Where We Stand: Protect Our Kids

As President Donald Trump tries to abolish the US Department of Education (ED) by executive order and Elon Musk takes a chainsaw to the federal government and the services and security it provides Americans, the AFT is fighting to protect our kids against the gutting of federal funds our kids now receive. We are fighting for our students to have more, not less. On March 4, as part of our Protect Our Kids campaign, we joined with students, families, educators, and advocates across the country, leading over 2,000 local actions to show that we won’t stand by as vital education funds are slashed to hand a $4.5 trillion tax cut to billionaires. 

Actions included clap-ins and walk-ins, teach-ins and rallies, parent meetings, webinars, and more. From coast to coast, communities focused on what our kids, public schools, and universities need. Like in Sacramento, where college and K–12 affiliates of the CFT marched with students and advocates. Educators at scores of schools in Los Angeles, New York City, and Miami held walk-ins and handed out leaflets. Corpus Christi AFT held a press conference and rally in front of district headquarters to safeguard public education from severe budget cuts, and Texas AFT’s virtual town hall featured former ED staff explaining what dismantling ED would mean for students, from pre-K to postdoc. Members of the Detroit Federation of Teachers clapped in their students, distributed fliers, and participated in a citywide virtual teach-in. After actions across Massachusetts, like the walk-ins at 27 schools hosted by the Lynn Teachers Union, AFT Massachusetts and several partners hosted a virtual town hall to ensure families know how gutting federal education funding would harm students—and to build a path forward together. 

And in my home state of New York, I joined hundreds of educators, families, and advocates—led by New York State United Teachers President Melinda Person—at a rally in front of the state capitol in Albany in the morning. In the afternoon, I marched with the New Haven Federation of Teachers, several labor and community partners, and hundreds of advocates.

What’s at stake? This isn’t about ED’s bureaucracy—it’s about how ED funding streams create opportunities for needy kids. ED ensures 7.5 million students with disabilities receive special education services. It funds smaller classes, additional instruction in reading and math, mental health programs, and preschool, afterschool, and summer programs for 26 million kids living in poverty. It helps 12 million students in career and technical education master the skills and knowledge needed in today’s economy. It protects students from discrimination based on race, sex, disability, religion, and national origin. It puts higher education in reach for 10 million students from working-class families. It does this and much more—with funds appropriated and approved by Congress on a bipartisan basis.

Musk has already cut $900 million in grants focused on improving teaching and student outcomes. The We the People program that I used to teach had an $11 million multiyear grant stopped, cutting professional development for the Civics That Empowers All Students program. At the same time, Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency has been trying to steal the Social Security numbers and bank account information of millions of Americans who rely on ED for financial aid. The AFT is the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit to stop Musk—and we already won a restraining order that temporarily prevented Musk’s team from accessing personally identifiable information while we prepared for additional hearings.

Trump’s directive to “return decision-making to the states” doesn’t pass the smell test. States and school districts have always been in charge. Local school boards typically set property tax rates, and state legislatures and school officials establish teaching and learning standards, adopt curricula, distribute dollars, and determine what it takes to graduate. The federal role is to level up opportunity, making the promise of public education real for every child. Gutting federal support for education will break that promise; either students will lose services or states and communities will have to raise taxes to maintain those services.

Some lawmakers want to convert federal funding that is currently targeted for needy students into no-strings-attached block grants. Funding that provides speech and occupational therapy for students with disabilities, for example, should not be diverted to pools of money that states can use for unrelated purposes like vouchers (which have a disastrous track record on student achievement) or tax cuts. 

This attack on our kids’ futures is wrong. It’s a perfect storm of chaos, confusion, corruption, and cronyism. But we’re fighting back shoulder-to-shoulder with parents and other community members. In the courts, and the court of public opinion, we will continue to press Congress to protect our kids and strengthen—not destroy—public education.     

[Photo: AFT]