Loss of U.S. Education Department money could affect half of Palm Beach County students
Closing the U.S. Department of Education — a 45-year-old talking point on the political right that gained significant traction after President Donald Trump was re-elected — could cost the Palm Beach County School District at least $150 million a year being used for teacher training, educating special needs students and providing extra assistance to schools with a high percentage of low-income students, who account for about 100,000 of the district's 189,000 students.
Despite the potentially far-reaching consequences of what the loss of federal education funding could mean for districts like the one in Palm Beach County, state legislators in Tallahassee, where federal school money is sent before being routed to local school districts, have not come up with a plan to make up the money gap if the Department of Education is shuttered and the funding pipeline from Washington is closed.
"Nothing's been discussed," said state Rep. Joe Casello, a Boynton Beach Democrat who is chairman of the Palm Beach County Legislative Delegation. "Right now, there's been no talk or suggestion about what would happen."
The school district appears to be taking a cautious approach even as Trump's choice to lead the Education Department, Linda McMahon — a former World Wrestling Entertainment executive who led the Small Business Administration during Trump's first term — told U.S. senators during a recent confirmation hearing that she embraces the president's stated goal of shuttering the department. Multiple media outlets are reporting that, within days, Trump could sign an executive order calling for the dismantling of the department.
Two bills have been filed in Congress calling for the abolition of the U.S. Department of Education, Solnet told board members.
"Bills such as this have been filed in the past and they weren't, for lack of a better word, taken seriously because they never saw the light of day," Solnet said. "They never went to a floor vote. But we need to consider these bills very seriously right now."
Services for students with autism, speech problems, other issues will be affected
Solnet urged the district to let local residents know just how much the district gets from the U.S. Department of Education to help pay for such responsibilities as helping schools with a high percentage of low-income students, providing enhanced training for teachers and other school leaders, teaching immigrant students English so they can meet state standards and educating students with disabilities.
Such students include those with autism, developmental delays, intellectual disabilities, hearing, vision and speech problems, physical impairments, traumatic brain injuries and those with learning disabilities.
In fiscal year 2023-24, the district said it received about $300 million in federal funds. A big chunk of that money, about $120 million, came from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which helps provide free breakfasts and lunches to all students.
All schools benefit from one kind of federal money
The biggest piece of that money, about $150 million, came from the Department of Education.
In the most recent budget year, the district said it received $58 million in federal money through Title I, the federal education program aimed at helping schools with a high percentage of low-income students. Some 100,000 of the district's roughly 189,000 students at 145 schools benefited from that funding.
The district got $7 million in funds for Title II, a federal education program that provides enhanced training for teachers and other school leaders. All schools benefited from Title II funding, the district reported.
Title III, the federal education program that helps schools teach English to immigrant students so they can meet state education standards, brought $4.5 million to the district and helped 20,000 students, the district said.
And IDEA, the program created by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, brought $48 million to the district, where it helped 30,000 students, the district reported.
"We have to think about the possibility of reductions in Title I, Title II, Title III and IDEA funding as well," Solnet said. "We hope that's not the case. We obviously continue to lobby to keep our budget intact."
That's a taller-than-usual order in the current climate.
When was the Education Department created?
In 1979, former President Jimmy Carter signed the law that created the U.S. Department of Education. Its duties had been part of the old U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare.
Since it began operating in 1980, the Department of Education has been a target of political conservatives, who objected to federal involvement in education, which was long viewed as a local responsibility.
The department's growing budget reached about $250 billion in 2024, less than a third of what was allocated to the U.S. Defense Department.
Still, conservatives view the Department of Education as a bastion of waste and castigate liberals who point to what they see as its importance.
"The only people who will cry foul about this are the same people in the pockets of the teachers’ unions who kept kids out of school for years by crying 'COVID,'" U.S. Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fort Pierce, said when asked whether he supports closing the department. "The Department of Education has only existed since 1979, but it’s already managed to become as bloated and ineffective as the rest of the swamp. Every (Education Department) program should be carefully evaluated in terms of the benefits provided to students, and those that aren’t delivering should be cut and the responsibility sent back to the states where it belongs."
Supporters of the department have argued that federal assistance is needed to even the playing field for poor or disabled students who live in communities with a tax base that can't pay for the additional help those students often require.
"Quality public education is one of the cornerstones of our democracy," said U.S. Rep. Lois Frankel, D-West Palm Beach. "It equips young people, regardless of their background with the knowledge, critical thinking skills, and opportunities they need to participate fully in society and contribute to our economy."
Frankel said "the administration's effort to eliminate the Department of Education could have serious consequences for Palm Beach County schools, potentially reducing funding for tutoring services, teacher training, social services for students and families, and college readiness programs. This would not only limit students’ futures but also undermine the strength of our democracy and the prosperity of our communities."
For all of the talk about dissolving the U.S. Department of Education, shuttering it has proved more popular in theory than in reality.
Indeed, the long history of the United States has shown that, while government agencies are frequently created, they are very rarely closed. And even in cases where an agency is closed — take the U.S. Department of War's demise in 1947 — the old agency's duties are usually transferred to one or more different groups. The War Department's duties, for example, were parceled out to the Department of the Army and the Department of the Air Force, which both joined the Department of the Navy in eventually moving into the newly minted Department of Defense in 1949.
By federal government standards, the Department of Education has a small staff — 4,400 employees, compared with the 700,000 plus civilian employees of the Defense Department.
Still, the idea of eliminating those jobs has had an enduring appeal for political conservatives.
In the past, it has taken an act of Congress to close an agency it created, though an emboldened Trump has paused congressionally approved spending without being totally shut down by the court system.
If the Departent of Education is closed through an act of Congress or by presidential fiat, it is unclear what that would mean for states, which serve as a sort of middle man in directing federal money to districts, or for local school districts, which rely heavily on that money.
The department could be closed with some or all of the money it typically provides sent to the states as so-called block grants. That would save the federal government some personnel costs, but state taxpayers could well end up having to pick up at least some of that slack.
The federal money would need to be tracked and the effectiveness of the programs it pays for would need to be measured. Either the feds would continue doing that work or it could fall to the state government or local school districts, which would almost certainly have to significantly bolster staffing to handle additional duties.
In Tallahassee, where Republicans hold sway, growing education staffing would likely be intensely unpopular.
For local school districts like the one in Palm Beach County, there is an even worst-case scenario: the closure of the Department of Education and the end of all federal funding for education.
Unless the state picks up all of that slack — unlikely in an environment where Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis is backing a plan to eliminate property taxes — the extra money districts get for teacher training, to help English learners and disabled students would be gone. Districts don't have unilateral control over how much they bring in through property taxes, so they couldn't simply raise property tax rates to make up for the loss of federal funding.
Solnet said she and other education advocates are working hard to keep the federal pipeline of funding open.
"Regardless of what happens to the U.S. Department of Education, whether the plans are to eventually dissolve it or abolish the U.S. Department of Education, the funding is still an issue that we need to be laser-focused on because it boils down to being able to sustain our students with the highest quality possible in education and services," she said.
Wayne Washington is a journalist covering education for The Palm Beach Post. You can reach him at wwashington@pbpost.com. Help support our work; subscribe today.