I look at your arguments and I find them at least as deficient as those you criticize.
Bottom line is there is zero evidence - ZERO - that the existence of the federal Dept of education has done anything to improve education.
It correlates quite well with an accelerated decline. It costs money and increases the size of the federal government.
That's more than enough for me. Reforming it means leaving it there to serve the whims and desires of future administrations, which is a risk not worth taking
Tom: Unfortunately you missed the main point. YES DOEd has been horrible.
My recommendation is to GUT DOEd and START OVER. Therefore your response is irrelevent as we are dealing with completely new people, completely new policies, etc, etc..
No, unfortunately you missed my point. You imply that only the "existing" and "past" departments were a failure, and so there's no reason to believe that a "new" or "reformed" department would fail as well. After all, you reason, there will be new people and new policies, so why shouldn't it succeed now?
A more naive argument would be hard to find. Like, only now will the right people staff it, and only now will the right policies animate it.
Yet, not one time in the past has it worked, with whatever administration driving it. But you still say keep it.
The fact is that it is not the people or the policies that make the dept a failure. At the root it is doomed to failure by virtue of what it is: a federal bureaucracy meddling in an area that belongs rightly to local officials.
It should not exist at all. Therefore reforming it is a fools errand.
But no brother it's not about that at all. It's just understanding Jefferson's maxim that the natural course of things is for liberty to yield and tyranny to gain ground.
There are known processes that enable that to happen. It's happened throughout history long before the US even existed.
The Romans had similar problems with bureaucracy and those issues contributed to their downfall.
You don't create a government department and then hope it's eventually run by the right people with the right policies.
That just doesn't work long term. Governments exist for the purpose of securing the rights of the people. Nothing else.
I'm pretty sure you mean well, but defending the existence of some failed department that wasn't created until the late 1970s as if it was something precious to be preserved is not sensible.
Tom: Last time. The negativity and illogicality of your position is stunning.
The plan I oppose here (and you support) is to turn over what is done by one bureaucracy to 50 bureaucracies. Further, almost all of these 50 bureaucracies have been infiltrated by Leftists. The question is: what is easier to fix: a) one bureaucracy that conservatives have 100% control of, or b) 50 bureaucracies that conservatives have very little control of?
The "negativity" criticism is purely subjective and I think I'm operating with a consistent set of principles that are based in reality and history.
We both (I assume) want a much better education for US k-12 students, so the dispute is purely on how to get there. Therefore I don't think either of us is being negative.
I see your logic, and I think what it's missing is that it sits in a vacuum without historical context and is not based on what I think are the relevant principles.
Let's leave out the idea of who controls what bureaucracy right now, because that can change.
Leftists in general have more control in Washington than out in the 50 states. Supporting the existence of a Washington/federal bureaucracy because you think that the Trump administration is not leftist is not persuasive to me.
Even if that's true, we will not always be blessed with such an administration. You have to think of how future administrations will use this federal bureacracy. It seems you are operating only in the here and now.
More important is your "logic" that we would rather "fix" one bureaucracy that we ostensibly (temporarily) have control over than 50 others.
First off let's clarify that even if we kept the federal DOE, and reformed it, we would STILL HAVE the other 50 state bureaucracies anyway.
Are you suggesting that this newly "reformed" and "good" federal bureaucracy would then flex its muscles and override state education Departments?
I hope not, which leads me to my main criticism of your last comment.
I have to question your understanding of federalism, because by your logic, we shouldn't have state governments at all.
After all, there are 50 state governments, each with their own bureaucracies. Should they be overridden by a federal government with better people and animated by better policies?
The idea here is we WANT there to be 50 bureaucracies instead of one, just as we WANT 50 state governments.
As much power as possible should be devolved to the state, and even local levels.
You seem not to understand the risk of central planning and centralized power
John. In your plan for reforming the DoE, would you advise the feds to use the threat of the loss of federal funding to get states to implement these new policies?
Have you considered the idea of bypassing State DoE’s altogether and sending the $ directly to parents to choose the beat performing schools and to the local government for public education?
Secondly, how would you propose these new policies be codified into law to make it much more difficult for future Presidents to go back to previous failed policies?
Granny: I advocate starting with the carrot approach. DOEd clearly define what the K-12 education goals are that all States should aspire to. That has never been done, so we have 50 sets of K-12 education goals — which is absurd.
