On March 20, President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at accomplishing one of his most ridiculous campaign promises: the dismantling of the Department of Education.
While Trump cannot personally disband a federal department, the executive order significantly curtails the Department’s ability to carry out its responsibilities. In the first section of his recent executive order, Trump dubiously claims that his goal in undercutting the Department of Education is to ensure “excellent educational opportunities for every child.”
Trump goes on to emphasize America’s admittedly appalling education statistics, noting that “70 percent of 8th graders were below proficient in reading, and 72 percent were below proficient in math,” despite significant investment in the federal education system.
Trump is correct that the Department of Education has not been entirely successful in its goal of bringing the United States to the forefront of education and ensuring that students across the nation have equal access to education. However, the solution to this problem is not the total elimination of federal education oversight.
Dismantling the Department of Education will exacerbate existing educational disparities — the states with the worst education systems take the most money from the federal government for public education. Arizona is ranked last in the nation for education, and 19% of its public education funding for the 2021-22 school year was federal, compared to a national average of 13.7%. Massachusetts, which is ranked number one in the United States, received only 9.7% of its public education funding from the federal government.
That trend does not bode well for South Carolina. South Carolina is ranked 38th in the nation for education, and 15.2% of its public education funding in 2021-22 was federal. If Trump’s plan to eradicate the Department of Education progresses, South Carolina and other lower-ranked states will lose much more federal funding per student than high-ranked states. In a twist of bitter irony, the states that take the most federal money to support their education systems are overwhelmingly Republican — many South Carolinians voted for this.
Across the nation, the best public education systems are also the best-funded. If Trump succeeds at completely eliminating the Department of Education, which is without a doubt his ultimate goal, he will eliminate a significant portion of the education budgets for many of the states with poorer education statistics.
The Department of Education is also responsible for establishing federal regulations safeguarding students. Without federal enforcement, school integration and the reform of violent, dehumanizing special education programs would have been impossible.
Returning control of education to the states would be catastrophic for students in economically disadvantaged areas, students with special needs and students who belong to minority demographic groups, while worsening divides between the highest and lowest achievers in our schools.
Thomas Merzlak is a sophomore world cinema major from Florence, South Carolina. Thomas can be reached at [email protected]
