Brookings scholars’ reflections on the US Department of Education

In its first weeks in office, the Trump administration has aggressively targeted the U.S. Department of Education (ED). It has put ED employees on leave for attending DEI trainings, slashed funding from the Institute of Education Sciences, and threatened to withhold funds from institutions that do not align with the administration’s priorities on school curriculum, DEI, and COVID-19 vaccines. Further, the administration is reportedly working on an executive order that will call for the elimination of ED.  

We asked Brookings scholars for their perspectives on the U.S. Department of Education and the threats it now faces. This piece accompanies (1) an explainer that describes what ED does and (2) a FAQ piece that addresses questions about what the Trump administration can and cannot do with education policy and governance in the United States.

First, to be clear, the President cannot eliminate the Department of Education. Nevertheless, diminishing ED would destroy human capital. While I feel confident in the blanket nature of this statement, here I am speaking specifically about attacks on the ED workforce. And I speaking from the experience of having worked at ED once myself.

Those who work at ED are not “radicals, zealots, and Marxists” who should be “fired and escorted from the building,” as President Trump’s campaign materials described. They are civil servants who take the oath of office to support and defend the Constitution and commit that they will “well and faithfully discharge the duties” of their jobs. They have the expertise and experience to carry out the Department’s mission. They were, for a time, my respected colleagues.

While confusion reigns, evidence is emerging that some ED employees have been placed on leave and others fired. These are positions that require competence and commitment. This is brain drain—and for what?

The proposal to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education is shortsighted and could undermine two of the most pressing national priorities: global competitiveness and national unity. In an era when a nation’s economic success hinges on human capital, education is the most powerful tool to equip Americans with the skills needed to thrive in an increasingly competitive world. Weakening the federal role in education risks deepening disparities and limiting opportunities for students who need them the most.

Moreover, at a time of growing division, education can serve as a unifying force that fosters a shared understanding of American history, values, and civic responsibility. Without a national framework, states and localities could pursue fragmented policies that erode the cohesive identity necessary for a strong and united nation. A country that neglects its educational system compromises its own foundation.

One of ED’s unique roles in the public K-12 school system—monitoring for differences in access to educational resources on the basis of students’ race, ethnicity, gender, disability, or other protected status—has already been functionally neutered.

Pursuant to President Trump’s Executive Order on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), signed mere hours after his inauguration, ED has scrubbed language from its website and canceled numerous projects that could show that student outcomes vary across different racial or ethnic groups. ED staff involved in promoting DEI initiatives in schools or even participating in training have been put on leave, with their full termination a foregone conclusion. 

Those of us in education research are familiar with the many ways marginalized students get short shrift in schools. Inequalities are evident in both educational resources provided to students and the outcomes they produce. And, I would argue, ED’s heretofore consistent monitoring of these issues is a key reason why these gaps have (slowly) declined over time.  

But let’s dispose with the magical thinking: These gaps will not go away once we turn our attention from them. 

The Trump administration says they aren’t targeting financial aid for funding freezes or the proposed dismantling of ED. However, they don’t need to cut funding to leave students scrambling to pay for college. The opaque “DOGE” team is making government less efficient, including at ED.

First, they are indiscriminately decimating the federal workforce to the point where it can no longer perform its core functions. At ED, DOGE wants to replace the financial aid call center staff with a chatbot. Applying for financial aid is complex and often requires individualized guidance. Last spring, during the disastrous 2024-25 FAFSA rollout, ED received 5.4 million calls but was staffed to answer only 1.4 million. If DOGE continues weakening ED’s workforce, millions of students might not get the answers they need to access financial aid. 

Second, DOGE’s (legally dubious) access to sensitive data has families hesitant to submit a FAFSA. Families with mixed immigration status—where the student has U.S. citizenship but parent does not—are concerned that data could be weaponized for immigration enforcement. To be clear, using financial aid data for immigration actions is illegal. But uncertainty about this administration’s commitment to following the law has nonprofits issuing warnings. When students don’t file FAFSA, they can’t access federal aid and may be barred from state aid (many “free college” programs use FAFSA to determine eligibility). States and institutions may need to make up the shortfall so that students can afford college. 

I worry about what a dismantling of ED could mean for family engagement efforts. Extensive research shows that when families, schools, and communities collaborate, student learning and development increases and education systems are strengthened. Family, school, and community engagement is vital to all schools, public or private, and across rural, urban, or suburban districts. Historically, family engagement has been a key issue across partisan lines.

