In a by the Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias, which worked closely with the Education Department, the previous administration is alleged to have employed federal programs to target Christians disproportionately.

The report follows a February executive order that established the task force to eliminate anti-Christian bias in government. The task force denounces the Biden administration for charging excessive fines against Christian universities, allowing men into girls’ sports and locker rooms, mandating vaccines and excluding Christians from public programs.

Protecting Christian schools and universities

The task force points to a 2023 case involving Grand Canyon University. The Biden administration for misrepresenting the cost of doctoral programs, CNN reported. However, the Trump administration ��last year.

In early 2024, another Christian institution, Liberty University, was fined $14 million over failing to report campus crime,��The Hill��. The university was accused of violating the Clery Act, a law requiring annual security reports about campus crime statistics.

Meanwhile, the task force argues that the fines “dwarfed” the penalties against non-Christian universities involving sexual assault charges. The report cites the child sex abuse case in 2012 involving former Pennsylvania State University assistant football coach , and another incident in 2016 involving Michigan State University’s , a former sports physician, who was charged with criminal sexual conduct.

In each case, the universities were fined $2.4 million and $4.5 million, respectively. Such actions are clear examples of unfair treatment against Christian institutions, according to Education Secretary Linda McMahon.

���Every American deserves equal treatment under the law, but we continue to discover the magnitude of the Biden 91心頭istration���s gross iniquities and flagrant violations of religious liberty���particularly targeting Christians,��� McMahon said.

Find more solutions in the full “Field Guide for People Leadership,” which is available with .油Then, navigate to the People section of the Content Hub, which is listed in the menu on the left side of 91心頭+.

Book bans and Title IX

At the K12 level, the report condemns the Biden administration for its enforcement of Title IX, specifically how it punished private Christian schools for not allowing boys into girls’ sports and locker rooms.

In 2023, the Mid Vermont Christian School forfeited a girls’ basketball playoff game when it was revealed that the team would be competing against a male athlete. The school requested that the Vermont Principals’ Association, which governs extracurricular activities throughout the state, prohibit the male player from competing, but the association refused.

Two days later, the association’s executive director testified in support of a state bill that would strip private religious schools of public funding, claiming that “we should never provide any tax dollars to schools that… look away from the common decency of all students being welcomed,” according to the report.

The association $566,000 in damages and attorney’s fees over the dispute.

The review comes at a time when the Trump administration is cracking down on issues ranging from Title IX to book bans in school libraries. Last year, the Office for Civil Rights scrapped its “book ban coordinator” position, which was previously tasked with investigating school districts and parents working to protect students from obscene content.

“Parents and school boards have broad discretion to fulfill that important responsibility. These decisions will no longer be second-guessed by the Office for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Education,” said Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor.

More from 91心頭: McMahon: Look to states for new education innovations

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McMahon faced intense scrutiny as she testified before the Senate Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations Subcommittee on the Trump administration’s FY27 budget request, which includes $75.7 billion in discretionary authority for the Education Department.

The proposal maintains Title I funding at roughly $18.4 billion while providing significant boosts to special education and charter school funding.油Key components of the IDEA boost include:

• A $439 million increase for IDEA state grants while consolidating six smaller IDEA programs to reduce administrative burden on state agencies and districts.
• A $50 million increase for IDEA grants for infants and families.
• Proposed flexibility for states to streamline enrollment processes for expectant parents of children likely to have a disability.

The administration would also commit $500 milion to expand the number of charter schools, broadening the Education Department���s school choice expansion agenda.

Fragmenting the Department

Meanwhile, McMahon was grilled by the subcommittee regarding the Education Department’s recent fragmentation of programs to other federal agencies. To date, the department has established with the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, State, Treasury and Interior.

Breaking up the Department does little to streamline efficiency for schools in search of federal resources, argued Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis.