Yes - spot on. It's easy to point fingers and lay blame solely at the feet of the DOE - We spend billions of dollars on education with disappointing and unacceptable results. However, the DOE is taking the brunt of criticism for what the States are ultimately responsible for. We need more awareness on this distinction or we won't be able to fix the problem! More specifically, WHAT children are taught, and HOW children are taught is *mostly* decided and adopted at the State level. Elected and non-elected State Board of Education members (and State Department of Education employees) wield immense power over what the curricula is - not the DOE. Yes, the DOE ties funding to standards, attendance and compliance (ex. ESSER funding during Covid), but largely the states decide what curriculum they want and approve it as such. If the DOE's goal is to produce more critically thinking graduates - as you suggest, they could provide the States with guidance and support to this end - but again, the States are the ones who get to decide this which is why we already see a split in priorities among Red and Blue States. I agree that the DOE needs major reform, but do not believe eliminating it completely will solve the problem.
John: I have felt if first hand. I was elected to the Elmira School Board and left after a year. However, not every state is New York State. I have also learned over the years that nothing stays the same. Who would have predicted five years ago that President Trump would be our President today? Many states have been rejecting the Marxist approach and creating much better educational systems which can and likely will be models for change in other states. Just yesterday Vivek announced that he would like to revamp the School system in Ohio to one of teacher merit, not simply curriculum change. Here is where new ideas and policies can be tested without risking failure on a nationwide basis. Change is coming to New York. Which direction it will go is unknown to me. Home schooling is at its highest percentage of student involvement in modern history. Public schools are not necessarily the answer. Me? I prefer that the innovations and the consequential successes and failures occur at the state level first. But that is just me.
Chris: No one (neither DOEd or anyone else) is restricting States from upgrading their K-12 education systems. However, they simply are not doing it, because State education departments have been taken over by progressives, etc. who have no interest in their graduates being proficient with the 3Rs, Critical Thinking, etc.
SOMEONE needs to take leadership here, and a TRANSFORMED DOEd has the podium and money to do that.
It’s been a long time, but I understood that the school curriculum in the civilized world was the rational thought system. Since Einstein had proved that only physical factors influenced physical results there was no justification for any religion’s primacy since no religion including Marxism had any physical evidence in its favour. This also applies to fiction of divine rights and divine authority.
Let's get real: the chance of totally eliminating the DoEd is a long shot. This whole Oval Office performance is more evidence of what I've claimed previously: this is an Art of the Deal operation by Trump. Critical think your way our of that proposition? Can't. It's all conjecture...which is a crucial element of any Art of the Deal move. Pop the popcorn. News at eleven.
I'm starting to believe that this is an "Art of the Deal" move by Trump. John Droz, Jr.'s "dream" to bring the DoEd back into normalcy may be doable. An acceptable "doable" would fall witnin John's 90%-10% range.
Agreed. A suburb of Grand Rapids, MI has nothing much in common with an inner city school in Los Angeles. Lansing and Sacramento do little to add to the coversation--much less a DC-bound DoEd.
John, I appreciate your work and agree with your critical thinking on reforming as opposed to eliminating the DOE. Somehow your information has to get to Trump. Hopefully, you can send it to the new Secretary of Education. Your case is too good and too important not to be adopted.
Being a retired teacher of both the high school and community college systems, I have to disagree with your statement that state school systems are not under federal mandates. They sure were and are. No school was going to give their monies away and adopted the common core curriculum across the board to keep their checks flowing. Even at the college level, GED testing was changed to fit the common core agenda which involved no critical thinking teaching at all.
Common core made math impossible to teach. I also was a tutor for private companies in my city and none of the 3rd-8th grade students knew fractions or decimals at all. First, I had to unindoctrinate them. It only took 2-3 hours of tutoring to teach them the skills that were not being taught in public schools. Needless to say the parents were amazed, and the students gained a sense of competentacy. I told them when you teach math the correct way, the skill is easy to master. The same was true of algebra. Other teachers also could not figure out how to teach math with common core curricula. It simply didn't make sense and included many unneccessary steps. In other words, it was not meant to give students mastery over the subject just as leaving out critical thinking skills was meant to make mastery over literature and the lanquage impossible and leave our students in the stone age of reasoning skills.
Joni: I'm, sorry for the misunderstanding, but I never said that there were no federal mandates. What I did say was that by-and-large almost all curricula-related decisions are made by State Boards of Education and State Departments of Education.
