The Department of Education: A History of Shaping American Education
The Department of Education is the agency of the federal government that establishes policy for, administers, and coordinates most federal assistance to education. Its mission is to serve America's students-to promote student achievement and preparation for global competitiveness by fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access.
Origins and Early Years
Although the Department is a relative newcomer among Cabinet-level agencies, its origins go back to 1867, when President Andrew Johnson signed legislation creating the first Department of Education. Its main purpose was to collect information and statistics about the nation's schools, providing advice in the same way the Department of Agriculture helped farmers. The department was originally proposed by Henry Barnard and leaders of the National Teachers Association, renamed the National Education Association. Barnard served as the first United States Commissioner of Education.
Expansion and Evolution
Beginning in the 1950s, political and social changes resulted in expanded federal funding for education. The successful launch of the Soviet Union's Sputnik in 1957 spurred nationwide concern that led to increased aid for science education programs. The 1960s saw even more expansion of federal education funding: President Lyndon Johnson's "War on Poverty" called for the creation of many programs to improve education for poor students at all levels-early childhood through postsecondary. This expansion continued in the 1970s with national efforts to help racial minorities, women, people with disabilities, and non-English-speaking students gain equal access to education.
In 1939, the organization, then a bureau, was transferred to the Federal Security Agency, where it was renamed the Office of Education. After World War II, President Dwight D. Eisenhower promulgated "Reorganization Plan No. 1 of 1953".
The Creation of the Modern Department
In October 1979, Congress passed the Department of Education Organization Act (Public Law 96-88). Created by combining offices from several federal agencies, the Department began operations in May 1980. President Jimmy Carter created the federal Department of Education in 1979 under Public Law 96-88. President Carter’s vision was to provide a department to ensure equal access to all regardless of race, creed, color, national origin or sex. President Carter’s goal was to support education of students from poor communities through the enactment of Title I. Ten years later, Congress enacted the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, which eventually became the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act. The intent was to provide equal access to education regardless of economic status.
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In 2007-08, the Department's elementary and secondary school programs served approximately 55 million students (pre-K through grade 12) attending some 100,000 public schools and 34,000 private schools. Department programs also provided grant, loan, and work-study assistance to about 10 million undergraduate students.
When Congress created the Department in 1979, it declared these purposes:
- To strengthen the Federal commitment to ensuring access to equal educational opportunity for every individual.
- To supplement and complement the efforts of States, the local school systems and other instrumentalities of the States, the private sector, public and private educational institutions, public and private nonprofit educational research institutions, community-based organizations, parents, and students to improve the quality of education.
- To encourage the increased involvement of the public, parents, and students in Federal education programs.
- To promote improvements in the quality and usefulness of education through federally supported research, evaluation, and sharing of information.
- To improve the coordination of Federal education programs.
- To improve the management and efficiency of Federal education activities, especially with respect to the process, procedures, and administrative structures for the dispersal of Federal funds, as well as the reduction of unnecessary and duplicative burdens and constraints, including unnecessary paperwork, on the recipients of Federal funds.
- To increase the accountability of Federal education programs to the President, the Congress, and the public.
Responsibilities and Functions
The federal Department of Education, a cabinet-level executive branch agency, oversees education policy and administers a budget of nearly $268 billion (spent in 2024) for programs from pre-kindergarten through post-secondary education. It provides grants through Title I, and the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act provides funding to the states that help local school districts provide necessary support for students with special education needs. In addition, the federal Department of Education provides oversight of funding and regulations during emergencies, such as the COVID pandemic.
The Department of Education has been tasked with research including how to improve academic performance of students in our schools. Other initiatives include increasing access to education to students from underserved and low-income communities.
Probably one of the most important roles of the department is to oversee compliance with many of the civil rights laws. The Office of Civil Rights handles civil rights complaints including investigation, resolution, and compliance issues. The department has been tasked with ensuring civil rights laws including Title IX, and violations of the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act are addressed.
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In a narrow sense, the department's job as an executive branch agency is to enforce and implement laws passed by Congress. In practice, that means that first of all, the department distributes funds in K 12 education. The two largest funding streams by far provide additional funds to school districts to serve economically disadvantaged students and students with disabilities. And then the department spends even more on higher education through Pell Grants and the Federal Student Loan Program. So first it distributes funds. Second, the department issues regulations on the use of funds. These regulations address how federal funds can and can't be used, but sometimes they also say what other policies must be in place for states school districts, institutions of higher education to accept federal funds at all? These regulations often give the federal government more influence than its limited financial role would imply. A third aspect of the department's role, it carries out through its Office of Civil Rights, which works to ensure that all schools receiving federal funds abide by federal civil rights laws. And then finally, the department has a long standing role in gathering official statistics on education and both conducting and supporting education, research and development.
