Should the Department of Education get closed down?

[AgnosticBoy]

Elon Musk has been appointed to head DOGE to cut government waste, up to even gutting government agencies entirely. One government department on Musk's list is the Department of Education. Recently, Elon posted:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1888038615780909178

I'm sure problems can be found with any government agency, but is the solution to gut them as opposed to reforming?

For Discussion:
1. What problems does Elon, Trump, and other Republicans have with the Department of Education?
2. Are their concerns valid and is the only fix to gut the department?

 

[AgnosticBoy]

1. What problems does Elon, Trump, and other Republicans have with the Department of Education?

I think there are 2 big issues:
1. Republicans want to shrink government. That could be in the form of just shrinking the role of the federal government, like the Department of Education, and letting states manage it or even enable more private schools.

2. Republicans also have a problem with "woke" agenda or even Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) being in school curriculum (kids being taught about LGBT, Critical Race Theory, etc).

2. Are their concerns valid and is the only fix to gut the department?

I think some of their concerns are valid because sometimes it does seem that our education system is becoming too centered on DEI related matters. This could also be that the media focuses on this issue more. But if kids in America are ranking low in the basic subjects (in comparison to other countries) like math, science, and reading, then more should be spent on that than on DEI related subjects.

And for the record, I'm not against DEI, but I'd probably find problems with how it is implemented and if some go too far trying to push and implement it.

Now where I disagree with Republicans is that I don't think they should go as far as eliminating federal involvement by closing the Department of Education (DOE). To me, that sounds just as extreme as the calls to defund the police. I think we need national standards and we need a federal agency to oversee that otherwise we're going to have 50 different standards, one from each state. Perhaps it would be better to shrink the role of DOE or to change its focus.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Short analysis on Department of Education... not from experts but was still good coverage on the topic!