The Trump administration has released new details of its vision to wind down the U.S. Department of Education. The budget proposal for fiscal year 2026 calls for a 15% funding cut to the department and a handful of changes to key K-12 and higher education programs. Here are five things to know:
1. The document renews President Trump's commitment to close the department
Last month, a federal judge blocked Trump from carrying out his executive order calling for the education secretary to close the Education Department. Nonetheless, the proposed budget summary begins with a quote from Trump on the day he signed that executive action: "We're going to be returning education very simply back to the states where it belongs."
Overall, the proposal "reflects an agency that is responsibly winding down," the document says.
Still, this summary requests $66.7 billion for the department, making it clear that the dismantling of the agency will be a marathon, not a sprint.
2. Title I funding isn't going anywhere
Title I, one of the two most important streams of federal funding to K-12 schools, provides extra help to districts that serve neighborhoods of concentrated poverty.
Public school advocates have fretted that the administration's ultimate goal is to disrupt or even wind down this funding, as called for in the conservative policy playbook Project 2025. But this budget request would leave Title I funding levels where they've been the previous two years: just over $18 billion.
3. Big cuts and consolidation to a range of K-12 programs
In addition to administering those important Title I dollars, the Education Department also sends districts roughly $6.5 billion to administer 18 smaller programs that support, among other things, teacher training, at-risk students, literacy instruction, rural schools, arts education, school safety and students experiencing homelessness. This budget summary recommends combining them all into one grant and dramatically cutting funding to $2 billion.
This consolidation would, in the administration's view, give districts "flexibility" to spend the dollars "consistent with the needs of their communities." But it would also eliminate individual funding streams for programs.
For example, advocates told NPR they worry that if support for students experiencing homelessness isn't specifically funded, districts may choose to spend those federal dollars on other students and other needs.
In a statement, The School Superintendents Association (AASA) applauded the administration's decision to preserve Title I funding levels but criticized the decision to release a budget summary that "eliminated other crucial education funding, under the guise of efficiency."
4. A special education funding increase (but not really)
Besides Title I funding to high-poverty school communities, the other key federal funding stream to schools comes from the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which requires all public schools to provide a free, appropriate education to all children with disabilities.
The Trump administration proposes what appears to be an increase in IDEA funding to states, to roughly $14.9 billion, but the budget summary also suggests folding several previously separate programs into that funding stream. Once those costs are accounted for, districts' special education funding would be essentially flat.
5. College aid cuts
On the higher education side, the budget summary proposes a few significant changes to the federal role in helping students pay for college.
Federal Pell Grants go to low-income students and do not need to be paid back; the administration wants to cut the maximum amount of the annual grant from roughly $7,400 to $5,700. That would be a significant reduction, considering the average, all-in cost to attend a public, four-year university in 2022-23 was more than $22,000.
This cut to Pell, along with other proposed cuts, "reverses decades of commitment to the promise of the Higher Education Act and would result in considerable harm for students pursuing postsecondary education," said Melanie Storey, the president and CEO of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA), in a statement.
The budget summary attributes this change to a growing shortfall in Pell funding and insists that "maintaining the current maximum award and eligibility would put the program in an untenable financial position."
The administration also proposes a dramatic flip in the Federal Work-Study program, slashing funding by roughly 80% and calling on colleges and universities to take on the bulk of students' hourly wages.
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