“This isn’t reducing bureaucracy,�� it’s creating another layer of it,” Baldwin said. “Where states previously primarily dealt with the Department of Education, they will now have to deal with multiple federal agencies.

Declining test scores also don’t warrant eliminating the Education Department, Baldwin added. Rather, she argued that the agency has supported states’ efforts to curb learning losses through research and by adopting evidence-based approaches to improve student outcomes.

However, the current state of student achievement reflects decades of mismanagement from the federal government, according to McMahon. In her prepared remarks, she restated her mission from President Donald Trump to “sunset a 46-year-old, $3 trillion, failed education bureaucracy in Washington, DC.”

“Amid record-low test scores and record-high numbers of students buried in debt, Americans want results,” she added.

Find more solutions in the full “Field Guide for People Leadership,” which is available with .油Then, navigate to the People section of the Content Hub, which is listed in the menu on the left side of 91心頭+.

Eliminating college readiness programs

Members of the subcommittee also slammed McMahon for the department’s plans to zero out funding for , which helps disadvantaged students enroll and graduate from college. The cuts would save the Department roughly $1.191 billion.

When asked by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., about the department’s intent to dissolve TRIO, McMahon said the program is underperforming.

“It may be a high cost, but this Congress passed the president’s One Big Beautiful Bill, which provided a tax cut for an annual income over $1 million, and it’s now costing the taxpayers over $1 trillion,” rebutted Shaheen.

Returning power to the states

Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., praised the secretary for the work she’s done to protect women’s sports, expand school choice and return authority to the states. When McMahon took the job, he argued, the department was “the poster child for excess federal government.”

“I also want to say from the record I don’t think we ought to mislead the American people,” Kennedy told McMahon. “This isn’t your budget. This budget was put together by the OMB and the White House. Every White House does it.”

McMahon reflected on the innovation being pioneered in schools during her “Returning Education to the States Tour,” adding that innovation has come from the states, not the federal government.

“What I hope to do is to put together a toolkit to leave behind and to share with these states, ‘This is what is working,'” she said.

For example, she referred to “Mississippi Miracle.” As of October, 2025, Mississippi now ranks 16th in the nation for education after ranking last in 2012. The state attributes its success to its focus on phonics, teacher training and literacy support for schools.

“The steps that they took and made, Louisiana adopted, Florida adopted, Tennessee and other states,” McMahon said. “We have seen through the state’s innovation���and continued funding, which will continue to come through government programs���they have made a difference, and that’s why states are the center of what’s going to be successful for them.”

Watch the full hearing .

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The Office for Civil Rights, under previous administrations, cited the districts for violations such as “improper use of preferred pronouns” or “asking questions about a student’s preferred gender.” Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey described those efforts as a “radical transgender agenda.

Title IX protections under the Trump administration operate based on sex, not gender ideology, the department pointed out, adding that the school districts did not violate the law under the Biden and Obama administrations.

“While previous administrations launched Title IX investigations based on ‘misgendering,’ the Trump administration is investigating allegations of girls and women being injured by men on their sports teams or feeling violated by men in their intimate spaces,” Richey said.

The districts and colleges released from their previous Title IX agreements include the Cape Henlopen School District, Delaware Valley School District, Fife School District, La Mesa-Spring Valley School District, Sacramento City Unified School District and Taft College.

Sacramento City USD officials are waiting to see if the move will impact district policy or federal funding, district spokesperson Al Goldberg told .

“The Sacramento City Unified School District remains committed to the support of our LGBTQ+ students and staff,” Goldberg said in a statement.

In Sacramento USD’s case, a student who identifies as male and uses male pronouns lodged a complaint in 2022 that a teacher refused to use the student’s preferred pronouns and didn’t provide time for the student to join the boys’ group during a class activity, according to The Sacramento Bee.

Under the Biden administration, the OCR prompted the district to provide training on Title IX policies to school administrators, teachers, guidance counselors and school resource officers.

