End of Dept Ed
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Anonymous
Have any of you actually READ what the plan is? Do you know that K-12 will now be under the Labor Department, ostensibly to provide good little workers with a side of patriotic education? But, this administration wants an AI revolution and is firing people left and right, including federal workers, so how does that possibly square with their stated goals? Is anyone actually looking to see the ACTUAL GOALS of this administration? https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/osec/osec20251118 https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/ending-radical-indoctrination-in-k-12-schooling/ |
Anonymous
You fail at reading comprehension because the quoted section does not relate to moving of parts of USED to other agencies/departments. |
Anonymous
Replacing science with classes about Charlie Kirk and how the blacks were happier as slaves. That's MAGA education. |
Anonymous
Your dismissal of concrete metrics as "meaningless" and "chatGPT talking points" is intellectually dishonest and ignores how large-scale systems actually function. Let me address your points directly: On "meaningless" metrics: You can't simultaneously complain that "cohorts of 9th graders can't read" while dismissing data collection and transparency as meaningless. How exactly do you think we know about reading deficiencies? Through the very data collection systems the Department of Ed maintains via NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress). Without federal data standards, we'd have 50 different state measurements with no way to identify systemic problems or compare outcomes. On Special Education: You call IDEA "breathtaking fraud" but provide zero evidence. Before IDEA (passed in 1975), millions of children with disabilities were simply excluded from public schools or warehoused without education. Today, students with disabilities have enforceable rights to free appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment. Graduation rates for students with disabilities have increased from 55% in 2008 to 73% in recent years. That's not fraud, it's progress enforced by federal standards that many states would never implement voluntarily. On your declining proficiency argument: Yes, scores have declined, particularly post-COVID. But attributing this to the Department of Ed's existence rather than to underfunding, pandemic disruption, poverty, state-level policy failures, or district mismanagement is absurd causation. The Department of Ed doesn't run classrooms or hire teachers. FCPS's failures are FCPS's failures, not proof that federal oversight is harmful. Your glaring omission: You completely ignored Pell Grants, which have enabled millions of low-income students to access higher education. You ignored Title I funding that provides $18 billion annually to high-poverty schools. You ignored federal enforcement that prevents states from discriminating against students with disabilities, English language learners, and minority students; that's enforcement that wouldn't happen without federal oversight. The "let it burn" fantasy: Your "solution" of dissolving the department and "starting over" is not a plan. What happens to Civil Rights enforcement under Title VI and Title IX? Who ensures FAPE for students with disabilities? Who distributes $80+ billion in federal education funding? State departments that have repeatedly proven they'll shortchange vulnerable populations when left to their own devices? Here's the bottom line: Yes, the Department of Ed has serious flaws and needs reform, but claiming it provides "no value" while offering zero alternative mechanism for civil rights enforcement, data collection, or equitable funding distribution is not a serious policy position, it's destructive, counterproductive nihilism dressed up as tough talk. If you actually work in education, you should understand the difference between systemic challenges and scorched-earth rhetoric. You are clearly unserious about actual policy and are making disingenuous arguments. |
Anonymous
+1 Well written! |
Anonymous
But are state board of eds and local school boards any better? It seems like all they do is pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to consultants to select and implement “new” curriculums only to decide a few years later those are crap and repeat the cycle all over again. The only people who benefit are the employees paid to hire the consultants and the consultants themselves. Why do we need to constantly reinvent the wheel with reading and math curriculum? |
Anonymous
Maybe the parent does care but can’t do anything because they are at work. Or maybe the parent gave up on the system because they have not benefitted from the system. |
Anonymous
There is no need to devote a cabinet level agency to metric collection. Yes, data is important but celebrating the act of gathering data as some of the “win” is ridiculous. It is the bare minimum. Although perhaps some credit is due for not falsifying data. Can you imagine if a business reported declining profits but then demanded accolades for reporting on it? Insane. Special Ed is literally bankrupting school systems. All for students who are unlikely to be net contributors to our economy. Yes, they deserve an education. No, they do not deserve an egregiously high proportion of education dollars. You tout “graduation rates”. what good is a high school diploma when an individual is functionally illiterate. Your point that declining literacy is more the fault of teachers omits the facts that the Dept of Education is responsible for pushing idiotic and counterproductive “innovative” approaches to literacy. I noticed that you’re quick to talk about college Pell grants but strangely reticent to mention student loans. Crippling student loans debt (made worse when couple with low-income majors) is a generational issue. It has ruined the financial lives of many who lacked the financial education to understand that taking about $400K for a social work major is a bad idea. Here’s the bottom line: it’s clear that you have never stepped foot in a classroom and are completely ignorant about how the Dept of Education fails students, especially low income. Your privilege and ignorance is not just ill-informed, it’s actively harmful to public school students. How dare you accuse me of “nihilism” when my life has been committed to public education. Public education is administered at the state and local levels. Federal level policy does nothing but make that job harder and enrich DC bureaucrats. |