John: It is your blog. But it doesn't change the fact that the concentration of power in a large national entity has its own problems and benefits which differ greatly from state control problems and benefits. This debate is not unlike the debate about the US constitution in the Federalist papers - centralized power v. decentralized power. The Federal Constitution was only approved upon the express condition that they would all return to approve a Bill of Rights. I don't see an analogous check on the power of a surviving Department of Education.
Chris: yes there would be federal aspects, but my point is to arrange then so that they are a Net Benefit to States, local school districts and students.
Secondly, you are playing down the almost non-existent check on the power of State Boards of Education. In your case, show me that you can get the NYS Regents to stop requiring NYS school districts to teach the Marxist NGSS... I'll wait.
William T. Lynch, PhD. March20, 2024 ... Yes, the Federal Department of Education should not be eliminated, and it is equally true that the State and City Governments should be held responsible for providing a proper education to all citizens. After all, about half our State income and property taxes are already assigned to Education, and more money has never been the solution. For thirty plus years the metrics employed for evaluating student and cohort progress have been totally wrong. Point scores, and their algebraic differences, do not measure progress. But relative knowledge, and absolute relative gains, can be quantitatively measured, with comparisons valid over decades. The national plan for NCLB was noble, but was destroyed by States, politicians, and teachers’ unions who guaranteed a false success by means of horrible metrics. Individual states also wished to avoid their deserved embarrassment. Only the “Nation’s Report Card” (NAEP) is left as a common standard. The latest suggestion for a replacement for NCLB that allows the States to conduct their own tests will also offer a common linkage via the common nationwide NAEP tests was rejected by a Congressional Committee.
The recommended set of normalized metrics that have been proposed will give the same results for all “good” tests that profess to cover the same topic and grade. But it is required that all students being compared have taken at least one common test. (NAEP, e.g., meets that requirement.) The range of “difficulty” of the tests does not matter. For any pairing of cohorts (ethnic, poverty, Lunch vs. NFL) these performance and gap metrics have been consistently reliable: District tests, end-of-year State tests, NAEP, and even SATs (for its common sets of students).
They also provide more obvious (and realistic) goal setting for year-to-year progress (even if the tests are being changed every few years). For example one such metric is the answer to the question: “What percent of students in lagging cohort B have scores below the 25-percentile score of the control cohort?” One would like that to be 25%, but it more likely to be 60% to 65%. And it has not yet been proven in the classroom, but it could be (should be) demonstrated (as it is on paper) that, when students are differentiated in their classroom assignments as belonging to the lowest 20 percentile, the highest 20 percentile and an intermediate 60 percentile – with a significant overlap that is the annual responsibility of the Principal to adjust – the burden on the teacher is greatly reduced AND the progress of each category will be expanded enormously. A full disbursement of 100% presents a teacher with students having a current confirmed knowledge (that does not mean aptitude) range of about 30. The three-way split (with overlaps) will give each teacher a more manageable range of about 5. It may be desirable to wait until the fifth grade to initiate the splits. Common accord between Principals and teachers is the trigger that will make this work, not political intervention. For us to show progress in the world we must introduce these changes.
The biggest problem with a top down approach are regulations driven by Executive Order. Biden (or his handlers via auto-pen) issued 241 DOEd EOs in his first year, most of which were through the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education. Many of these EOs reversed Trump EOs or fortified Obama EOs. On top of that were Biden's government-wide EOs that imposed DEI in all federal departments.
The reforms you describe are fantastic, if they can be done by Congress (unlikely, now or in the foreseeable future). But reform by EO would be quickly undone by the next progressive President. It's better to put education policy beyond their reach.
I agree we must get this right, but so far no one in DC has gotten it right.
Robert: Agreed that so far no one in DC has gotten this right.
I'm an optimist and it seems to me that the forces are properly aligned here so that we have our best chance ever to finally get it right. Throwing in the towel — and turning it over to 50 groups that have repeatedly failed, is hardly an inspired choice.
John is charged with one more critical thinking exercise, I would think: Is there any way to eliminate 90% of the DoEd and guarantee that it won't simply expand exponentially like just about every other federal bureaucracy? (Examples to the contrary are welcomed.) This excerpt from this otherwise cogent post remains a concern for me and requires expansion in light of John's insistence that the "real creators of the K-12 education bureaucracy are States":
"5 -- "We should eliminate DOEd as we need less bureaucracy.”
No argument there — I advocated getting rid of 90% of DOEd. That said, the real creators of the K-12 education bureaucracy are States. For example, look at the huge increase in administration K-12 positions. Essentially all of this is due to poor State oversight rather than DOEd."
