Education and return authority over education to the States and local communities while ensuring the effective and uninterrupted delivery of services, programs, and benefits on which Americans rely.
(b) Consistent with the Department of Education’s authorities, the Secretary of Education shall ensure that the allocation of any Federal Department of Education funds is subject to rigorous compliance with Federal law and Administration policy, including the requirement that any program or activity receiving Federal assistance terminate illegal discrimination obscured under the label “diversity, equity, and inclusion” or similar terms and programs promoting gender ideology.
Sec. 3. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
(i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof; or
(ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.
(c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.
DONALD J. TRUMP
THE WHITE HOUSE, March 20, 2025.
Why is closing the Department of Education . . . expected to improve the quality of the school system in the USA?
There is no legitimate reason to think that it will, and improving the quality of the school systems in the U.S. isn't a significant motivation for doing so.
Even Section 1 of the Executive Order, which observes that the Department of Education manages to administer its student loan portfolio with less than 0.1% of the personnel of commercial banks engaged in similar activity, seems to refute any claim that the Department of Education is inefficient or wasteful.
Section 2(b) of the Executive Order, similarly, actually calls for unprecedented centralization of authority over educational policies in the federal government, rather than restoring authority to state and local governments, exactly contrary to the alleged justification for the EO in its title, its rhetoric in Section 1, and the related press release from the White House. There is no statutory authority for this part of the Executive Order, which would seem to be facially invalid as a result.
Many Republicans have a low opinion of the value of public education and of higher education as a whole, often believing that it does more harm than good, so from that perspective, eliminating federal support to educational institutions (many of which are private rather than state supported), is a good thing, because it undermines higher education.
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But a March 2025 poll suggests that these views have evolved:
The survey of 500 Republican voters found that most respondents, 63 percent, view four-year degrees as valuable—including 60 percent of voters who have “very favorable” perceptions of President Trump. Trade schools and community colleges enjoy particularly robust support; 91 percent and 87 percent of respondents, respectively, view them favorably. By comparison, 69 percent hold favorable views of four-year colleges and universities, and 37 percent feel positively toward for-profit universities.
At the same time, Republicans surveyed believe the most needed reforms in higher ed today are greater accountability and greater affordability.
Most respondents, 87 percent, support increased accountability for higher education institutions. And many believe the government should play various roles to ensure that principle is upheld. Seventy-one percent agree that the federal government should require transparency from institutions and accredit them based on their value to students. The same share believe there should be federal guardrails to prevent “bad actors” from charging students for low-quality degrees. And nearly half agree taxpayer dollars should be withheld from colleges that don’t offer a sufficient return on students’ investment.
Toward that end, 83 percent of Republicans support the financial value transparency rule, which requires colleges to report program-level information like the total cost of attendance and the amount of private education loans disbursed to students. To make college more affordable, 81 percent of Republicans are in favor of Pell Grants, federal financial aid for low-income students, and 79 percent support the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program and income-driven repayment for student loans. Almost 70 percent favor borrower defense to repayment, allowing students who attended fraudulent institutions to have their student loans discharged.
Of course, as always, public opinion is often malleable and inconsistent, and polling often produces inconsistent results depending upon the way that questions are asked.
Much of the Republican base believes things about history and science (and other topics) which are factually untrue and want to inject that into the curriculum, which would be easier without any federal involvement in education.
Many key Republican officials would also like to inject false, and racially discriminatory, elements into K-12 curricula, and removing federal government civil rights authority over educational institutions could make it easier for state and local governments to do that in public schools.
For example, Republican elected officials in Oklahoma want to require that students be taught that there was significant fraud in the 2020 election, as President Trump falsely claimed in litigation the resulted in many of his attorneys being sanctioned or disbarred.
Similarly, Republicans in Florida in 2023 set curriculum standards that teach students that Black people benefited from slavery.
Many Republicans have also long sought to remove science instruction that conflicts with religious doctrine, like the teaching of evolution in schools.
President Trump pushed the 1776 Project in his first term, "to support what he called "patriotic education". The commission released ;The 1776 Report' on January 18, 2021, two days before the end of Trump's term of office. Historians overwhelmingly criticized the report, saying it was; filled with errors and partisan politics'".
President Trump, so far in his term, despite his rhetoric regarding returning authority over education to the states, has actively pushed to investigate and withdraw federal funds from both K-12 educational institutions, and from higher education, when those institutions are managed in a manner that disagrees with his views, exactly contrary to the notion of abdicating federal authority over education. This has, for example, caused an Idaho school district to order a teacher to remove an "Everyone is Welcome Here" poster for fear that it would violate President Trump's Anti-DEI Executive Orders, even though the district is not part of the federal government and only receives federal funding (like every other public school district).
Arguably, these are tactical moves intended to build liberal political support for removing federal involvement in schools, but there is no publicly available affirmative evidence that this is Trump's plan.
