Donald Trump took the overwhelming step of revoking the Department of Education on Thursday by signing an executive order to dismantle the institution responsible for the country’s national education policy.
With the stroke of the pen, Trump goes back to 2016 and fulfills his campaign promise.
What is the Ministry of Education?
The Department of Education is a cabinet-level institution created in 1979 by Jimmy Carter overseeing national education policies and administering federal assistance programs for schools around the country.
The department manages a budget of around $268 billion and employs around 4,400 staff. Its central responsibilities include distributing federal financial aid for education, gathering data on US schools, identifying key educational issues, enforcing federal education laws that prohibit discrimination and implementing Congressional Education Act.
Among its most important features are the federal student aid program, which may provide grants, research funds and loans to more than 13 million students. The agency also oversees programs that address special education, English acquisition and education for underprivileged students.
Critics have long questioned the need for the department, arguing that education should remain entirely under state and local control, and that its supporters play an important role in protecting education equity and providing much-needed federal support to schools that serve vulnerable groups.
Can Trump legally eliminate government agencies?
Congressional approval is required to destroy an entire department. This is a failure for decades by conservatives trying to eliminate the education sector.
It has never previously closed any Cabinet-level institutions surrounded by law. And the constitutional separation of power means that the president’s administrative authority alone is not enough to close the agency due to his pen’s stroke.
The White House has granted the restrictions and the executives have confirmed that they do not have the necessary votes in Congress to completely eliminate the department.
So instead, Trump’s executive order would instruct Secretary of Education Linda McMahon to essentially “take all necessary steps to promote closures” while working within the powers of existing administrative departments. This could include reorganizing certain functions, assigning leadership to targets under aggressive drawing, and potentially returning certain authorities to states permitted by federal law.
What does executive order mean to American students?
The massive weakening of agencies undoubtedly creates significant uncertainty for the 50 million American public school students and their families, and its impact will vary widely depending on how the directive is implemented.
For the time being, most students will likely be little change to their daily teaching experience. Because the schools operate primarily under state and local controls and have already budgeted for the year. However, if federal education programs are changed or reduced, the long-term impact could be greater.
Experts say that closing departments puts marginalized students at the most risk. Federal programs face the brunt of impact as they support special education, English learners and disadvantaged students. The Disabled Education Act (IDEA), which provides protection to students with disabilities, is enforced by the federal government through the department.
What happens to student loans?
There is great uncertainty in the federal student loan system, which currently manages approximately 1.69 tons of outstanding debts for more than 43 million Americans.
While the White House shows continued functions such as student loans, disruptions in departmental grants, research funds and loan distributions could affect more than 19 million university students in the United States.
There are questions about which departments could oversee these businesses, but earlier this month Trump proposed transferring loan management to either the Treasury, the Commerce Department, or, in turn, the Small Business Bureau. The Ministry of Finance may be the most likely choice.
Currently repayment borrowers are unlikely to immediately change payment requirements or loan terms, but they may face uncertainty about where to direct questions and how to navigate repayment options if management liability changes. However, the executive order on new student loans and the impact on financial aid processing for university students remains unknown.
