Category: Department of education
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The radical nonprofit that is destroying state education
For decades, U.S. education has been dominated by the American left. Its stranglehold was highly visible during the Biden administration, with countless stories about wildly inappropriate books in school libraries, critical race theory being taught in classrooms, and national associations calling for parents to be designated domestic terrorists.
How did our public school systems — including those in red states, from Iowa to Alaska — become infected with radical leftist ideology? The answer is education consulting groups.
As long as Republicans continue to outsource their governance and expertise to thinly veiled activist groups, nothing will change.
Most Americans don’t realize that every aspect of governance, from parks and wildlife departments to the curriculum in kids’ schools, has been outsourced to a coalition of nameless, faceless NGO consulting groups that are funded by millions of taxpayer dollars funneled through the government. One of the worst offenders is the American Institutes for Research.
AIR is currently under contract with at least 25 states, with the majority involving contracts to develop state standards. For those unfamiliar with education policy, standards determine what students need to learn and when they need to learn it. Lesson plans, curriculum, and textbooks are required by law to be aligned with standards.
AIR’s tentacles stretch from D.C. into health care and counseling policy — and education. It has long been entrenched in most red-state education departments to “facilitate” standards revisions. Take its influence in Alaska as a recent example.
Alaska has had multiple contracts with the nonprofit, including the School Climate and Connectedness Survey, which focuses on social-emotional learning and adult education content standards. AIR is also cited as a teaching resource for curriculum implementation.
On the Alaska Department of Education’s social studies website, AIR is listed as a source multiple times, including in the HQIM Rubric and in a PowerPoint presentation that was given to the state board, which was co-presented with an AIR employee. The presenters insisted that standards must have an equity focus and touted a shift from learning about social studies to student activism, or “action civics.”
These standards were implemented in Alaska’s new social studies curriculum, and the results are predictably a mess. Developed by a panel selected by race rather than merit, the standards are chock-full of land acknowledgments and other progressive claptrap. Alaska is now training its kids to be activists rather than teaching them about the American founding.
Worse yet, Alaska is also a partner with AIR for its Indigenous Student Identification Project, headed by Nara Nayar. On her LinkedIn account, she proudly lists her work “on comprehensive sexuality education for elementary and middle school students.”
This is where Alaskan taxpayer dollars are going: equity education, activism training, and filling the pockets of far-left education consultants who teach sex ed to elementary students.
Turning to the Midwest, Iowa’s social studies overhaul is in consultation with Stefanie Wager, a former AIR employee who is a glorified activist. She lists “racial justice, equity, and inclusion” as top priorities. Wager has an extensive list of extremist views that influence her work as an education consultant.
Wager was once president of the National Association for the Social Studies, a left-wing outfit that has shaped red-state history instruction. She has also worked as the education partner manager for Bill Gates’ personal office. Wager began as an AIR employee embedded within the Iowa Department of Education. When news broke about her involvement, she left AIR and joined the Iowa Department of Education full-time.
These aren’t just one-off examples — they are emblematic of the reach and influence of shadow consultant organizations that control public education. Peruse nearly any state department of education, and you will find rubrics with equity focuses, social studies curriculum full of progressive ideology, and AIR-linked content on state websites. Nebraska, for example, contracted AIR for a social studies report that is spotlighted on AIR’s website.
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The worst part is that state taxpayers are unknowingly funding all of this. South Dakota signed a nearly quarter-million-dollar contract with AIR to facilitate work-group meetings to revise the state’s social studies standards, which produced standards laced with wokeness. The blowback was so swift that then-Gov. Kristi Noem (R) had to intervene and force South Dakota’s Education Department to restart its standards revision work from scratch.
The result was some of the best standards in the country.
Alaska has likely paid millions for its various studies and surveys, but the cost of only one project, at $350,000, is publicly available. Iowa awarded AIR a $31 million contract for testing assessments. This is a patronage scheme using taxpayer dollars to fund pet leftist programs. To make matters worse, most red states keep all of this hidden. In Alaska, you have to pay the state for a contract to be disclosed.
