This week, the U.S. Department of Education announced agreements to shift a number of functions within the department to four other federal agencies.
In a statement on the Department of Education’s website, the move was described as a way to “break up the federal education bureaucracy” and “ensure efficient delivery of funded programs,” while fulfilling President Donald Trump’s “promise to return education to the states.”
That announcement had education policy expert Jonathan Plucker, a professor of education at Johns Hopkins University, wondering, “On the one hand, we have the administration saying that we don’t need the department anymore; but if we don’t need the department and its services anymore, why are they transferring so many services to other departments?”
The agreements announced by the Education Department shift a number of functions to the Department of Labor, the Department of the Interior, Health and Human Services and the State Department.
David Law, the president of the School Superintendents Association and a superintendent of the Minnetonka, Minnesota, school district, told WTOP, “For any of the things we interact with government for, whether it be local, state or federal, we don’t want to have to go through multiple agencies.”
“It’s hard enough in any organization not to be siloed,” Law added. “Sometimes, multiple programs impact the same student — how can they, being in multiple agencies, be more efficient?”
Law said AASA’s Executive Committee talked about the role of federal education leadership at its meeting in January.
“What we talked about was there’s 74 million K-12 students across the country. Free public education is one of the cornerstones of our democracy, and of our country,” he said.
Law continued that because of the vital role of public education, “It’s hard to imagine that promise wouldn’t have a cabinet-level seat.”
Plucker said that there’s certainly a case to be made for debating ways to improve how the Department of Education performs.
“There’s no question, for example, that things like student loan administration have not gone very well at the higher education level,” Plucker said.
For example, Plucker said, moving student loan administration over to the Treasury or some other agency could be considered: “That’s a debate that lots of people across the aisle want to have.”
But, Plucker said, “Without a formal proposal being floated, it’s really hard for us to debate these issues.”
“Superintendents, school leaders, we love kids and we are fiercely protective of them,” Law said.
And referring to the latest announcement on changes at the education department, he added, “We hope this works out for the best and we hope that people are thoughtful when they make these changes.”
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