Getting rid of 90% of the DoDe sounds great and, indeed, may actually remove some regulatory and compliance redundancies thereby lessening the load of states' bureauracries but what guarantees do we have that the culled DoDe will remain trim? I just don't see any clearcut examples of that happening much at either the state or federal level.
Asking Grok, these four examples were returned (one from Trump's first administration):
"Yes, there have been instances where efforts to trim federal bureaucracy have yielded measurable results, though none precisely match a 90% downsizing of the Department of Education. Historical and recent examples demonstrate that reducing the size or scope of federal agencies is possible with deliberate policy actions, political will, and strategic reforms. Here are a few notable cases:
Reagan Administration’s Hiring Freeze and Spending Cuts (1980s)
During Ronald Reagan’s presidency, a key focus was reducing the size of the federal government. One of his first actions after taking office in 1981 was to institute an immediate hiring freeze across federal agencies. This blunt measure, combined with targeted budget cuts, slowed the growth of the federal workforce. According to analyses, real government spending growth under Reagan was reduced to about one-third the rate of other post-World War II administrations. Domestic spending (excluding interest and savings-and-loan bailout costs) dropped from 14.8% to 12.2% of GDP. While not a 90% reduction in any single agency, this effort showed that broad bureaucratic trimming could be achieved through executive action and congressional cooperation.
Post-World War II Bureaucratic Reduction (1945-1950s)
The federal bureaucracy saw significant growth during Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and World War II, peaking at over 3.5 million employees in 1945. After the war ended, the workforce was reduced substantially, stabilizing at around 2.5 to 3 million by the 1950s. This downsizing was driven by the elimination of wartime agencies and a shift away from emergency programs, proving that large-scale reductions are feasible when the need for certain functions diminishes. While not a single agency cut by 90%, it reflects a broader success in scaling back bureaucracy when political and economic conditions align.
During Donald Trump’s first term, the federal workforce shrank in several departments. By September 2017, most Cabinet agencies (except Homeland Security, Veterans Affairs, and Interior) had fewer permanent staff than at the start of his term, with reductions often in the hundreds per agency. This was achieved through a combination of hiring freezes, voluntary buyouts, and early retirement offers. For example, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) saw staff reductions and budget cuts, though not to a 90% level. More recently, in 2025, executive orders under a renewed Trump administration reportedly eliminated entities like the Federal Executive Institute and reduced non-statutory functions across agencies like the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, showing continued momentum in trimming efforts.
Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 (Carter Era)
While not a direct reduction in size, Jimmy Carter’s Civil Service Reform Act (CSRA) laid the groundwork for more efficient bureaucracy management. By introducing a more flexible personnel system, it enabled later administrations (like Reagan’s) to assert policy control and reduce staffing through attrition and reorganization. The CSRA didn’t slash an agency by 90%, but it demonstrated that structural reforms can facilitate downsizing without legislative gridlock.
These examples suggest that trimming federal bureaucracy is most successful when it involves clear executive action (e.g., hiring freezes, program terminations), congressional support (e.g., budget cuts), or a shift in national priorities (e.g., post-war downsizing). A 90% reduction in the Department of Education specifically would be unprecedented in scale and would likely require eliminating most of its functions—such as federal student aid administration, which accounts for a significant portion of its budget—while facing resistance from stakeholders like educators and state governments reliant on its funding. No historical case matches that exact figure, but the above instances show that substantial cuts are possible with the right strategy and political alignment."
I don't see the need for a DoEd at the federal level unless it were designed to provide assistance to alternative, school choice endeavors. The present marketplace needs to be replaced. It's broken beyond repair. Change my mind.
Reggie: TY for your lengthy comment. I answered your questions in my commentary. For example:
1 -"DOEd is NOT broken beyond repair." It can be easily gutted and transformed.
2 - "I don't see the need for a DoEd at the federal level..." The need is that by-and-large the State Boards of Education are incompetent and corrupted by Left ideology. At this point ZERO states have a high quality education product.
I look at your arguments and I find them at least as deficient as those you criticize.
Bottom line is there is zero evidence - ZERO - that the existence of the federal Dept of education has done anything to improve education.
It correlates quite well with an accelerated decline. It costs money and increases the size of the federal government.
That's more than enough for me. Reforming it means leaving it there to serve the whims and desires of future administrations, which is a risk not worth taking
Tom: Unfortunately you missed the main point. YES DOEd has been horrible.
