Jan Resseger reports some surprisingly good news: the Senate Appropriations Committee passed an education budget that restored Trump’s cuts to education and disregarded his plan to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education.
Jan sees their action as evidence that public protest works and that the public does not want to abandon federal funding of schools. Jan also cautions that education may yet be imperiled by Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, and Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. Vought was overall writer and editor of “Project 2025” and McMahon is a dedicated ideologue.
Nonetheless, it’s heartening to know that some Republicans were willing to stand up to Trump and Reject one of his worst ideas.
She begins:
On July 31st, K-12 Dive’s Kara Arundel reported some very good news: “The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday approved a bipartisan spending bill for fiscal year 2026 (FY 26) that would prevent the executive branch from removing Title I and special education programs to agencies outside the U.S. Department of Education. The legislation also rejects several other funding reforms proposed by the Trump administration… In total, the Senate Appropriations Committee recommends funding the Education Department in FY 26 at $79 billion…. That’s $12.3 billion more than President Donald Trump’s proposal of $66.7 billion. In the current fiscal year, the Education Department is funded at $78.7 billion.”
More than a thousand members of the Fresno Teachers Association rallied in late May and vowed to strike if the union and school district fail to agree to a contract by Sept. 29, 2023.
Credit: Courtesy of Fresno Teachers Association
The Fresno Teachers Association swiftly rejected the latest proposal by Fresno Unified Friday because the offer does not raise teachers’ pay enough to keep pace with inflation and cost-of-living increases, union president Manuel Bonilla said.
The district’s offer, which Superintendent Bob Nelson said is “above and beyond” educators’ requests, came only days ahead of Wednesday’s teachers union vote on whether to strike.
“No new investments to reduce class size. No new investments to reduce special education (caseloads). A salary that doesn’t keep up with inflation. They want to cut our healthcare (contribution),” Bonilla said. “Those are the four remaining items we don’t agree on.”
Both the school district and teachers union admit that they’ve failed to agree on “critical” items, such as salary and class size, but Nelson said there’s been “significant progress” with the district’s proposals, including, 19% pay increases over the next three years, expanded medical benefits for the rest of employees’ lives, even after retirement, and changes to class size overages.
“I believe this is a historic proposal for… pay increases and health benefits like we’ve never seen before in Fresno Unified.“ Trustee Susan Wittrup said.
But Bonilla said the Fresno Teachers Association disagrees with the district’s characterization of the offer.
More pay on the table
For salary, the district is now proposing 19% salary increases or 14% in raises and 5% in one-time payments — up from its previous offer of 11% raises.
Over three years, that includes:
A 8.5% raise this school year
A 3% raise and a 2.5% one-time payment in the 2024-25 school year
A 2.5% raise and a 2.5% one-time payment in 2025-26
The 3% and 2.5% raises for the next two school years are contingent on the school district having an Average Daily Attendance (ADA) of 92%, according to the revised proposal. The district’s ADA currently hovers around 92%, district spokesperson Nikki Henry said. If the district doesn’t meet that threshold, the district and union would have to negotiate the raises again. If cost-of-living adjustments increase, so would the raises.
The raises put teachers’ average salary at $103,000, Nelson estimated.
Plus, starting pay and max salary for teachers in other Central Valley school districts outrank the pay of teachers in Fresno Unified, though the district is the largest in the region, Bonilla said.
Based on Fresno Unified’s pay schedule, salary currently ranges from $56,013 for new teachers to about $102,000 for teachers with loads of experience, not including those with professional development.
Based on a compensation comparison of 16 districts across the Central Valley, data provided by the union, the $56,013 for new teachers and $102,000 max salary rank at the bottom among the other school districts.
Fresno Unified’s proposal also still comes with a cut to how much the district contributes to the healthcare fund, Bonilla noted. The health fund, in part, determines employee healthcare benefits.
The suggested contribution cut saves the district money, which Fresno Unified will use to fund its proposed salary increases, Bonilla asserts.
“They want to reduce the amount of money that goes into our health fund so that they can use some of it to pay for the salary increases,” Bonilla told EdSource.
District’s offer achieves the same thing as lifetime retiree benefits, Nelson says
The teachers union has proposed district-provided medical benefits for the rest of employees’ lives, even after retirement, restoring the practice, which ended in 2005.
Instead of lifetime medical benefits after retirement, Fresno Unified proposes:
At age 57.5, if an employee has worked in Fresno Unified for 20 years, they’ll be offered the same healthcare plan, and at the same rate, as current employees.
At 65 when employees become eligible for Medicare, they will have access to a district health plan that covers medical procedures that Medicare doesn’t pay for.
Nelson called the proposal a bridge to Medicare, which will meet the same goal as lifetime retiree benefits.
“What does that mean?” Nelson posed. “If you work for us for 20 years and retire, you will never be without medical coverage.”