A minority of Republicans are genuinely interested in shifting the duty of raising and distributing funds administered by the Department of Education from the federal government to state and local governments, thereby reducing federal spending and increasing state and local government spending, either because they think that this reflects the original intent of the Founders in our federal system under the U.S. Constitution, or because they trust their own state and local governments more than the federal government in a general, non-specific way.
But federalism considerations are rarely a hot button issue for anyone. This argument doesn't have much political heft outside of conservative think tanks.
Furthermore, any effort to shift education related programs from the federal government to state governments requires the involvement of state and local governments in lengthy consultations with them, in order to avoid harm to students. It can't just be done unilaterally in an Executive Order. The approach taken in this Executive Order is not consistent which a sincere and legitimate desire to disentangle the federal government from involvement in education in a way that does not harm students or reduce the quality of education in the United States.
A more realistic assessment might be found in the other answer. However, this answer is answering on the basis of what the proponents of this move say. And have been saying for a very long time. So I am going to go back some months, to avoid the Trump effect, where most Republicans now feel compelled to repeat Trump's every word.
So... in their own words, here's from the pro-camp:
Republicans opposed the Department of Education from its beginning and regularly threaten to abolish it now, arguing that educational policy should be reserved to the states. Two respected Democrats also objected to the department’s creation almost 40 years ago. New York Sen. Daniel Moynihan warned that it would become a partisan sword. New York Rep. Shirley Chisholm worried about divorcing education from other policy areas vital to student success, such as making sure they had decent housing and enough to eat.
History has proved the critics right. It’s time for the department to be dismantled. It has done some good, especially in pointing out education inequity. But more often it has served political, not educational, interests.
In fact, the Department of Education was created by President Carter in part as a gift to the National Education Assn., for the union’s early support of his candidacy. Politics was the department’s original sin, and that reality has gotten only worse.
This politicization of education is most clearly evident in the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act and the department’s enforcement of its provisions.
...
Of course, effective teachers, good reading and math skills, and periodic student assessments are important. But the No Child Left Behind Act had obvious failings. Universal proficiency was simply an impossible, utopian mandate. And it was a fiction that students’ life circumstances had no effect on their learning.
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To be fair, the Department of Education didn’t initiate or write the legislation. But it did bring the full weight of the federal government against states and local school boards. No Child Left Behind erroneously presumed that Congress and the department — not local education agencies — understood how best to address schooling for high-needs learners. It’s the locals, however, who have real advantages in helping such students.
School boards in towns and cities are less ideological and more pragmatic than politicians in Washington. They see students in personal and concrete terms. They have to work with classroom teachers, local administrators and community leaders as partners. Because they are less wedded to a political dogma, they respond more quickly when a policy isn’t working for kids.
Washington has a role to play in education. The federal government alone is positioned to prevent “local control” from becoming a pretext for discrimination. It also must maintain funding to schools and colleges. But a separate executive branch department isn’t necessary to those functions. The essential tasks can be shifted to Health and Human Services and the Justice Department.
For perhaps a more candid view into the motivations of the MAGA-side proponents, let's turn to Fox:
A conservative nonprofit that was formed to oppose what it calls "radicalism" in American education has launched an effort to abolish the Department of Education.
"As everything from declining test scores to far-left ideology infiltrating classrooms shows, the federal Department of Education has failed students and parents," Adam Waldeck, president of 1776 Action (note: 1776 Action is an ideological offspring to Trump's 2020 1776 Commission), told Fox News Digital. "There is a growing sense that the top-down, centralized approach is hopelessly broken."
Waldeck's comments come as 1776 Action officially released a petition aimed at drumming up support for abolishing the Department of Education, which it claims has produced little results for students despite continued increases in funding.
"Academic achievement is plummeting while politics runs rampant in our classrooms, and like any bureaucracy, the federal education bureaucracy has become bloated, unaccountable, and focused on its own survival," an explanation of the petition on the organization's website reads.
In a press release promoting the petition, the organization also accused the Department of Education of "pushing Critical Race Theory" in classrooms and forcing schools that receive "federal funding to allow biological males to compete on women’s sports teams and use women’s restroom and locker room facilities."
Xi Van Fleet, a senior fellow at 1776 Action, told Fox News Digital that the department's agenda reminds him of growing up in Communist China.
"As someone who was once a poster child for Mao's centralized, government-run school system, I understand first-hand how dangerous it is," Van Fleet said. "My education was not designed to fulfill my dreams and aspirations. Instead, it was designed to cultivate an unwavering loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party and its socialist agenda."
Van Fleet argued that the same history is "repeating itself in America" in large part because of the Department of Education.
"The Left wants to use schools to brainwash kids into becoming activists for radical social causes instead of helping them to become successful and responsible citizens," Van Fleet said.