My recommendation is to GUT DOEd and START OVER. Therefore your response is irrelevent as we are dealing with completely new people, completely new policies, etc, etc..
No, unfortunately you missed my point. You imply that only the "existing" and "past" departments were a failure, and so there's no reason to believe that a "new" or "reformed" department would fail as well. After all, you reason, there will be new people and new policies, so why shouldn't it succeed now?
A more naive argument would be hard to find. Like, only now will the right people staff it, and only now will the right policies animate it.
Yet, not one time in the past has it worked, with whatever administration driving it. But you still say keep it.
The fact is that it is not the people or the policies that make the dept a failure. At the root it is doomed to failure by virtue of what it is: a federal bureaucracy meddling in an area that belongs rightly to local officials.
It should not exist at all. Therefore reforming it is a fools errand.
Tom: I'm sorry that your life has hardened you to not be open to things changing under different leaders and goals.
Ha ha. You think this is about "my life"?
That's so cute. Bless your little heart. ♥️
But no brother it's not about that at all. It's just understanding Jefferson's maxim that the natural course of things is for liberty to yield and tyranny to gain ground.
There are known processes that enable that to happen. It's happened throughout history long before the US even existed.
The Romans had similar problems with bureaucracy and those issues contributed to their downfall.
You don't create a government department and then hope it's eventually run by the right people with the right policies.
That just doesn't work long term. Governments exist for the purpose of securing the rights of the people. Nothing else.
I'm pretty sure you mean well, but defending the existence of some failed department that wasn't created until the late 1970s as if it was something precious to be preserved is not sensible.
It's never worked. It never will.
Just let it go.
Tom: Last time. The negativity and illogicality of your position is stunning.
The plan I oppose here (and you support) is to turn over what is done by one bureaucracy to 50 bureaucracies. Further, almost all of these 50 bureaucracies have been infiltrated by Leftists. The question is: what is easier to fix: a) one bureaucracy that conservatives have 100% control of, or b) 50 bureaucracies that conservatives have very little control of?
The "negativity" criticism is purely subjective and I think I'm operating with a consistent set of principles that are based in reality and history.
We both (I assume) want a much better education for US k-12 students, so the dispute is purely on how to get there. Therefore I don't think either of us is being negative.
I see your logic, and I think what it's missing is that it sits in a vacuum without historical context and is not based on what I think are the relevant principles.
Let's leave out the idea of who controls what bureaucracy right now, because that can change.
Leftists in general have more control in Washington than out in the 50 states. Supporting the existence of a Washington/federal bureaucracy because you think that the Trump administration is not leftist is not persuasive to me.
Even if that's true, we will not always be blessed with such an administration. You have to think of how future administrations will use this federal bureacracy. It seems you are operating only in the here and now.
More important is your "logic" that we would rather "fix" one bureaucracy that we ostensibly (temporarily) have control over than 50 others.
First off let's clarify that even if we kept the federal DOE, and reformed it, we would STILL HAVE the other 50 state bureaucracies anyway.
Are you suggesting that this newly "reformed" and "good" federal bureaucracy would then flex its muscles and override state education Departments?
I hope not, which leads me to my main criticism of your last comment.
I have to question your understanding of federalism, because by your logic, we shouldn't have state governments at all.
After all, there are 50 state governments, each with their own bureaucracies. Should they be overridden by a federal government with better people and animated by better policies?
The idea here is we WANT there to be 50 bureaucracies instead of one, just as we WANT 50 state governments.
As much power as possible should be devolved to the state, and even local levels.
You seem not to understand the risk of central planning and centralized power
John:
Have a good weekend.
Chris
John. In your plan for reforming the DoE, would you advise the feds to use the threat of the loss of federal funding to get states to implement these new policies?
Have you considered the idea of bypassing State DoE’s altogether and sending the $ directly to parents to choose the beat performing schools and to the local government for public education?
Secondly, how would you propose these new policies be codified into law to make it much more difficult for future Presidents to go back to previous failed policies?
Granny: I advocate starting with the carrot approach. DOEd clearly define what the K-12 education goals are that all States should aspire to. That has never been done, so we have 50 sets of K-12 education goals — which is absurd.
