AILSA CHANG, HOST:
Federal education policy has seen a lot of changes in the past six months since President Trump's inauguration. There's the Department of Education itself, which Trump has vowed to close.
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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We're going to shut it down and shut it down as quickly as possible. It's doing us no good.
CHANG: But that has not stopped the Trump administration from also wielding the department's power, most recently by withholding billions of dollars for K-12 schools. We're going to spend the next few minutes looking at the first six months of Trump's second term with NPR education correspondent Cory Turner. Hi, Cory.
CORY TURNER, BYLINE: Hey, Ailsa.
CHANG: OK, so of all the changes in education policy that you've seen under President Trump this year, which ones do you think have the most far-reaching consequences?
TURNER: Well, there's obviously the effort to close the department itself. You know, between the buyouts, early retirements and the cutting of nearly 1,400 employees, the department currently stands at about half the size it was six months ago. On the higher ed side, there's the administration's high-profile fight with Harvard. There are also sweeping changes to student loans. You know, these are all huge stories.
CHANG: Yeah.
TURNER: The change I want to start with, though, that I think is having the biggest impact right now on K-12 schools is the withholding of federal money that was supposed to be delivered three weeks ago.
CHANG: Wait, say more about that. Like, how much are we talking here, and why is it being withheld?
TURNER: Yeah. So as of today, it's nearly $5 billion. And to be clear, this is not the two biggest, most important funding streams that go to schools, that support kids in poverty and kids with disabilities. But this is still a lot of money, and it was already agreed to by Congress back in March. The Ed Department was supposed to disburse it to schools by July 1, but it was kind of mysteriously held up by the administration. At a recent breakfast hosted by the Christian Science Monitor, Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought told reporters why this money was being held up.
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RUSSELL VOUGHT: These are the programs that we have some of the gravest concerns with regarding the Education Department.
TURNER: Vought argued the money was being used to fund programs that are, in his words, riddled with critical race theory.
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VOUGHT: You have school improvement programs that are indoctrinating teachers to be cultural revolutionaries in the classroom.
TURNER: Now, Ailsa, I spoke with Sasha Pudelski. She's the director of advocacy for AASA. That's The School Superintendents Association. And she told me, you know, this funding goes to 13,000 districts, and punishing all of them for the anecdotal mistakes of a handful is wrong. And for the most part, Pudelski told me this money is being used by schools to pay for teachers and teacher training and for programs that help kids learn math and the science of reading. It even funds some AP classes, as well as support for English learners.
SASHA PUDELSKI: It's never been done before. And this is not suddenly a future problem. This is a today problem because district budgets were set with these funds in mind, and the sudden withholding of these funds by the Trump administration has thrown them into chaos.
TURNER: Pudelski's group did a quick survey, too, of hundreds of local superintendents from all over the country.
PUDELSKI: If this funding isn't released soon, three-quarters of districts are going to have to eliminate programs that help children improve academically in core subjects like reading and math.
TURNER: And one more point here, Ailsa - this is a problem that's going to affect red and blue districts. There was an analysis of the data by researchers at the liberal New America, and they found that, on average, school districts represented by Republicans stand to lose 1.6 times as much funding per pupil as districts represented by Democrats.
CHANG: Oh, interesting. Well, still, I mean, there's, like - what? - nearly $5 billion that's being withheld right now for K-12 schools. So do you know what that means for schools right now?
TURNER: Yeah, I've been on the phone with superintendents, including Bryan Huber. He runs the Page County Public Schools. It's a small, high-poverty rural district in the shadow of Virginia's Shenandoah Mountains. And he told me, where he is, it is really hard to find and keep experienced teachers. So he often has to hire people with little or no experience, and then he relies on this federal money that's being withheld to train them.
BRYAN HUBER: Not only are we bringing in people that are not experienced and not trained, we also need to have funds that can help them get better and also feel better at the work that they're doing. You know, no one wants to come to work and feel like a failure.
TURNER: You know, President Trump has talked a lot about how America's students are struggling at reading and math because public schools and the U.S. Department of Education, he says, have failed them. But Huber told me low-income rural schools have it really hard right now.
HUBER: If you want to talk about how we're not being successful in public education, then you need to fund it. And I feel strongly about that.
CHANG: OK, but can we talk about the department staff right now? - because with half of the staff gone, what kind of work is actually just going to stop? - because I'm sure there's no way they can everything they once did with now just half of the people, right?
TURNER: Yeah. I mean, I know many of the employees who remain are being asked to juggle multiple jobs right now. But I just want to focus on one thing, one of the most important things the Ed Department does at the K-12 level, Ailsa. Keep in mind, before federal laws guaranteed kids with disabilities a right to an education, in many states, these children were turned away by public schools. That is not allowed anymore because the federal government got involved. Now, I mentioned the money earlier that it sends to schools to help pay for special education. But it also employs staff, including attorneys, who make sure students get the help they deserve. And these are some of the people who are being cut, including attorney Emily Merolli.
EMILY MEROLLI: I am worried about students with disabilities and their families being left vulnerable and without a mechanism for making sure that their kids are receiving the services that they are legally entitled to and they are morally entitled to.
TURNER: I need to say, because Merolli won't officially lose her job until August 1, she was sharing her personal views there. Also, I asked the Education Department for comment on this, but they did not respond to my request.
CHANG: OK, well, can we get to higher education as well? - because you laid out two big changes already. Can you tell us what's going on there?
TURNER: Yeah, so first, there's the Trump administration using the Education Department really as a weapon to go after elite universities over allegations of antisemitism. We saw Columbia University just agree to pay an enormous fine - over $220 million. The spotlight is also on Harvard. While that case is technically about policing antisemitism on campus, you know, Trump has used this fight to cast himself as a kind of populist fighter against elite, woke, liberal universities. For Harvard, though, and really for colleges and universities all over the country, Ailsa, I mean, this is an existential fight for their financial and intellectual independence.
The other big higher ed story I need to mention here - it's less visible, but it's still a big deal. And that is that Republicans just passed a sweeping overhaul of the entire federal student loan system. You know, I think borrowers will actually like some of the changes in here, but it is hard to overstate just how much work it's going to be for the department to implement all these changes, especially considering they've got half the staff they had six months ago.
CHANG: Yeah.
TURNER: You know, on a personal note, Ailsa, my email right now is a swirling vortex of borrower questions.
CHANG: I bet.
TURNER: I think that's because so much is changing, and it seems to be getting harder and harder for borrowers to just pick up the phone and get answers.
CHANG: Maddening - that is NPR education correspondent Cory Turner. Thank you so much, Cory.
TURNER: You're welcome.
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