As long as Republicans continue to outsource their governance and expertise to thinly veiled activist groups, nothing will change. Schools will continue to be breeding grounds for left-wing extremism, school libraries will be filled with radical propaganda — and taxpayers will keep funding all of it.
Red-state legislatures and governors need to look to trusted alternative providers that reflect their states’ values. They should create and fund parallel structures that put outcomes above partisan dogma and properly vet each person to whom they give their constituents’ money. This is the only way to begin countering the efforts of the shadow government in our states.
Editor’s note: A version of this article appeared originally at the American Mind.
Trump admin takes major step toward dismantling Department of Education
The Trump administration is advancing its plan to dismantle the Department of Education, seeking to return more power to the states.
The department announced on Tuesday that it had entered into six new interagency agreements with four government agencies to “break up the federal education bureaucracy” and “ensure efficient delivery of funded programs.”
‘What we want to do is to show Congress that this implementation works.’
These new agreements involved partnerships with the Departments of Labor, Interior, Health and Human Services, and State.
“Cutting through layers of red tape in Washington is one essential piece of our final mission,” Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said. “As we partner with these agencies to improve federal programs, we will continue to gather best practices in each state through our 50-state tour, empower local leaders in K-12 education, restore excellence to higher education, and work with Congress to codify these reforms. Together, we will refocus education on students, families, and schools — ensuring federal taxpayer spending is supporting a world-class education system.”
The Education Department and the DOL will establish the Elementary and Secondary Education Partnership, which aims to “empower parents and states” to promote improvements in the education system that will better serve students.
“DOL will take on a greater role in administering federal K-12 programs, ensuring these programs are better aligned with workforce and college programs to set students up for success at every part of their education journey,” a press release from the Education Department read.
A separate partnership with the DOL aims to improve postsecondary education and workforce development programs. The Labor Department will administer grant programs to “help students from all walks of life obtain the credentials and career training they need to prosper and contribute to the American economy.”
Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
The Department of the Interior will work with the Education Department to establish the Indian Education Partnership to improve Native American education.
“Through a vital partnership with the Department of Education, the Department of the Interior will assume administration for enhancing Indian education programs, streamlining operations, and refocusing efforts to better serve Native youth and adults across the nation,” Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum stated.
The HHS will establish the Foreign Medical Accreditation Partnership to assess whether the standards of foreign medical schools are comparable to U.S. standards.
“Medical education must incorporate timely, rigorous science on nutrition, metabolism, and all medical subjects. [HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.] is leading the charge with American medical schools and HHS will encourage foreign medical schools through this partnership,” Health and Human Services Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill stated.
HHS will also create the Child Care Access Means Parents in School Partnership to improve on-campus child care programs for parents attending college.
Lastly, the State Department will set up the International Education and Foreign Language Studies Partnership “to streamline international education program funding and data collection measures, consolidate program management, and advance national security interests.”
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McMahon told CNN on Wednesday that these partnerships are not yet ready to implement but are in the “beginning stages” of establishing interagency agreements.
She acknowledged that the Trump administration would need congressional approval to make these moves permanent, adding that the current goal is to demonstrate that the changes will be effective.
“What we want to do is to show Congress that this implementation works,” McMahon told CNN.
Randi Weingarten, the head of the American Federation of Teachers, has previously pledged to take legal action against the Trump administration’s attempts to dismantle the Education Department.
Freedom Foundation CEO and Teacher Freedom Alliance President Aaron Withe responded to the Education Department’s latest “bold action” and the union’s roadblocks, in a statement emailed to Blaze News.
“President Trump is delivering on his promise to dismantle the federal education bureaucracy, and who is leading the opposition? Randi Weingarten and the teachers’ unions,” Withe stated. “The teachers’ unions have enjoyed unprecedented power over this department since Jimmy Carter created it as a political favor to the [National Education Association]. They’ve had decades to deliver results. Instead, American students keep falling further behind while spending keeps going up.”