Yes - spot on. It's easy to point fingers and lay blame solely at the feet of the DOE - We spend billions of dollars on education with disappointing and unacceptable results. However, the DOE is taking the brunt of criticism for what the States are ultimately responsible for. We need more awareness on this distinction or we won't be able to fix the problem! More specifically, WHAT children are taught, and HOW children are taught is *mostly* decided and adopted at the State level. Elected and non-elected State Board of Education members (and State Department of Education employees) wield immense power over what the curricula is - not the DOE. Yes, the DOE ties funding to standards, attendance and compliance (ex. ESSER funding during Covid), but largely the states decide what curriculum they want and approve it as such. If the DOE's goal is to produce more critically thinking graduates - as you suggest, they could provide the States with guidance and support to this end - but again, the States are the ones who get to decide this which is why we already see a split in priorities among Red and Blue States. I agree that the DOE needs major reform, but do not believe eliminating it completely will solve the problem.
JH: Thank you for a thoughtful response.
John: I have felt if first hand. I was elected to the Elmira School Board and left after a year. However, not every state is New York State. I have also learned over the years that nothing stays the same. Who would have predicted five years ago that President Trump would be our President today? Many states have been rejecting the Marxist approach and creating much better educational systems which can and likely will be models for change in other states. Just yesterday Vivek announced that he would like to revamp the School system in Ohio to one of teacher merit, not simply curriculum change. Here is where new ideas and policies can be tested without risking failure on a nationwide basis. Change is coming to New York. Which direction it will go is unknown to me. Home schooling is at its highest percentage of student involvement in modern history. Public schools are not necessarily the answer. Me? I prefer that the innovations and the consequential successes and failures occur at the state level first. But that is just me.
Chris: No one (neither DOEd or anyone else) is restricting States from upgrading their K-12 education systems. However, they simply are not doing it, because State education departments have been taken over by progressives, etc. who have no interest in their graduates being proficient with the 3Rs, Critical Thinking, etc.
SOMEONE needs to take leadership here, and a TRANSFORMED DOEd has the podium and money to do that.
It’s been a long time, but I understood that the school curriculum in the civilized world was the rational thought system. Since Einstein had proved that only physical factors influenced physical results there was no justification for any religion’s primacy since no religion including Marxism had any physical evidence in its favour. This also applies to fiction of divine rights and divine authority.
John may up be joining our children in this swim upstream: https://open.substack.com/pub/2ndsmartestguyintheworld/p/breaking-trump-i-will-begin-eliminating?r=71l80&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
Let's get real: the chance of totally eliminating the DoEd is a long shot. This whole Oval Office performance is more evidence of what I've claimed previously: this is an Art of the Deal operation by Trump. Critical think your way our of that proposition? Can't. It's all conjecture...which is a crucial element of any Art of the Deal move. Pop the popcorn. News at eleven.
I'm starting to believe that this is an "Art of the Deal" move by Trump. John Droz, Jr.'s "dream" to bring the DoEd back into normalcy may be doable. An acceptable "doable" would fall witnin John's 90%-10% range.
Get rid of the State Boards, as well! let all localities do their own thing; let's have freedom instead of centralization
Agreed. A suburb of Grand Rapids, MI has nothing much in common with an inner city school in Los Angeles. Lansing and Sacramento do little to add to the coversation--much less a DC-bound DoEd.
John, I appreciate your work and agree with your critical thinking on reforming as opposed to eliminating the DOE. Somehow your information has to get to Trump. Hopefully, you can send it to the new Secretary of Education. Your case is too good and too important not to be adopted.
Robert: TY. Agreed. If you have her email please send it to me privately.
Being a retired teacher of both the high school and community college systems, I have to disagree with your statement that state school systems are not under federal mandates. They sure were and are. No school was going to give their monies away and adopted the common core curriculum across the board to keep their checks flowing. Even at the college level, GED testing was changed to fit the common core agenda which involved no critical thinking teaching at all.
Common core made math impossible to teach. I also was a tutor for private companies in my city and none of the 3rd-8th grade students knew fractions or decimals at all. First, I had to unindoctrinate them. It only took 2-3 hours of tutoring to teach them the skills that were not being taught in public schools. Needless to say the parents were amazed, and the students gained a sense of competentacy. I told them when you teach math the correct way, the skill is easy to master. The same was true of algebra. Other teachers also could not figure out how to teach math with common core curricula. It simply didn't make sense and included many unneccessary steps. In other words, it was not meant to give students mastery over the subject just as leaving out critical thinking skills was meant to make mastery over literature and the lanquage impossible and leave our students in the stone age of reasoning skills.
Joni: I'm, sorry for the misunderstanding, but I never said that there were no federal mandates. What I did say was that by-and-large almost all curricula-related decisions are made by State Boards of Education and State Departments of Education.