Anonymous
Again,you are pissing on metrics, without which we don't even have a coherent picture of proficiency rates, dropout trends, or inequities between school districts. You yammer about "meaningless" data while citing proficiency statistics in glaring self-contradiction. Second, calling special needs students "not net contributors" is both morally offensive and economically shortsighted. Lots of students with disabilities enter the workforce, pay taxes, and contribute in diverse ways. And, the law is about equal rights, not economic triage. If school districts are getting it wrong, that's a district problem, not a Department of Ed problem. Third, literacy declines are NOT caused by the Department of Education. The Dept of Ed DOES NOT dictate classroom instruction. Phonics, sight reading, "balanced literacy" and other things are chosen at the state and district level. Blaming Dept of Ed for local curriculum choices wildly misses the mark and someone supposedly in education for years should know that fundamental, which makes me think you are a fraud misrepresenting yourself. Fourth, your hyperbolic strawman about a "$400,000 social work degree" - no social work program costs anywhere near that much. Also, Pell grants and federal loan protections exist precisely to prevent predatory lending and make higher education accessible. Department of Ed is who cracks down on for-profit colleges that saddle students with massive debt for low-value degrees, since nobody else was doing it. Fifth, "enrich DC bureaucrats" - again hyperbolic nonsense. The vast majority of Dept of Ed funding is passthrough to the states and cutting it means states lose billions in funding for all kinds of programs. Also, you ignore the fact that Dept of Ed is who enforces issues of discrimination which is a very real thing that happened to shortchange minority and low-income students across America. And again, you keep blaming Dept of Ed for failings that are at the STATE and SCHOOL DISTRICT level. It makes you sound either clueless and fraudulently representing yourself as someone who knows education well, or a dishonest, disingenuous shill who knows better but has an agenda to pitch. Either way your arguments are a total fail with me. |
Anonymous
You're clearly a liar and a fraud because you got so many fundamental things wrong that someone in public education would know better. Go take a flying leap with your "how dare you" crap. |
Anonymous
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Once the Dept. of Ed. made the testing high stakes, the kiss of doom was sealed. When the tests become the means by which funds are given or taken away or school choice is to be granted or busing will become an issue or tutoring is mandatory or teachers are to be called onto the carpet, it's a HUGE problem. So what happened? The tests were watered down. The "data collection" rules were changed (to a 3 year average from a 1 year). They did anything and everything to make the statistics "work" for both the Dept. of Education and the local districts. Because nobody wanted to admit that testing was not the way to improve the schools (anything else would be a lot more difficult and how could they let the taxpayers and voters know that they had failed). Meanwhile the teachers were totally aware of the game and the parents were not far behind. Employers and taxpayers were livid. Is it any wonder that people were mad? When they made education into a political football they ruined it. Now everything is politicized and look where we are. |
Anonymous
I am neither one of the PPs. There is clearly a huge disconnect between people in the trenches and the generals. If you read through this thread it is clear. A top down approach from the outside has not worked. How can we give teachers what they need instead of what the government thinks they need? And I'm not a Republican. |
Anonymous
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If you believe that the tests are indicative of achievement and standards, you have been drinking the koolaid. If you believe that high school graduation rates means something, you have been blinded. There are many kinds of diplomas now. Some are basically seat hours. It's a lot of smoke and mirrors. |
Anonymous
The tests were driven by state-level accountability and bipartisan legislation like NCLB, not Department of Ed passing random edicts from on high. Also, testing isn't inherently "doom." It's a diagnostic tool. The problem is in how states and districts use test results, typically for punitive measures rather than improving the curriculum and instruction. Also, NAEP wasn't "watered down" and 3 year averages aren't "watering down" - all it does is smooth out temporary anomalies like a bad year due to a local disruption - or the pandemic. NAEP is still the gold standard for measuring proficiency, and is independent of state tinkering and it is what prevents states from gaming results. It's true that testing alone doesn't improve schools. But testing DOES provide transparency. NAEP revealed persistent achievement gaps by income and race that otherwise would have been hidden. Also, what's your alternative? No testing means no accountability, and parents, taxpayers and others would not have a good way to measure how schools are serving students compared to others. "Teachers knew it was a game, parents caught on, employers were livid" - sounds like anecdotes and hyperbole. I don't know of any employers who hire based on 4th grade test scores, they care more about long term skills, which testing tracks. Parents WANT transparent data, otherwise they'd be in the dark on how well or poorly their kid's school is performing. And politicization isn't new - Brown v Board of Education and other things have been part of the education game for years. But that said, blaming politicization solely on Department of Ed ignores all of the insane things happening at the state level where it comes to curriculum, funding and local control. I for one do not want my state to mandate that schools be named after Charlie Kirk or that teaching about slavery or climate science be eliminated to be replaced with school prayer. What's going on there is far worse than anything I see Department of Education doing. |
Anonymous
Can you show me where "seat hours" diplomas were mandated or authorized by the Department of Education? That's not a Department of Education problem, that's school districts failing our kids and trying to fake that they didn't. |