More from 91心頭: MEGA: ���Make Education Great Again��� grants proposed in new federal budget

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The Trump administration on Friday released its fiscal year 2027 budget proposal, which includes one of the most consequential changes to K12 funding streams. The MEGA (Make Education Great Again) grants are a $2 billion consolidated fund designed to replace most of the U.S. Department of Education’s elementary and secondary grant programs.

“This overhaul of grant-making eliminates the Department’s ability to micromanage federal funds intended for local communities,” the budget reads.

Seventeen existing programs totaling $6.5 billion would be folded into the MEGA grant structure, while maintaining Title I funding at $18.4 billion. The shift from categorical to block grant funding will require special attention from district financial officials to how MEGA grant rules are written.

Congress has the final authority over appropriations, although prior budget requests included similar cuts and were never enacted.

The budget does not explicitly name the 17 programs being folded into the MEGA grants, but it identifies specific eliminations and consolidation categories. Programs being eliminated outright include:

• Teacher Quality Partnership (-$70 million): Funding for educator preparation partnerships between universities and high-needs districts.
• Training and Advisory Services/Equity Assistance Centers (-$7 million): Regional equity assistance centers for desegregation and civil-rights related technical assistance.
• Comprehensive Centers (-$50 million): Regional technical assistance centers providing support to states and districts.
• Migrant Education and Special Programs for Migrant Students (-$428 million): Funding for programs supporting children of migrant agricultural workers.
• English Language Acquisition (-$890 million): The proposal cites concerns about bilingual emphasis over English proficiency, potentially impacting districts serving large English-learner populations.

Critics argue that the proposal places the burden on vulnerable students.

“While we���re thrilled NASSP school leaders successfully pushed for additional funding for students with special needs, slashing programs that support English learners, migrant students, and educator preparation will cause lasting harm to our kids,” said Ronn Nozoe, CEO of the National Association of Secondary School Principals.

Special education and charter school funding

The proposal includes a $539 million increase for Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) programs, raising total special education funding to nearly $16 billion. Key components of the IDEA boost include:

• A $439 million increase for IDEA State Grants while consolidating six smaller IDEA programs to reduce administrative burden on state agencies and districts.
• A $50 million increase for IDEA Grants for Infants and Families.
• Proposed flexibility for states to streamline enrollment processes for expectant parents of children likely to have a disability.

The administration would also commit $500 milion to expand the number of charter schools, broadening the Education Department’s school choice expansion agenda.

Career and Technical Education takes a new form

Meanwhile, the budget proposes moving the Office of Career, Technical, and Adult Education (OCTAE) and its associated Perkins V programming to the Department of Labor. This represents another step toward efficiency by offloading program responsibilities from the Education Department, the administration contends.

“Transferring OCTAE to DOL helps fulfill the President’s promise to return education to the states, breaks up federal bureaucracy, and reduces administrative burden on states and the workforce development system so they can focus on helping Americans enter the workforce,” the budget reads.

District leaders should expect different regulatory and reporting requirements, including implementation timelines.

More from 91心頭: Q&A: A leader must now possess these tech skills

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The Department will relocate its headquarters to 500 D Street NW in August, abandoning the historic Lyndon B. Johnson building it has occupied since 1980, when the Department first launched. The move will save taxpayers $4.8 million annually in operating costs and reduce the agency’s footprint by nearly 80%, according to the .

The U.S. Department of Energy will take over the lease on the Lyndon B. Johnson building, which would otherwise be 70% vacant if operated by the Education Department.

���This is the government working smarter for the American people,” General Services 91心頭istration 91心頭istrator Edward C. Forst said in a statement. “I want to thank Secretary (Chris) Wright and Secretary (Linda) McMahon for their positive energy and collaboration in executing President Trump���s directive to strengthen the government���s real estate portfolio.���

Earlier this month, the Education Department unveiled a partnership with the Treasury Department to help manage ED’s $1.7 trillion loan portfolio, which has been “badly mismanaged for years, “U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent said in a statement.