Political Debates and Scrutiny
Department of Education has been a subject of political debate since its creation in 1980. “It's the one whose status has been most tenuous from the inception. So the recent calls we've heard to eliminate the Department of Education have really been a constant feature of its history from the moment it was created,” says Professor Martin West, an expert in the politics of K-12 education. He explains that the DoEd, established in 1980 under President Jimmy Carter, was politically motivated but also aimed at consolidating federal education efforts.
Upgrading Education to cabinet-level status in 1979 was opposed by many in the Republican Party, who saw the department as unconstitutional, arguing that the Constitution does not mention education, and deemed it an unnecessary and illegal federal bureaucratic intrusion into local affairs. However, others saw the department as constitutional under the Commerce Clause, and that the funding role of the department is constitutional under the Taxing and Spending Clause.
The 1980 Republican Party platform called for the elimination of the Department of Education created under Carter, and President Ronald Reagan promised during the 1980 presidential election to eliminate it as a cabinet post, but he was not able to do so with a Democratic House of Representatives.
In 1994, after the Newt Gingrich-led "revolution" took control of both houses of Congress, federal control of and spending on education soared. That trend continued unabated despite the fact that the Republican Party made abolition of the department a cornerstone of its 1996 platform and campaign promises, calling it an inappropriate federal intrusion into local, state, and family affairs.
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In March 2025, Trump signed an executive order which would begin the dismantling of the Department of Education, seeking to fulfill decades of conservative ambition to eliminate the agency, but raising new questions for public schools and parents. Republican attempts to close the agency date back to the 1980s. Partisanship over the department has been rife since the start, from progressive-leaning teachers' unions who organized against President George W.
Arguments for and Against the Department
Some view the DoEd as essential for ensuring equal access to education and enforcing federal education laws, while others see it as an unnecessary bureaucracy that interferes with state and local control. The debate regarding the value of the federal Department of Education is not new. With each administration, the department’s role and the desire to improve outcomes for students have been important campaign issues. Each administration has its own vision for the provision of education and how to best serve students, including those with disabilities.
Those who think the federal footprint in American life should be much smaller overall question whether the federal government should play any role at all. They recall that the American Constitution laid out a limited set of responsibilities for the federal government and through the 10th Amendment reserved to the states and the people responsibilities for things not mentioned beyond those enumerated powers. The debates over the Department of Education in particular also reflect the enduring strength and appeal of the tradition of local control.
Potential Impact of Eliminating the Department
If the Department of Education doesn't exist in its current state, there's a huge window of what this could look like. Most proposals to eliminate the Department of Education that we've seen in recent years would simply shift the core activities of the department to other places in the federal bureaucracy. And if that were the case, schools and states and higher ed institutions would even notice the difference, much less struggle to continue to operate.
However, some proposals suggest eliminating many of the laws that the department is currently charged with implementing. For example, it proposed gradually over a 10-year period phasing out what's known as Title One of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. That's that funding for economically disadvantaged students. And so that would amount to a pretty dramatic change. Many districts, especially those that serve large numbers of economically disadvantaged students do rely on that funding.
If you eliminate those major federal funding streams, give the department less room to place rules on the use of federal funds and even more to place rules on what other policies need to be in place. So for example, right now the Elementary and Secondary Education Act requires that all states in order to receive funds under Title One, have to have pretty extensive systems of test-based accountability in place. If you no longer have those federal funds to attach conditions to, then the federal government wouldn't have the power or the authority to put those types of requirements in place. So one thing if you went in a more sweeping direction in eliminating the department and also eliminating some of the funding streams is that it would give states and school districts more autonomy in their policymaking.
Recent Developments
On March 11, 2025, the Department of Education announced a major workforce reduction, eliminating nearly half of its employees-reducing staff from approximately 4,100 to about 2,100. Remaining staff were placed on paid administrative leave beginning March 21, with separation or retirement packages scheduled by June 9. Based on a preliminary review of the layoffs that were ordered, the majority of cuts were seen in the Federal Student Aid office which oversees financial aid disbursement and student loans, and the Office for Civil Rights, which protects students and teachers from discrimination.
On March 21, 2025, it was announced by Trump that the management of the entire federal student loan portfolio and the other "special needs" programs overseen by the department would be moved to other departments.
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