I think of it in terms of a topological covering : the set of all sets from the most local to the global .
If the DoE was eliminated there would still need to be some association at the global , ie: national level , but perhaps with just advisory power .
John: It is your blog. But it doesn't change the fact that the concentration of power in a large national entity has its own problems and benefits which differ greatly from state control problems and benefits. This debate is not unlike the debate about the US constitution in the Federalist papers - centralized power v. decentralized power. The Federal Constitution was only approved upon the express condition that they would all return to approve a Bill of Rights. I don't see an analogous check on the power of a surviving Department of Education.
Chris: yes there would be federal aspects, but my point is to arrange then so that they are a Net Benefit to States, local school districts and students.
Secondly, you are playing down the almost non-existent check on the power of State Boards of Education. In your case, show me that you can get the NYS Regents to stop requiring NYS school districts to teach the Marxist NGSS... I'll wait.
William T. Lynch, PhD. March20, 2024 ... Yes, the Federal Department of Education should not be eliminated, and it is equally true that the State and City Governments should be held responsible for providing a proper education to all citizens. After all, about half our State income and property taxes are already assigned to Education, and more money has never been the solution. For thirty plus years the metrics employed for evaluating student and cohort progress have been totally wrong. Point scores, and their algebraic differences, do not measure progress. But relative knowledge, and absolute relative gains, can be quantitatively measured, with comparisons valid over decades. The national plan for NCLB was noble, but was destroyed by States, politicians, and teachers’ unions who guaranteed a false success by means of horrible metrics. Individual states also wished to avoid their deserved embarrassment. Only the “Nation’s Report Card” (NAEP) is left as a common standard. The latest suggestion for a replacement for NCLB that allows the States to conduct their own tests will also offer a common linkage via the common nationwide NAEP tests was rejected by a Congressional Committee.
The recommended set of normalized metrics that have been proposed will give the same results for all “good” tests that profess to cover the same topic and grade. But it is required that all students being compared have taken at least one common test. (NAEP, e.g., meets that requirement.) The range of “difficulty” of the tests does not matter. For any pairing of cohorts (ethnic, poverty, Lunch vs. NFL) these performance and gap metrics have been consistently reliable: District tests, end-of-year State tests, NAEP, and even SATs (for its common sets of students).
They also provide more obvious (and realistic) goal setting for year-to-year progress (even if the tests are being changed every few years). For example one such metric is the answer to the question: “What percent of students in lagging cohort B have scores below the 25-percentile score of the control cohort?” One would like that to be 25%, but it more likely to be 60% to 65%. And it has not yet been proven in the classroom, but it could be (should be) demonstrated (as it is on paper) that, when students are differentiated in their classroom assignments as belonging to the lowest 20 percentile, the highest 20 percentile and an intermediate 60 percentile – with a significant overlap that is the annual responsibility of the Principal to adjust – the burden on the teacher is greatly reduced AND the progress of each category will be expanded enormously. A full disbursement of 100% presents a teacher with students having a current confirmed knowledge (that does not mean aptitude) range of about 30. The three-way split (with overlaps) will give each teacher a more manageable range of about 5. It may be desirable to wait until the fifth grade to initiate the splits. Common accord between Principals and teachers is the trigger that will make this work, not political intervention. For us to show progress in the world we must introduce these changes.
The biggest problem with a top down approach are regulations driven by Executive Order. Biden (or his handlers via auto-pen) issued 241 DOEd EOs in his first year, most of which were through the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education. Many of these EOs reversed Trump EOs or fortified Obama EOs. On top of that were Biden's government-wide EOs that imposed DEI in all federal departments.
The reforms you describe are fantastic, if they can be done by Congress (unlikely, now or in the foreseeable future). But reform by EO would be quickly undone by the next progressive President. It's better to put education policy beyond their reach.
I agree we must get this right, but so far no one in DC has gotten it right.
Robert: Agreed that so far no one in DC has gotten this right.
I'm an optimist and it seems to me that the forces are properly aligned here so that we have our best chance ever to finally get it right. Throwing in the towel — and turning it over to 50 groups that have repeatedly failed, is hardly an inspired choice.
John is charged with one more critical thinking exercise, I would think: Is there any way to eliminate 90% of the DoEd and guarantee that it won't simply expand exponentially like just about every other federal bureaucracy? (Examples to the contrary are welcomed.) This excerpt from this otherwise cogent post remains a concern for me and requires expansion in light of John's insistence that the "real creators of the K-12 education bureaucracy are States":
"5 -- "We should eliminate DOEd as we need less bureaucracy.”