Roughly four in 10 borrowers are actively making student loan payments, and nearly 25% are in default, meaning they’ve fallen behind on payments by 270 days or more.

Under the interagency agreement, Treasury will assume operational responsibility on defaulted student loan debt and assist the Education Department’s efforts to return borrowers to repayment.

“As the federal student aid portfolio soars to nearly $1.7 trillion and with nearly a quarter of student loan borrowers in default, Americans know that the Department of Education has failed to effectively manage and deliver these critical programs,” McMahon said in a statement.

More from 91心頭: College costs aren���t surging. In fact, here���s how they���ve declined

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According to the department’s Office for Civil Rights, students waited months to be evaluated for individualized services. The investigation also claimed that untrained staff members were making decisions on behalf of students with disabilities and removing education services based on the availability of social workers and student participation.

The investigation also suggests that students with disabilities were provided inadequate transportation to and from school.

“Students and their families have been forced to demand accommodations the law entitles them through an adversarial system that, among other shortcomings, denies students timely evaluations, individualized placements, and reliable transportation that meets students��� needs,��� said Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey.

A pending resolution agreement will require the district to establish a Disability Services Division to oversee its programs for students with disabilities and provide annual training for district-level staff.

Meanwhile, the OCR says Jefferson County Public Schools in Colorado allowed male students to occupy 61 female sports roster positions, a decision described as “unconscionable” by Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey.

“The Trump 91心頭istration will not relent until female athletes’ safety, opportunities and equal protection under the law are fully restored,” Richey said in a statement.

The investigation also revealed male students had access to certain facilities based on their gender identity, including bathrooms, locker rooms and overnight accommodations.

As of March 13, Jefferson County Public Schools had 10 days to adhere to the OCR’s resolution agreement, which includes rescinding or revising policies that permit male students’ access to female-only facilities and participation in female sports.

The district must also release a public statement acknowledging its compliance with Title IX moving forward.

“The district must act now to end these violations and protect future generations of girls from sex discrimination,” Richey said.

Meanwhile, a separate investigation into Wisconsin’s New Richmond School District alleges that males are being allowed to use female bathrooms, according to reports from parents and students during a January board meeting.

One student testified at a subsequent board meeting about her anxiety about seeing boys in the girls’ restroom, adding that she no longer uses the bathroom at school.

In January, one school board member introduced a bathroom and locker room policy requiring student use based on biological sex. Only two of the seven board members voted in favor of the proposal.

“Young women should never be forced to share intimate spaces with boys and men because school leaders care more about radical gender ideology than protecting girls’ safety, dignity and privacy,” Richey said.

Similarly, Oregon’s Portland Public Schools is under investigation over its Center for Black Student Excellence, which is alleged to discriminate based on race. A complaint filed with OCR suggests the district used funds from a recent $1.2 billion bond to support academic interventions, wrap-around support, facilities and family programs exclusively for Black students.

Catch up on��District 91心頭istration’s��latest Title IX coverage here.

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Two new partnerships with the Departments of State and Health and Human Services aim to improve foreign gift and contract reporting for colleges and universities under , as well as improve school safety.

The Education Department has now established nine interagency partnerships since November.

“As we continue to break up the federal education bureaucracy and return education to the states, our new partnerships with the State Department and HHS represent a practical step toward greater efficiency, stronger coordination and meaningful improvement,” said Education Secretary Linda McMahon.

HHS will take on a greater responsibility for programs like the School Emergency Response to Violence Project (Project SERV), School Safety National Activities, Ready to Learn Programming, Full-Service Community Schools, Promise Neighborhoods and Statewide Family Engagement Centers.

The partnership will consolidate resources and initiatives to provide a more unified federal strategy surrounding school support, according to the Education Department.

Meanwhile, the State Department will guide Education in managing the Section 117 , assisting in reviewing and assessing compliance with the law, sharing data with public and federal stakeholders and identifying potential threats.