The district’s move doesn’t invest more money in teachers, Bonilla argues, because money was already in the healthcare fund to provide what Fresno Unified is proposing. The health care fund has a surplus of money, which will cover the costs of the district’s healthcare proposal.
“The money’s already there,” Bonilla said.
Still no on class size caps
The teachers union wants to cap class size with contract language offering parents the choice of moving their children to smaller classes before the cap is exceeded or giving teachers an increased stipend.
Many districts utilize class size caps or maximums, including Madera, Sanger and Selma school districts in Fresno County.
The district won’t budge on implementing class size caps, Nelson said, but lowering class size is a priority for Fresno Unified.
Maintaining existing class size averages or ratios, the district is proposing reducing the number of students over that average that triggers a teacher stipend.
Currently, teacher-student ratios are one teacher for:
24 students in transitional kindergarten to third grade classes
29 students for grades 4-6
28 students for grades 7-8
29 students for high school classes
Elementary teachers have the option of an aide or a $2,000 annual increase if their classes have more than 33 students for more than half of the school year. Secondary grade teachers have the same option of an aide or stipend, if their classes have more than 36 students.
Fresno Unified’s revised proposal reduces that to offer the stipend:
If K-3 grade teachers have more than 28 students in the 2024-25 school year and more than 27 students in 2025-26
If 4-6 grade teachers have more than 34 students this year, over 32 next year and more than 31 the following year
If 7-8 grade teachers have more than 37, 35 and 34 students this year, next year and the following year, respectively
If 9-12 grade teachers have more than 37, 36, and 35 students this year, next year and the following year, respectively
To help lower class sizes, the district, according to its proposal, will also reassign 50 teachers on special assignment back to the classroom.
And to continue to address class size and other issues, the district is proposing a problem-solving team with four district leaders, including the superintendent, and four FTA leaders.
Even though the union agrees with the concept to create a problem-solving team, Bonilla said negotiations are the time and place to address areas such as class size reduction.
Days ahead of a strike vote
The school district, according to Nelson, is still willing to adjust its proposal based on continued negotiations. Bonilla, too, said he is willing to return to the bargaining table.
“It’s largely dependent on where the district is and how they value their educators,” Bonilla said. “Superintendent Nelson has my phone number, and we’ll be willing to talk anytime, anywhere.”
In the meantime, Nelson and Fresno Unified board members urged teachers to read the district’s current proposal for themselves – especially before voting to strike this coming Wednesday.
When Wednesday does come, teachers’ vote to strike, Bonilla said, could be a vote on whether “enough is enough.”
“We believe that thousands of educators will be able to cast their vote and make their voice heard,” Bonilla said. “We believe that people are ready to strike because enough is enough with a (school) system that devalues our educators and doesn’t listen to the things that they (teachers) feel are needed to improve this system.”
Students study in the main lobby of Storer Hall at the University of California, Davis.
Credit: Gregory Urquiaga / UC Davis
Top Takeaways
The Legislature has until June 15 to present their budget bill to the governor.
The proposal received praise from speakers grateful to see more funding for higher education.
Student teachers would receive $600 million in new funding in legislators’ plan.
The Legislature is challenging Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposed funding cuts to higher education for next year, while largely leaving intact the relatively more generous TK-12 spending the governor called for last month.
“In many ways, it’s a tale of two budgets,” said Sen. John Laird, D-Santa Cruz, chair of the education subcommittee, who characterized Newsom’s higher-ed cuts as “draconian.”
In 2025-26, schools and community colleges will receive a record $118.9 billion under Proposition 98, the state formula that determines the minimum portion of the state’s General Fund that must be spent on schools and community colleges. Laird credits the law for “protecting schools from the hard decisions of what is happening to the other side of the ledger with higher education.”
Legislators would nix Newsom’s proposal to cut next year’s funding to the University of California and California State University by 3% and instead restore that money as part of a joint agreement of the Assembly and Senate.
The Assembly and the Senate published their version of a spending plan for education on Monday. The Legislature has until June 15 to present their budget bill to the governor, who then has until June 27 to sign, veto, or line-item veto the bill.
Higher education
The latest version of the 2025-26 budget may provide some relief to the state’s college students and public universities, who in January were told by Newsom to expect an 8% ongoing cut, a figure he revised down to 3% in May. Uncertainty regarding federal funding for higher education has compounded budget anxieties in California, as the Trump administration proposes reductions to programs like the Pell Grant and TRIO.
“I think many of you recognize that we’re facing some pretty devastating budget challenges this year,” said Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez, D-Pasadena, at a budget subcommittee hearing on June 10. “It has been incredibly, incredibly tough, and we are continuing to face ongoing challenges with potential cuts coming from the federal administration that will impact our higher education systems, and so we are going to be having ongoing conversations about the budget.”
While the Legislature’s take on the budget may seem more generous, it is not without asterisks. By forgoing the 3% ongoing cut, the Assembly-Senate recommendations would reinstate $130 million to the 10-campus UC system and $144 million to CSU’s 23 campuses. However, the Legislature would defer those payments until July 2026, giving the universities permission to seek short-term loans from the General Fund to tide themselves over.
