Tracking US education news, policy shifts, and impacts under the Trump administration.
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News Updates
The bill has passed the senate but has not been accounted for in the state budget, so it will remain in this committee until the House passes a new budget. The Fiscal Review Committee placed a fiscal note stating that the bill may cost more than $1 billion/year because it violates the Civil Rights Act and Title VI by denying a free public education to students and risks losing federal funding.
4/11/25 - An immigration judge ruled Mahmoud Khalil can be deported
The judge in Louisiana ruled the government met its burden for removal, but cited only a memo from Marco Rubio stating Khalil enables antisemitism. It does not appear there is any other evidence supporting this claim and immigration judges often rule in the executive branch's favor.
4/11/25 - Trump administration seeking a consent decree for Columbia University
A consent decree would make the concessions given by Columbia in relation to the federal money canceled legally binding, and allow federal oversight over its operations
4/11/25 - A federal judge ordered USDA to unfreeze funding to Maine's Child Nutrition Program
The judge found that the Trump administration did not follow proper legal procedures in freezing the funds and lied about their impact. He rejected the claim that "no irreparable harm" had occurred by freezing funding for programs which provide meals to low-income children and elderly and disabled adults. He granted the temporary restraining order and is allowing Maine to gather more evidence in its favor against the federal government.
The groups are the American Association of University Professors and the Harvard faculty chapter of the AAUP. This is in response to the announcement ED, HHS and GSA are reviewing federal funding for Harvard. The lawsuit asks for a temporary restraining order to block them from cutting funding saying that it violates free speech.
Maine DOE has not complied with ED's request to ban transgender students from girls' sports teams, which would violate Maine state law, and now is referring the case to DOJ for enforcement. They are also planning to terminate all federal funding for Maine K-12 schools. The Trump ED views transgender inclusion as a violation of Title IX.
4/10/25 - Official RIF notices sent to ED employees terminated on March 11
Employees were notified in the March 11 mass layoffs but official notices did not arrive until now. It is a 60-day notice and employees will be on paid administrative leave until the end of the 60 days. Experts have said the administration is not following legal procedures and this RIF may be illegal.
4/10/25 - Tennessee SB836/HB793 passed by Senate
This bill allows public schools to require families prove citizenship or legal residence and for undocumented students to pay tuition to attend.
4/10/25 - Texas SB 37 placed on intent calendar, which means it may be brought to the floor for debate soon
SB37 would require universities to have their curricula reviewed by a board and would limit the way race, gender, discrimination and the history of any other group whose rights could be considered "ideological" can be discussed. It would also create a way to file complaints about universities which do not comply, limit faculty and hiring decisions, and phase out degree programs which "don't clearly provide a return on investment"
4/9/25 - Court postpones DEI certification deadline until at least April 24
This is the result of an agreement between parties in a lawsuit filed by the NEA, NEA New Hampshire and the ACLU against ED. The case will be heard April 17 in the US District Court of New Hampshire and the agreement states no anti-DEI enforcement can take place until after this hearing.
Democrats say there has not been enough transparency with Congress, who are legally the only ones with authority to close ED. Republicans claimed this was "political theater" and opposed it, relying on misleading information about federal funds and how they are used.
4/9/25 - NIH is freezing all research grants for Columbia
This is in relation to the federal investigation over antisemitism at Columbia, and comes after Columbia agreed to implement new policies requested by the Trump administration. HHS has requested NIH block all new funding and stop paying for existing NIH research projects.
4/8/25 - NIH freezes funds for training programs which support researchers from underrepresented communities
The grants cut are the Undergraduate Research Training Initiative for Student Enhancement (U-RISE) and its graduate student program (G-RISE), the Maximizing Access to Research Careers (MARC) program, which funded undergraduate researchers; the Post-Baccalaureate Research Education Program (PREP); the Bridges to the Doctorate program, which trained masters students; the Initiative for Maximizing Student Development (IMSD), which supported graduate students; and the Institutional Research and Academic Career Development Award (IRACDA), which aided postdoctoral researchers in their development.
The administration said this is related to ongoing investigations over Title VI - likely DEI for Cornell and antisemitism for NU. Neither school has recieved official notification from the federal government.
4/7/25 - US National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) is cut in half
The fellowship has been cut from 2,000 to 1,000 offers. It is one of the longest running programs supporting global science and provides a stipend plus coverage of annual tuition for masters and PhD students.