No argument there — I advocated getting rid of 90% of DOEd. That said, the real creators of the K-12 education bureaucracy are States. For example, look at the huge increase in administration K-12 positions. Essentially all of this is due to poor State oversight rather than DOEd."
Getting rid of 90% of the DoDe sounds great and, indeed, may actually remove some regulatory and compliance redundancies thereby lessening the load of states' bureauracries but what guarantees do we have that the culled DoDe will remain trim? I just don't see any clearcut examples of that happening much at either the state or federal level.
Asking Grok, these four examples were returned (one from Trump's first administration):
"Yes, there have been instances where efforts to trim federal bureaucracy have yielded measurable results, though none precisely match a 90% downsizing of the Department of Education. Historical and recent examples demonstrate that reducing the size or scope of federal agencies is possible with deliberate policy actions, political will, and strategic reforms. Here are a few notable cases:
Reagan Administration’s Hiring Freeze and Spending Cuts (1980s)
During Ronald Reagan’s presidency, a key focus was reducing the size of the federal government. One of his first actions after taking office in 1981 was to institute an immediate hiring freeze across federal agencies. This blunt measure, combined with targeted budget cuts, slowed the growth of the federal workforce. According to analyses, real government spending growth under Reagan was reduced to about one-third the rate of other post-World War II administrations. Domestic spending (excluding interest and savings-and-loan bailout costs) dropped from 14.8% to 12.2% of GDP. While not a 90% reduction in any single agency, this effort showed that broad bureaucratic trimming could be achieved through executive action and congressional cooperation.
Post-World War II Bureaucratic Reduction (1945-1950s)
The federal bureaucracy saw significant growth during Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and World War II, peaking at over 3.5 million employees in 1945. After the war ended, the workforce was reduced substantially, stabilizing at around 2.5 to 3 million by the 1950s. This downsizing was driven by the elimination of wartime agencies and a shift away from emergency programs, proving that large-scale reductions are feasible when the need for certain functions diminishes. While not a single agency cut by 90%, it reflects a broader success in scaling back bureaucracy when political and economic conditions align.
Trump Administration’s Workforce Reductions (2017-2021)
During Donald Trump’s first term, the federal workforce shrank in several departments. By September 2017, most Cabinet agencies (except Homeland Security, Veterans Affairs, and Interior) had fewer permanent staff than at the start of his term, with reductions often in the hundreds per agency. This was achieved through a combination of hiring freezes, voluntary buyouts, and early retirement offers. For example, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) saw staff reductions and budget cuts, though not to a 90% level. More recently, in 2025, executive orders under a renewed Trump administration reportedly eliminated entities like the Federal Executive Institute and reduced non-statutory functions across agencies like the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, showing continued momentum in trimming efforts.
Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 (Carter Era)
While not a direct reduction in size, Jimmy Carter’s Civil Service Reform Act (CSRA) laid the groundwork for more efficient bureaucracy management. By introducing a more flexible personnel system, it enabled later administrations (like Reagan’s) to assert policy control and reduce staffing through attrition and reorganization. The CSRA didn’t slash an agency by 90%, but it demonstrated that structural reforms can facilitate downsizing without legislative gridlock.
These examples suggest that trimming federal bureaucracy is most successful when it involves clear executive action (e.g., hiring freezes, program terminations), congressional support (e.g., budget cuts), or a shift in national priorities (e.g., post-war downsizing). A 90% reduction in the Department of Education specifically would be unprecedented in scale and would likely require eliminating most of its functions—such as federal student aid administration, which accounts for a significant portion of its budget—while facing resistance from stakeholders like educators and state governments reliant on its funding. No historical case matches that exact figure, but the above instances show that substantial cuts are possible with the right strategy and political alignment."
I don't see the need for a DoEd at the federal level unless it were designed to provide assistance to alternative, school choice endeavors. The present marketplace needs to be replaced. It's broken beyond repair. Change my mind.
Reggie: TY for your lengthy comment. I answered your questions in my commentary. For example:
1 -"DOEd is NOT broken beyond repair." It can be easily gutted and transformed.
2 - "I don't see the need for a DoEd at the federal level..." The need is that by-and-large the State Boards of Education are incompetent and corrupted by Left ideology. At this point ZERO states have a high quality education product.