In his first two months back at the White House, President Donald Trump has railed against rampant “waste, fraud and abuse” across the government. 
That criticism, based in many cases on false and misleading claims about federal workers and programs, has fueled sweeping cuts. Another dramatic round of layoffs came last week when Trump staffers announced they’d slashed the workforce in half at the U.S. Department of Education. 
Linda McMahon, the newly installed education secretary, said Tuesday the cuts will eliminate “bureaucratic bloat.” Experts predict they’ll significantly impact students and teachers nationwide.
“Today’s reduction in force reflects the Department of Education’s commitment to efficiency, accountability, and ensuring that resources are directed where they matter most,” McMahon said in a statement last week. 
Gutting the agency may actually have the opposite effect, according to laid-off workers and former high-ranking officials. In interviews and social media posts, they argued that firing the watchdogs whose job is to hold schools accountable will hurt students who need help the most, while opening the door to predatory behavior.
“If there is waste, fraud and abuse, this administration has now eliminated the very agency that would provide oversight for that,” said attorney Sheria Smith, one of the hundreds of employees fired from the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights on Tuesday. 
Last week offered a troubling glimpse into what critics view as the potential fallout. The Federal Student Aid office, which disburses federal student loans and Pell Grants, lost over 300 people to layoffs, a preliminary union tally shows (that estimate doesn’t include nonunion members or supervisors). Student loan experts, technology specialists and people who investigate colleges were dismissed.
The day after the losses, the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, experienced a massive outage. The Education Department said the glitch wasn’t related to the cuts. 
In addition, the office that tracks student progress and administers funding for studies about the effectiveness of federal education programs was eliminated “wholesale,” Smith said.
Trump officials have promised those key offices can still fulfill their functions, which are mandated by Congress. Yet it’s unclear to employees and concerned observers how that will be possible. Democratic state attorneys general and disability rights advocates have sued, saying the cuts breach the limits of the executive branch under federal law. 
As schools enter a new era with less oversight, the implications for students may be hard to monitor, said Brittany Coleman, a Dallas-based civil rights attorney who was laid off. 
“We’re now about to be on the honor system,” she said. 
As the Education Department’s workload has grown, Congress hasn’t meaningfully increased its budget, prompting longstanding concerns about understaffing. For that reason, officials at the agency often turn to outside contractors to carry out much of their work. 
That reliance can create problems. Last year offered a prime example: A series of issues with the FAFSA prompted massive delays in the enrollment process for both colleges and students. 
Under former President Joe Biden, the Federal Student Aid office, which oversees the FAFSA, was reorganized. The goal was, in part, to help make the form function more smoothly. And the revisions worked, Miguel Cardona, Biden’s education secretary, told USA TODAY in January. The FAFSA got back on track. 
Last week, the newly reformed office was gutted. James Kvaal, Biden’s top higher education official, was alarmed to learn important divisions had been reduced to skeleton staffs or scrapped, jeopardizing the entire federal financial aid system. 
“All of our efforts to ensure those kinds of mistakes are not made again have been reversed,” he said. 
“These issues could continue to happen,” said Edward James, a laid-off Federal Student Aid staffer who is vice president of the local union representing Education Department workers.
His colleagues, he said, were “the glue that helps hold things together.”
The Education Department plays a significant role in ensuring that schools are deterred from taking advantage of students or discriminating against them. Fulfilling those dual missions will be tough with fewer personnel, employees said. 
On Tuesday, one key office that regulates colleges dropped from 192 staffers to 29 in minutes, a laid-off employee posted on social media. Kevin Roberts, an institutional review specialist dismissed last week, called it a “guaranteed fact” that some colleges will be forced to close or lose eligibility for federal financial aid because of the downsizing. 
“Linda McMahon has basically given 4,000 institutions plus foreign schools the green light to waste, abuse, and create fraud with Federal Financial Aid dollars with zero oversight,” he wrote on LinkedIn. 
The Office for Civil Rights, a vital watchdog for abuse, shuttered seven regional offices across the country, from New York City to San Francisco. It’s a huge deal, said Catherine Lhamon, who led civil rights enforcement in schools in the Biden administration.
Those regional offices exist, she said, so that attorneys can develop relationships with school lawyers, administrators and communities. The on-the-ground support ultimately speeds up investigations, solving students’ problems more quickly. 
“The department has so gutted the offices that they’re a sham now,” she said. 
Three days after Trump officials fired hundreds of staffers in the civil rights division, the Education Department ordered sweeping new investigations of six colleges accused of offering “impermissible race-based scholarships.” 
The new cases represent a “dangerous” reorientation of the office Lhamon led for years, she said. In her view, its sole focus now seems to be “pet projects for political leadership.”
Zachary Schermele is an education reporter for USA TODAY. You can reach him by email at zschermele@usatoday.com. Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele and Bluesky at @zachschermele.bsky.social.

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This story originally appeared on the Christensen Institute’s blog, and is reposted with permission.
