Slow Boring
America’s least understood and most efficient cabinet agency, explained
But the truth is, education is not and never was federalized. The Department of Education does not employ any teachers or run any schools. It’s statutorily prohibited from dictating what is taught in schools, how it’s taught, or when it’s taught.
Everything the Department of Education actually does falls into five categories:
- Making large foundational investments in schools serving low-income students and students with disabilities and enforcing associated requirements for states to educate the most disadvantaged children in society
- Running the student loan and grant programs that help about 10 million students a year and managing loan repayment for 40 million Americans
- Enforcing civil rights laws to ensure that students aren’t discriminated against because of their race, sex, or national origin
- Compiling data on education, tracking national educational progress, and funding research to figure out what works
- Administering a range of smaller grant programs for things like charter schools, programming for homeless and foster youth, college access, and institutional support for lower-resourced colleges.