“The unions oppose these reforms because they threaten the special access they’ve enjoyed for too long,” Withe continued. “Well, that era is over. Parents, students, and local communities deserve better than a system designed to serve union bosses. The Freedom Foundation applauds President Trump and Secretary McMahon for taking bold action to break up this failed bureaucracy and return control of education where it belongs.”
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Promoting Campus Viewpoint Diversity: A Modest Proposal
The highly progressive left-wing dominance on most college campuses has turned off not only the Trump administration but large portions…
Trump can’t call it ‘mission accomplished’ yet
With a divided Congress and the clock likely running out on GOP control, President Trump’s decision to forgo a second budget reconciliation bill is puzzling. Reconciliation is the only tool available to pass major priorities without a filibuster. So why refuse another chance to make the America First agenda permanent?
At a recent meeting with Senate Republicans, Trump told lawmakers, “We don’t need to pass any more bills. We got everything” in the big, beautiful bill earlier this year. “We got the largest tax cuts in history. We got the extension of the Trump tax cuts. We got all of these things.”
The first Trump presidency showed what executive courage can do. The second must prove what lasting law can achieve.
Really? That answer ignores reality. Tax cuts were never the full measure of the Trump revolution. The movement promised structural reform — from securing the border to dismantling bureaucracies. Limiting the victory to tax relief leaves unfinished the hard work of codifying executive policies into law before the next Democrat in the White House wipes them out with the stroke of a pen.
Biden’s first weeks in office in 2021 proved how fragile executive action can be. Nearly every Trump-era reform — on immigration, energy, education, and national security — vanished within days. The same will happen again if core policies remain tied to presidential discretion instead of actual statutes.
Immigration is the clearest example. Trump moved the country in the right direction, but many key policies remain blocked by courts or enjoined indefinitely. These include:
• Ending birthright citizenship for children of illegal immigrants,
• Defunding sanctuary cities,
• Cutting federal assistance for noncitizens,
• Requiring states to verify lawful status for benefits under the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act,
• Expanding expedited removal of gang members under the Alien Enemies Act,
• Authorizing ICE arrests at state courthouses,
• Deporting pro-Hamas foreign students,
• Returning unaccompanied minors to Central America,
• Suspending refugee resettlement, and
• Ending “temporary” protected status for long-term illegal residents.
Each of these reforms can and should be codified through legislation. Courts can’t enjoin what Congress writes into law.
The same applies beyond immigration. Critical Trump policies remain trapped or reversible, including:
• Abolishing the Department of Education,
• Keeping male inmates out of female prisons,
• Blocking federal funding for hospitals that perform gender “transitions” on minors,
• Removing Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook, and
• Requiring proof of citizenship to vote and restricting mail-in ballots in federal elections.
All of these measures would fulfill campaign promises. All of them will vanish the instant Democrats reclaim the White House — unless Republicans act now to make them permanent.
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Photo by Celal Gunes/Anadolu via Getty Images
Meanwhile, the economic front remains unsettled. Inflation continues to crush families, and Washington’s spending addiction keeps prices high. Health care remains broken, with no Republican alternative to stop Democrats from reinstating Biden’s Obamacare subsidies. The challenges are mounting, not receding.
The reconciliation process exists precisely for moments like this. It allows a governing majority to bypass the filibuster and pass budget-related priorities with a simple majority — the same procedure Democrats used twice under Biden to jam through massive spending and climate legislation. Refusing to use it again would be an act of political negligence.
Trump has accomplished much, but claiming “mission accomplished” now risks repeating the failures of his first term — executive orders that were erased within weeks and policies undone overnight.
The task ahead is to legislate the revolution. Codify the border. Dismantle bureaucratic strongholds. Rein in judicial activism. Secure election integrity. Cement economic reform.
The first Trump presidency showed what executive courage can do. The second must prove what lasting law can achieve. If Trump wants his achievements to outlive his term, he must act now — not by declaring victory, but by legislating it.