Jonathan Butcher, an education policy veteran with experience in South Carolina, Arkansas and Arizona, told the BBC that these reasons, broadly, are ones shared by various factions of the Republican Party - and have been for years.
"Reagan correctly saw the philosophical and practical point that when you create an agency in Washington, it only grows in size and assumes additional responsibilities," said Mr Butcher, now a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that has long called for the abolition of the department.
So, there you have it, some of the arguments put forward by the advocates of this move:
over-centralization takes away the agency of local and state authorities to best provide education services.
it's bloated, doesn't work and costs too much.
Federal-level services can be provided by other departments.
the Dept. of Education is neo-Communist.
I would also hazard a guess that the fine folk at intelligentdesign.org are none too upset at this move:
States have called for critical thinking about evolutionary theory, following Congress’s advice.
Five states (Kansas, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Minnesota) have already adopted science standards that require learning about some of the scientific controversies relating to evolution.
Their fellows at the Discovery Institute (another, linked, peddler of intelligent design), certainly are in agreement March 13, 2025 - The Downing of the U.S. Department of Education:
It’s time to eliminate the ineffective and astronomically expensive bureaucracy, return education to the states, and empower parents with education options for their children.
Again, quoting the advocates of this move, which doesn't mean I agree with them. I will add other citations if people find representative arguments from the right.
p.s. No I will not engage in big arguments in the comments about how this indeed a great idea - I don't think it is. But this move is in line with long-held, pre-Trump, hard Republican beliefs and it is useful, when looking at this event, to understand what motivated it. A lot of the more outlandish ideas held in the fringes of the Republican Party are now being pushed through and this is why the pushback against Trump's actions, from his party, is limited.
p.p.s. Another cause for worry is that, while this move may or may not be a good idea, it is also getting pushed through with apparently limited planning for a transition period and without much clarity on what the replacement will look like. Unless, of course, I've missed a major debate and project that has laid the ground for this transition.
Question
Why does Trump expect closing the Dept. of Education and returning education authority to the states will improve the quality of the school system?
The GOP has long tried to terminate the dept of education. It has nothing to do with returning education authority to the states. Education authority has never left the states. 90% of education money comes from state and local governments. The U.S. Department of Education (ED) is responsible for overseeing federal policies and programs related to education. Its primary goals include:
It does not control state education systems or local school districts, but it influences them through funding and policy recommendations.
I have just read one reason on whitehouse.gov:
The Department of Education burdens schools with regulations and paperwork.
Its “Dear Colleague” letters have forced schools to redirect resources toward complying with ideological initiatives, which diverts staff time and attention away from schools’ primary role of teaching.
Biden’s Department of Education added rules that imposed nearly $3.9 billion in costs and 4,239,530 paperwork hours.
(I am quoting, not judging)
Follow-up: Did Biden’s Department of Education add rules that imposed 4,239,530 paperwork hours?
As with many other executive orders since January, Trump simply did what the Heritage Foundation told him to.
In case it wasn't clear already, Trump admitted it himself last week. See Trump now openly backing Project 2025 during government shutdown.
project2025.org, pg. 319 describes the plan for the Department of Education:
Federal education policy should be limited and, ultimately, the federal Department of Education should be eliminated.
When power is exercised, it should empower students and families, not government. In our pluralistic society, families and students should be free to choose from a diverse set of school options and learning environments that best fit their needs.
On its first day in office, the next Administration should signal its intent to enter the rulemaking process to restore the Trump Administration’s Title IX regulation, with the additional insistence that “sex” is properly understood as a fixed biological fact. Official notice-and-comment should be posted immediately.
All ongoing investigations should be dropped, and all school districts affected should be given notice that they are free to drop any policy changes pursued under pressure from the Biden Administration
https://www.project2025.observer/en?agencies=Dept.+of+Education lists the objectives which have been completed, or are currently in progress.
I would contribute an answer from the state/local perspective.
My state (Maryland, population six million) receives about $20 billion per year in federal aid, about half for education. Many of the red counties require huge external aid/assistance, or they simply would not be able to function.
However, this topic is further complicated due to the K-12 outcomes are so poor, by the states own report card. That is with huge, $billions every year in perpetual aid.
https://dls.maryland.gov/budget/state-aid-to-local-governments/
https://reportcard.msde.maryland.gov/Graphs/#/ReportCards/ReportCardSchool/1/E/1/99/XXXX/2024
So there is a basic argument that the current system is flawed and not much better than 40 years ago.
However, that is mostly a fiscal argument, and is in conflict with some of the more conservative states, that are proactively saying they need the funding. For example, Ryan Walters, Oklahoma state education superintendent, has been on interviews recently and is careful to say that they still want the money. For example, in the form of grants, but without the bureaucratic requirements and baggage.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryan_Walters_(politician)
The reality is those expectations of continued funding, in light of the actual budget revenue challenges and escalating debt, are naive. But no one will be responsible for explaining that.
