President Trump’s FY 2021request was released on February 10, 2020. The proposal calls for block granting K-12 education funds and a separate and reformed federal student aid. Trump’s budget request for the U.S. Department of Education is touted by his administration as a transformative, student-first budget that prioritizes improving student achievement, reducing the outsized federal role in education, and returning control over education decisions to state and local leaders, teachers, parents, and students.

The budget calls for consolidating nearly all existing K-12 formula and competitive grant programs into one block grant to ctates, called the Elementary and Secondary Education for the Disadvantaged (ESED) Block Grant. Funds would be allocated using the same formulas as the Title I Grants to Local Educational Agencies program. The budget also builds on the multi-year Federal Student Aid (FSA) reform project U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos launched in 2018.

K-12 public education skeptics are leery of the use of terms used in the USDE such as increased “freedom”, “disadvantaged”, “reducing the federal role.” A reduced fereral role is seen by some as a means to reduce federal spending, which is already inadequate with regard to the federal role in funding special education.

To view details of the full budget request, click here.