Key points:
Picture your favorite teacher from your childhood. He or she may have been great at explaining things, energetic, affirming, funny, or had other wonderful attributes. I remember Mrs. Rider. She was smart and pretty, and showed she really believed in me.
With this picture in mind that highlights the many wonderful teachers who typify the “sage on the stage” teacher role, you may wonder why Guide School (full disclosure: I’m the founder) prepares teachers and other adults to become “guides” instead of sages. Why not spend our efforts developing more wonderful sages like Mrs. Rider?
The printing press provides a helpful analogy to answer that question.
Over time, Disruptive Innovations change how things are conventionally done
Before the invention of the printing press, books and written materials were primarily produced as handwritten manuscripts. Scribes, often monks or other church officials, painstakingly copied texts by hand using quill pens and special inks to illuminate and decorate each parchment.
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The printing press, invented by Johannes Gutenberg in the 15th century, revolutionized the production and sharing of written knowledge. It allowed for the mass production of books at a much faster rate and lower cost. In short, texts became accessible to a greater number of people.
But it also meant disrupting the profession of scribes, who suddenly found their work had shifted. Some scribes found new opportunities as proofreaders or editors within the emerging print industry. Others continued to provide handwritten services for personal letters and legal documents. Additionally, a market remained for beautifully handcrafted manuscripts among wealthy patrons who valued calligraphy.
There’s a parallel between the stories of scribes and conventional teachers. Just as the best scribes produced unique artistry in rare, individually commissioned works, the best teachers create rare but enviable classrooms with well-behaved, deeply motivated, impressively thriving students. Unfortunately, however, many people are left out of these ideal scenarios. Without the printing press, millions of people would have languished without access to printed materials. Without transforming the conventional classroom, millions of students today will continue to suffer from want of effective instruction. That’s because while the conventional system could develop more wonderful, conventional teachers like Mrs. Rider, doing so requires an investment of resources often unavailable to every student in every school across the world. All too often, only those who are lucky or whose families can pay receive the benefits of those investments. 
Happily, the printing press’s disruption of scribing proved to be an irrefutable boon for the education of humanity. The printing press facilitated the growth of literacy, numeracy, and scientific knowledge by enabling the widespread distribution of printed materials with dependable accuracy and lower costs. It played a crucial role in the Renaissance, Reformation, and Scientific Revolution, allowing for the mass sharing of ideas at unprecedented speed and scale. By the end of the 15th century, millions of copies of thousands of book titles had been printed, marking a dramatic shift in the accessibility of knowledge.
AI and its potential to disrupt conventional teaching
Similarly, the rise of AI-powered, online apps for instruction is disrupting the teaching profession. It’s giving rise to a new wave of global knowledge distribution with increasingly dependable accuracy and precision, allowing for mass learning at unprecedented speed and scale.
When the printing press arrived, the scribe profession did not disappear, but scribes did have to adapt to new roles as their industry changed. Similarly, many conventional teachers will need to adapt to a new role as their role of sage becomes disrupted. 
Fortunately, this pivot presents a remarkable opportunity for teachers and society at large. For years, experts have identified that students do best when they have personal, individual tutelage to help them learn. Top-down, whole-class, monolithic instruction isn’t working for most students–and observant teachers know that. The shift from sage on the stage to guide on the side of each student is a welcome relief for teachers who see that the conventional approach is broken in that it leaves behind too many students and want a model that allows them to have the individual impact they hoped for when they entered the teaching profession.
AI frees up teachers’ time to give more individual attention and students’ time for more than foundational knowledge attainment. The Flex blended-learning model, which pairs AI-powered apps with group discussions, real-world projects, individual coaching from guides, and other student experiences, attracts teachers who see its value and want its benefits. Rather than feeling replaced by computer-based instruction, these teachers feel attracted to a clear opportunity to shift their time spent on lectures and embrace the facilitation of a more student-driven learning design for their students.
Guide School prepares adults who feel called to this new role. The guide profession is different from the conventional teaching profession. It requires different mindsets, skills, and dispositions. But for those well-suited to and trained for the role, it’s a profession with unprecedented opportunities to help youth worldwide develop knowledge and talents to a higher level than ever before.
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Heather Clayton Staker is an adjunct fellow at the Christensen Institute, specializing in K–12 blended learning. She is the co-author of “Blended” and “The Blended Workbook.” She is the founder and CEO of Guide School (www.guide.school), which helps teachers implement a software-led “Flex” instructional model and elevate their role to world-class mentor and guide.

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Meaningful opportunities for teachers to build expertise and leadership beyond their classroom add to a sense of professionalism and fulfillment. In an age when the role of technology in education is rapidly changing, why not allow teachers to lead the way?
On average, about 25 percent of children in the early grades struggle with reading. These students are often reluctant readers because they find the process complicated, and they lack confidence in their abilities.
As students navigate an increasingly complex world defined by artificial intelligence, social media, and rapid technological change, the need for … Read more
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