“President Trump has been clear: Americans deserve transparency regarding foreign funding in American higher education,” said Sarah Rogers, undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy. “This partnership gives the State Department additional tools and resources to make good on that promise while safeguarding the integrity of our academic institutions.”

More from 91心頭: Texas makes school choice history. What���s been the response?

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Students, staff and parents��have a constitutional right to adhere to their religious beliefs and practices while at school, as long as they respect the rights of others, according to from the Trump administration.

Schools may not engage in religious activities or speech as an institution. School cannot favor secular views over religious beliefs or one religion over another

Local education agencies must provide certification to state education agencies each year that no policy prevents participation in constitutionally protected prayer.

“Our Constitution safeguards the free exercise of religion as one of the guiding principles of our republic, and we will vigorously protect that right in America’s public schools,” U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in a statement.

What does this look like in practice? The department provides some examples.

Schools can still regulate student speech that disrupts classroom instruction. For instance, a student can’t pray out loud during class in a manner that prevents others from learning. Any such disruptions must be handled consistently with other types of interference, according to the guidance.

School officials must also permit students to pray privately, whether in class, at an athletic event or before a meal.

“These policies also apply when a student is off-campus but taking part in a school-sponsored event,” the guidance reads. “A school may no more prohibit a student football player from praying before an away game than it could prevent him from praying before a home game.”

This also applies to students praying in a group setting. The department prohibits school leaders from preferring secular student groups to religious student groups or discriminating among religious groups of different faiths.

As for public school employees, the administration ensures that their First Amendment rights need not be forfeited. Leaders are required to permit the same right to expression as students, including prayer, as long as it does not coerce others into joining or affirming their prayer or function as the official speech of the school as an institution.

For example, a teacher may bow their head to say grace before lunch, and students are allowed to join. However, the teacher cannot instruct their class to pray with them.

“This is not the familiar but legally unsound metaphor of a ‘wall of separation’ between religious faith and public schools,” the guidance concludes. “It is rather a stance of neutrality among and accommodation toward all faiths, and hostility toward none.”

More from 91心頭:

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President Trump last week delivered his of 2026�� in Iowa, hoping to preserve his Republican majorities in Congress. His message to Iowans: let’s keep the ball rolling on his agenda.

“If we lose the midterms, you’ll lose so many of the things that we’re talking about,” he said during his speech. “So many of the assets that we’re talking about, so many of the tax cuts that we’re talking about. And it would lead to very bad things. We’ve got to win the midterms.”

It’s common for presidents to in midterm elections. Given the Republicans’ in the House and Senate, it would take much luck��on both sides of the aisle to gain control.

Reports suggest looming challenges for Republicans. A new finds that just 43% of likely voters approve of the job President Trump is doing, while 51% disapprove of his first year back in office.

Looking ahead to the midterms, the same survey finds that 48% of voters support the Democratic candidate on the generic congressional ballot and 42% will vote for the Republican.

What does this mean for K12?

Despite��the outcome of the midterms,��it doesn’t change the fact that we have an executive branch that seems comfortable “bending” laws to achieve political goals, argues , director of the Brown Center on Education Policy and senior research fellow at the Brookings Institution.

“The Trump administration has shown a willingness to push the limits of what it can do unilaterally, even if it gets resistance from congressional Republicans,” he says. “The June 2025 freeze of federal education formula funds was an example of that.”

The administration��withheld��those funds temporarily, even though they were congressionally appropriated, Valant adds. However, Democrats flipping Congress wouldn’t be nearly as significant for K12 education policy as winning back the White House in 2028.

However, there are individual races that could impact education policy, says , senior visiting fellow on education programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. ,��who currently serves as chair of the��, will face off against the Trump-endorsed primary challenger,��, in Louisiana.