4/7/25 - Maine is suing the Trump administration over USDA funding freeze related to Title IX disputes
The USDA has frozen funds for MDOE's child nutrition program because of the HHS and ED Title IX disputes. The lawsuit is asking for a temporary restraining order while the case proceeds.
4/7/25 - Tennessee SB836/HB793 recommended for pass by House Government Operations Committee
This bill allows public schools to require families prove citizenship or legal residence and for undocumented students to pay tuition to attend. One Republican member voted against this bill, Faison, but it still passed 8-7.
4/7/25 - Northwestern University legal clinics targeted by congressional committee probe
The US House Committee on Education and the Workforce has requested all policies, budgets and payments by the Community Justice and Civil Rights Clinic to outside groups since 2020. This is related to the law clinic's support for pro-Palestine protesters in Chicago.
The lawsuit alleges the cuts have made it impossible for IES to operate and for organizations which rely on IES data to perform their jobs.
The AGs are asking the court to stop the closure of these agencies stating that the Administration's action to dismantle them is illegal and will "inflict immediate and irreparable harms on the Plaintiff States, their residents and the public".
This is part of Mahmoud Khalil's case, and the lawsuit also wanted to stop the government's $400 million funding "pause" for Columbia. It alleged that student privacy laws and First Amendment rights were threatened by sharing student records, but the judge ruled that Columbia had already shared records with identifying info removed and that the lawsuit did not address everything it needed to for its complaint. The judge did say that Columbia must give students 30 days notice before sharing any more of their records.
This is shifting responsibility from ED to DOJ through a "joint" special investigations team, and is intended to speed up the process and get through a backlog of complaints. Secretary McMahon has made it clear this is primarily to enforce the administration's anti-trans interpretation of Title IX, and is a new way of handling these complaints. It is also likely this is a result of the layoffs at ED which cut OCR in half.
4/4/25 - States are appealing the last-minute cancellation of COVID relief funds
States had received extensions into 2026 for these funds and even McMahon's ED had previously assured state education agencies these would be honored.
This grant was for a program within the Rehabilitative Services Administration in ED which helped support post secondary youth and young adults transition to higher education or careers successfully. It is possible this program was eliminated because of the word "transition" as the Trump administration is eliminating any support for transgender people.
These grants were part of the Teacher Quality Partnership and Supporting Effective Educator Development programs. The court ruled 5-4.
This is part of the federal grant review announced by the "Joint Task Force to Combat Antisemitism" and the letter did not specify a deadline
A judge ruled that Haskell Indian Nations University in Kansas and Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute in New Mexico can hire back the 70 they employees laid off or who resigned. The colleges have reported that some have already turned down job offers.
K-12 State Education Agency Commissioners must sign a letter certifying they are in compliance with Title VI, which this administration interprets as making any diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts illegal. The department will withhold ALL federal funds to states which do not sign the certification.
4/2/25 - Mahmoud Khalil's case will remain in New Jersey
The federal government had asked to move Khalil to Louisiana, but a federal judge ruled NJ has jurisdiction over his case. The government is also trying to move another university student detained by ICE for her pro-Palestine activism to Louisiana.
The letter was led by Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del) and asks McMahon to respond to a series of questions by April 11, detailing the cuts to ED and how it plans to ensure disabled students receive an appropriate education.
4/2/25 - Senate Democrats investigating whether DOGE is planning to replace ED call center workers with AI
NYTimes reported that DOGE is considering replacing call center workers who answer financial aid questions with AI bots, and Senate Democrats are investigating the risks of misinformation, data privacy and conflicts of interest
Staff was put on administrative leave until June without warning. The National Head Start Association has warned this may lead to delays or loss of services for children and families enrolled in Head Start. Head Start supports child care, education, health, nutrition and other early childhood needs.
This hearing seemed to have been a way to discuss the pros of AI and use it as further justification for ending federal oversight of education, claiming states will be able to create better and faster regulations than the federal government. The summary describes Democrats as "hijacking" the meeting when arguing the opposite point.
4/1/25 - SB836 passed the Tennessee Senate Finance, Ways and Means Committee
SB836 would allow public schools to require students show proof of legal immigration status or citizenship and charge undocumented students tuition to attend. The bill specifies that it would only apply to students who have "exhausted all appeals" and are under a final order of removal, and claim this would not violate Plyler v Doe.
This is not related to the "Joint Task Force" activities and is instead part of an OCR investigation into 60 higher ed institutions for alleged violations "relating to antisemitic harassment and discrimination"