CASEY RYAN: Yes, American Education Can Survive Just Fine Without Federal Department

Despite President Donald Trump’s plan to dismantle the Department of Education (ED), he is currently using the agency to hold schools promoting antisemitism, gender ideology, and equity, diversity and inclusion (DEI) accountable. This poses a new question that must be addressed. How can the administration continue to hold schools accountable when the department no longer exists?

In recent weeks, the Trump administration through ED cut $400 million in federal funding from Columbia University over incidents of antisemitism, including an anti-Israel encampment in 2024. 

ED then followed by launching investigations into more than 50 universities for using “racial preferences and stereotypes in education programs and activities” and for “allegedly awarding impermissible race-based scholarships.” The department is clear in that these actions “can result in loss of federal funds.” 

There is concern that the Trump administration may lose its grip on this authority if the department is eliminated or significantly downsized. While this is a legitimate concern, the administration will still have the power to hold bad actors accountable. 

ED is relatively young and was only created in 1980 after then-President Jimmy Carter signed legislation into law creating the agency. Before then, a separate Office of Education existed from 1867 until that point. 

This office originally served the purpose of “providing educational information to the state and local education authorities” with only three people serving as staff at the start. This remained the office’s objective until 1965 when then- President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act into law. 

This new law increased the federal government’s role in education while reducing local control. The federal government would then account for 8% of public school budgets. Johnson essentially paved the way for what would become today’s Ed by growing the federal government’s role in the education system. 

For the majority of its first seven decades, the Office of Education existed within the Department of the Interior (DOI). In 1939, then-President Franklin D. Roosevelt moved the Office of Education to the Federal Security Agency, which was a short-lived government agency that dissolved in 1953.

After the dissolution of the Federal Security Agency, then-President Dwight D. Eisenhower created what is now known as the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and transferred the Office of Education to this new agency. This department handled education issues until the creation of ED in 1980. 

As Trump works to dissolve ED and give more power to the states, functions such as providing federal funds to America’s schools can be given back to the DOI or HHS, or even to the Department of Treasury. All these options would be great alternatives for upholding the federal government’s downsized role in education. 

In fact, dissolving ED should have no impact on holding schools accountable. The administration would only need to move specific offices dealing with funding and continue business as usual on this front. 

Take the University of California (UC) system, for example. UC had approximately 300,000 students now with $50.1 billion in funding for the 2022-2023 school year. Data from 2024 revealed that nearly $16 billion of the university’s funding was from the federal government. 

Each campus within UC expends resources on DEI staff and race-based “advisory councils” as well as segregated affinity groups for employees. UC also has policies that mandate the recognition of “nonbinary” as a gender and “clear and continuous prioritization of diversity by Chancellors, deans, and other administrators” to increase “racial diversity.” 

As long as UC wastes funding on DEI and gender ideology, the university system certainly does not need federal funding. Regardless of whether the responsibility of education funding belongs to the DOI, HHS or Treasury Department, the administration will have the same power to cut UC’s funding until the university chooses to use its resources wisely. 

Ed did not exist until 1980, and the authority over education matters fell under other jurisdictions up to that point. Dissolving ED only eliminates waste that should have never existed in the first place. The offices that ensure the executive branch can hold bad actors accountable can easily be folded into other agencies. Trump can continue to clean up our nation’s education system without a hitch once ED is eliminated. 

Casey Ryan is a writer and investigative reporter at Parents Defending Education.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.