Cassidy is��one of the three remaining Senate Republicans who voted to convict Trump after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

Senator Bill Cassidy on empowering families through school choice.

Challenges to the Trump education agenda

Despite an unusually aggressive year of executive action toward education, there probably won’t be much of an education agenda for the next three years, Chu explains.

“Ask yourself: what does the President want Congress to do? Permanently abolishing the Department of Education was never realistic,” he says. “Divided government only reinforces that reality.”

The Trump administration will continue to seek influence over education through executive fiat and lawfare, Chu adds, whether through grant cancellations and delays, reinterpretation of statutory language, shifts in enforcement priorities, or the aggressive use of administrative discretion.

We’ll continue to hear discussions on school choice, as well as race and gender policies in schools, the latter of which has already felt the wrath of the Education Department less than one month into the new year.

In mid-January, the Department announced sweeping Title IX investigations into nearly 20 school districts and colleges for allegedly permitting transgender athletes to compete in girls’ and women’s sports.

A Democratic-led Congress, if anything, would hold oversight hearings to raise awareness of some of the controversial executive actions, says Valant.

“Unfortunately, if the administration wants to continue its anti-DEI, ‘anti-woke’ push through its selective enforcement of civil rights law, I’m not confident that Congress would stop them, no matter who has control,” he explains.

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In December, more than 100 K12 superintendents and district leaders traveled to Washington, D.C., with Digital Promise’s , to advocate for increased education research and development at a time when some public officials are scrutinizing K12 funding and policy.

The half-day event featured approximately 60 meetings with state representatives to discuss the future of education funding, with a specific focus on fiscal year 2026 appropriations for the and the .

Districts currently rely on federal funding to support programs focused on robotics, cybersecurity and coding, says Miranda Ming, executive director at Momentum Academy, a K-8 school.

“In our district, we work very heavily with our higher education institutions and some of our local corporations,” says Ming. “The NSF funds actually fund internship programs for our students to expose them to careers in STEM.”

Losing such funding could put these programs in jeopardy, she adds. As it stands, the Trump administration proposes a 6% cut to in 2026��and a to NSF STEM R&D. However, the House Appropriations Committee recently announced a spending package that challenges most of those cuts, as well as the administration’s plan to redistribute power from the Education Department to other federal agencies.

David Aderhold, superintendent of the West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional School District, says his visit to Capitol Hill helped establish rapport with legislators and elevate local issues. K12 leaders spotlighted the ripple effect that cuts to SNAP and Medicaid funding could have on students and their families.

Aderhold, who serves as the president-elect of the New Jersey Association of School 91心頭istrators, notes that his organization has examined these issues extensively.

“We anticipate that starting in 2027, when Medicaid dollars shift from the feds to the states, is that they’re going they’re going to have to make decisions about the types of programs they’ll continue to fund,” he says. “In New Jersey, students can get insurance through Medicaid funding.”

States will have to compensate for��declining federal support by tapping into other funding sources.

“They will either start by defunding pensions or putting less contributions toward pensions, less direct aid to schools or the retiree health care system,” he explains. “My fear is it’s going to be a combination of all these tactics.”

Education R&D can only be impactful if it moves as quickly as the education sphere evolves, especially regarding edtech, says Jillian Doggett, director of network supports at Digital Promise. Federal policies are restricting leaders’ ability to leverage grant funding for things like artificial intelligence, she adds.

“I think it’s the money, but it’s also policy and structural flexibility and autonomy and an accountability system that doesn’t penalize people for trying new things,” she says.

The League of Innovative Schools plans to release a national landscape analysis in January to evaluate how R&D is currently used in K12 settings. Superintendents are already��bringing��lawmakers into schools to see the impact of federal investments.

“It’s really incumbent on us as leaders to get out there,” Aderhold explains. “Our visit reaffirmed that we have to continue to advocate and build bridges at the federal level.”

More from 91心頭: Teacher prep programs drive diversity but results are uneven

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