Dismantling ED would have several harmful impacts on family engagement, especially if it comes with reduced funding for the core programs that ED administers. For example, Title I provides an important stream of money to schools to meaningfully engage families. In addition, ED has facilitated the development of well-studied practices in how to effectively build family engagement, documented through Education Innovation and Research grants and catalogued in the What Works Clearinghouse. If the federal government cuts funds and resources to schools and education agencies, and disrupts research, students and families stand the most to lose.

Most of the Department’s work in K-12 education aims to remedy the abject failures of states to provide equal educational opportunities for all students. This includes providing compensatory funding to schools in poor communities and schools that serve students with disabilities, as well as enforcing federal civil rights laws that prohibit schools and colleges from discriminating based on race, ethnicity, shared ancestry, sex, disability status, and age.

While the administration is unlikely to shut down ED altogether, it’s clear they’ll undermine many of its core functions by unlawfully and capriciously firing staff, cutting off congressionally appropriated funding, and cancelling research contracts. We already have evidence that the administration has halted its routine civil rights enforcement work—focusing instead on weaponizing ED’s civil rights office against transgender students.

I worry about the repercussions of a dwindling federal role for the millions of children, young people, and adults whose educational experiences and opportunities were made better by ED’s work. Public schools and colleges may lose out on important sources of federal funding, families will have fewer avenues to remedy illegal discrimination, and attacks on public education and higher education will undoubtedly gain a larger platform.

My first reaction is that what’s going on at ED (and other agencies) is lawless and destructive. A president simply doesn’t have the authority to dissolve a congressionally established department, and the indiscriminate firing of employees is disrupting the Department’s capacity to carry out so many important duties.

This includes strengthening our student loan program. The Department has made progress to improve the administration of the income-driven repayment (IDR) and Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) programs. However, that work is incomplete, and legal challenges to the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) IDR plan have left the repayment system in disarray. While the courts review SAVE, millions of borrowers who had enrolled in SAVE are in forbearance. This is confusing and unfair to borrowers (some of whom can’t get credit towards IDR/PSLF forgiveness) and costly to taxpayers (because borrowers aren’t making payments or accruing interest on their loans).

Parts of the SAVE Rule were already implemented, so simply returning to the pre-SAVE status quo is not possible. Regardless of what the courts rule, ED’s Federal Student Aid (FSA) office will need to get the student loan repayment system up and running again. FSA has long been understaffed and underfunded, and the institutional upheaval will only make it harder for FSA to fix the repayment system.

Evidence shows how critical the early years are for our life trajectories. Early childhood education (ECE) is recognized in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 4.2), which posits that all children should have access to high-quality ECE so that they are ready for primary school. Yet, the U.S. has no national universal provision, with only some states (Florida, Oklahoma, Vermont) and the District of Columbia providing universal pre-K.

The federal government has important roles to play in ECE. Federal support for young children straddles the U.S. Department of Education (ED) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), with both departments seeing cuts as part of government efficiency measures. This is despite evidence that investing in early learning offers a large return on investment, with the greatest gains for the most vulnerable children. ED supports early learning through Title I funding to schools with a large low-income population and the Individual with Disabilities Education Act supports children with disabilities. Federal cuts to early learning would provide only very modest savings in the federal budget. However, it could negatively affect young children’s life trajectories and, in turn, the country’s future.

I can’t remember a time when the politics of education seemed so detached from the problems of education. Today, there are real challenges for U.S. schools. That was evident in the NAEP scores released last month, which showed a lackluster recovery from COVID-19 and growing gaps between our highest- and lowest-scoring students that reflect intolerably large opportunity gaps. Rates of chronic absenteeism remain far above pre-pandemic levels, raising concerns about changing attitudes about the importance of school. Meanwhile, federal relief funds for schools are depleted, leaving education leaders short on resources as they search for answers.

These problems are solvable. They do, however, require focus, resolve, collaboration, and investment. Yet, which “solutions” are dominating the political discussion, at least at the federal level? It’s dismantling the U.S. Department of Education, withholding funds from schools with DEI initiatives, restricting transgender students’ rights, and destroying the nation’s education research infrastructure. These priorities aren’t even remotely responsive to the problems of the day. In fact, they’re sure to make matters worse.

Now, more than ever, we need state, local, and school leaders to focus on the (real) issues before them—including, unfortunately, problems created or exacerbated by the Trump administration—and show the upsides of our decentralized system of education governance.