Now what does this mean? The Department of Education’s purpose is to provide opportunity for equal acquisition of knowledge and skills that will enable people to develop their full potential, and become successful members of society. They oversee aspects of K-12 and higher education. Their elementary and secondary education programs serve nearly 18,200 school districts and over 50 million students attending 98,000 public schools and 32,000 private schools. It also provides grants, loan, and work-study assistance to more than 12 million post-secondary students.
Getting rid of the Education Department might indicate the termination of these programs that help millions of students — Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) being one of them. Most students in New York City depend on FAFSA to pay for their CUNY colleges, in some cases the student’s full year is covered by the aid.
John Dewey High School is no stranger to this program, every year, hundreds of its graduating students apply for the aid as a part of their college application journey. The school even holds workshops for students with college counselors, Ms.Wolkoff and Ms. Mazzolla, helping them one-on-one with the application.
This controversy concerns teachers and school staff such as Special Education teacher and Dean Mr. Prempeh. “Money that’s coming in from the government is extremely necessary, I mean class sizes could increase. There is no way to track growth in education, and without having that on a national level …I see that as being detrimental to the progress of our nation,” he said.
Mr. Prempeh continued to point out that not having enough funds for a school can lead to an increase in the size of classes, causing there to be more students than a teacher can handle. “That’s very difficult for a teacher to manage, how do you make sure to maintain equity,” Mr. Prempeh said. When class sizes increase, it could potentially lead to students receiving a less adequate education and not getting enough attention to work with educators.
On the other hand, some people say that getting rid of the Education Department can help states personalize their schools to meet their needs. “There’s certain things New York wants to focus on, and I think that’s okay… I think [it’s important] that there has to be core standards that are universal … [but] there should be some variations of what schools can do, some wiggle room of what schools can use to teach something different,” Mr. Prempeh said.
Eliminating the Education Department can allow states to be able to make rules and regulations based on their own circumstances, but Mr. Prempeh suggests that there should be a balance of what they can and can’t do. “I think there are some good that could come out of it but I’m scared that a lot of states will intentionally omit some topics that they don’t want to cover,” he said.
This issue is of concern for teachers, students, school staff, parents, and even everyday citizens, because it can determine the fate of future generations. Senior college-bound student Ion Huang gives his take on the matter, saying “A lot of kids will be cut-off from financial service, [which] usually is a bad thing … It’s hypocrisy, you live in this country where it prides itself in being free and equal but yet it’s not … here [the Education Department] are the attempts to make it free and equal but there are people that want to take it down.”
Huang claims that the Education Department is an attempt at giving kids equal access to education, but with that getting taken down, it could risk thousands of students from their right to education. “It denies a lot of children potential education. It denies them the ability to express their potential, from ever having the opportunity to dedicate to society and themselves,” he said.
Education is one of the milestones that help people step-up in society, and both Mr. Prempeh and Huang agree on the fact that the availability of education for many children and students could be significantly reduced.
When it comes down to how it will personally affect him, Huang said that, “It will be cutting off the financial assistance that I need and my parents need when it comes to paying for college tuition. We have a middle class income but that doesn’t mean that paying for college tuition isn’t inconvenient, it would be really inconvenient to me, but detrimental to anyone who is poor.”
You might be wondering ‘What does this mean for John Dewey?’ well, according to Huang, “Because from my understanding, this school [JDHS] is located in an impoverished area, you have kids that are born poor being denied the opportunity of being successful in life, I’m not saying that college is the only way to be successful but it’s one of the ways to be successful. It means that students who are poor will just stay poor, that’s just a terrible outcome and it’s even worse for them, [John Dewey students], compared to other schools.”
According to U.S. News, the percentage of John Dewey High School’s students that are economically disadvantaged is 86% as of 2024. Since the school consists of many students who come from low-income families, not having the Education Department to fund schools like ours can become a real issue for education quality and access.
“But it’s also a bad thing in that there are certain schools or states that oppose to teaching things [such as] black history… so if the state says, ‘You know what? we’re no longer teaching black history’ [then] that’s a problem,” Mr. Prempeh said.
If too much power is given to states over the education system, they can purposefully exclude specific things from being taught. Having a balance on what states are able to change about their school system is a crucial matter because if states have too much authority, it can result in students “being taught this curriculum that they don’t see themselves in at all and that’s a problem,” Mr. Prempeh said.
The Education Department getting abolished could also mean the termination of grants, loans, and work-study assistance programs for postsecondary education. “In America, this great nation of ours, the great equalizer is education, and some people are fortunate to come from money. Their family is able to fund their education [which is] a great thing. But you also have the majority of people whose money is not there, and these grants enable those students to go to college that enable them to change the trajectory of their family… [making it more available] for them to acquire wealth. Taking that away makes it very difficult because then what you see is that only the ‘haves’ are the ones [that are] going to progress in society and if you don’t ‘have’ then too bad for you,” Mr. Prempeh said.
To summarize all of these things, students who come from low-income families would have a harder time getting post-secondary education. They will be burdened with having to pay for their tuition if they previously weren’t or will get less aid causing them to get loans with high interest rates, stress about money, or maybe tackle jobs while going to school. Although, since the proposal is still being discussed, it will take action in Congress. “There’s a lot of talk and we have to see what comes out of that,” Mr. Prempeh said. This issue is a real concern as it can discourage people from going to college and there are many people like Mr. Prempeh who “want everyone who wants to go to college to be able to go [and] money shouldn’t be the determinant factor”.
