On Thursday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to facilitate closing the U.S. Education Department.
And before that, the Trump administration announced that nearly half of the U.S. Department of Education would be laid off. During a visit to Florida this month, Education Secretary, Linda McMahon, stated that she is taking steps to close the department, as per President Trump’s mandate.
The Department of Education funds public school programs, gives college aid through FSA, conducts education research, and works to ensure equal access to education through work like Title I.
More than 400,000 students in Florida currently rely on programs funded by the Education Department. The FSA and other loan websites saw outages following the mass layoffs last Wednesday, according to the Associated Press.
Duval County State Representative Angie Nixon is also Executive Director of Florida for All. She believes that these cuts hinder economically disadvantaged students from being able to start college because of the cuts to Pell Grants.
While on the campaign trail, President Trump vowed to dismantle the Education Department because he believes it’s wasteful. He also stated that he wants to return education to state authority.
A recent poll from Inside Higher Education found that about 60% of Americans strongly oppose eliminating the department, which works to ensure that students have equal access to education.
President Trump has now announced he will sign an executive order to dismantle the department Today.
However, education is not decided upon federally. As stated on the department’s website, “Education is primarily a State and local responsibility in the United States.”
Carol Burris, the Executive Director of Network for Public Education, opposes dismantling the department. She also echoed the sentiment from the department’s website and said that it does not determine curriculum, state tests, or teacher hiring as that is in the power of the states.
Burris also believes that such cuts to the Education Department would create a new problem; fraud.
“My organization, for example, does a lot of work on the federal charter schools program which doles out money to create more charter schools. We found a few years ago, that over one billion dollars were being wasted by people who were given money to start new schools and never did,” said Burris “That was found with a fully staffed department, one can only imagine the extraordinary waste with no one there to check on where the money goes. “
Burris says that without support from both chambers of Congress, the executive order cannot shut down the department. These cuts, however, raise concern about funding for Title I programs, financial aid for college students, and aid for students with disabilities.
Nixon urges people to get involved by calling their senators and state officials to express concern.
“Right now we are seeing the fall of democracy and we need to step up the plate,” said Nixon. “We need to ensure everyone in this country has the opportunity to be healthy, prosperous, and safe”
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