President Donald Trump has signed an order aiming to eliminate the Department of Education. According to the US President the department is wasting billions of dollars. He wants education to become a matter of individual US states again, as it used to be.
This affects, among other things, US student funding. Trump believes that the ministry should not handle ‘banking matters’ such as debt and wants to transfer this to ‘an entity that can serve American students’.
The total student debt currently stands at $1.6 trillion. Student debt is a problem in the US anyway. Democrats wanted to cancel debts, but Republicans did not.
Permission
Trump has yet to get formal permission from the US Congress to actually abolish the ministry, but until then he can already downsize the department substantially.
The ministry has existed since 1979, when Democratic President Jimmy Carter was in power. Carter turned 100 and was just able to vote in the last election. He was an outspoken opponent of Trump, who is now giving him a kicking: he suggests that Carter created the department only to gain support from the largest US education union.
Equal opportunities
The department not only regulates student funding but also deals with equal opportunities and non-discrimination. So the blow is harder for groups of pupils and students who already have a harder time in education, for example those from poorer families. (HOP, BB)
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