Additionally, lawmakers parted ways with the governor on a plan to defer a 5% increase in base funding from 2025-26 to 2026-27. The legislative proposal instead splits the deferral, offering the universities a 2% ongoingincrease in 2026-27 and the remaining 3% in 2028-29.
The legislative proposal was met with praise from many speakers attending the subcommittee hearing. Representatives from the California State University Employees Union, which represents non-faculty and student assistants, the Community College League of California and the Cal State Student Association all spoke in support of the Legislature’s version.
Eric Paredes, the legislative director of the California Faculty Association, which represents professors at CSU, thanked the Legislature for restoring funding to the university system. “We know it’s been a difficult budget year, and just are really appreciative of the Legislature’s ongoing commitment to higher education,” he said.
The legislative proposal also alters a plan to defer nearly $532 million in community college apportionment funding from 2025-26 to 2026-27, instead offering a smaller deferral of $378 million.
To pare back the 2025-26 deferral, the Legislature’s plan would reappropriate $135 million from the 2024-25 part-time faculty insurance program. A representative of the Faculty Association of California Community Colleges, speaking at the budget subcommittee hearing opposed that move, calling the funds for the part-time health care pool “necessary.”
The Legislature is also turning down a Newsom proposal to provide $25 million in one-time Prop. 98 dollars to the Career Passports initiative, which would help Californians compile digital portfolios summarizing the skills they’ve built through work and school.
The Legislature’s plan, in addition, calls for a variety of one-time Prop. 98 funding for community colleges, including $100 million to support college enrollment growth in 2024-25, $44 million to fund part-time faculty office hours and $20 million for emergency financial aid for students.
For the state’s public universities, the budget bill would set in-state enrollment targets, asking UC and CSU to enroll 1,510 and 7,152 more California undergraduates, respectively, in 2025-26.
The current draft of the budget bill would also require CSU campuses that have experienced “sustained enrollment declines” to submit turnaround plans to the chancellor’s office by the end of 2025, outlining how they will increase enrollment and any cost-saving strategies they have planned. The chancellor’s office, in turn, will summarize those plans in a report for the Legislature by March 2026.
Finally, the Legislature’s proposal also includes a sweetener for the state’s financial aid budget by restoring funding for the Middle Class Scholarship program. It provides grant aid to more than 300,000 recipients and would receive $405 million in one-time funding in 2025-26 and $513 million ongoing.
TK-12 spending
A stipend for aspiring teachers is the single largest difference in spending between the governor and the Legislature’s version of the TK-12 budget for next year. California would go all-in on paying student teachers working on their credentials if the Legislature can persuade Newsom to build in the $600 million expense in the 2025-26 state budget. Newsom is proposing $100 million for what would be a new program.
To make room for this and other changes, the Legislature would cut a one-time Student Support and Discretionary Block Grant that Newsom is proposing, from $1.7 billion to $500 million.
Brianna Bruns, a representative with the California County Superintendents, expressed concern, noting that this is an important funding source for “core educational services” in light of the expiration of one-time pandemic-related federal funds.
Lawmakers are recommending two other significant changes that reflect their worry that state revenues may fall short of projections amid an uncertain economy.
It would put $650 million into the Prop. 98 rainy day fund that would otherwise be depleted, under the expectation that it will be needed next year. And in a proposal that districts and community colleges may welcome, they would substantially cut back on late payments from the state, called deferrals, under Newsom’s May budget revision.
The governor is proposing to push back $1.8 billion that the state normally would fund in June 2026 by a few weeks to July 2026, the first month of the new fiscal year; the Legislature would reduce the deferral to $846 million. As a debt that must be repaid to make districts fiscally sound, the Legislature would pay most of it back in 2026-27 and the rest in 2027-28.
Advocates for paying teachers at the daily rate of a substitute teacher while they are student teaching say it is critical to encourage more people to become teachers. During a one-year graduate program to earn a teaching credential, candidates are required to spend 600 hours in the classroom. Many candidates earn no income while accumulating between $20,000 and $40,000 in debt, based on the program they attend, according to an analysis of a bill proposing the stipends before the Legislature.
“California is facing a persistent teacher shortage that disproportionately affects our most vulnerable students,” said Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi, D-Torrance, the bill’s sponsor. “Many aspiring teachers struggle to complete their required student teaching hours due to financial hardship.”
The proposed $600 million in the budget would cover two years of stipends for all teachers seeking a credential, according to an analysis of the bill.
The Legislature would support Newsom’s $200 million to support reading instruction for K-2 teachers and $100 million for training teachers in literacy and math instruction, although that would be $400 million less than Newsom favors. The Legislature also rejected $42 million to establish a math professional learning partnership and a statewide math network.
Theresa Montaño, a professor in Chicano/a Studies at CSU Northridge and a member of the LAUSD-UTLA Ethnic Studies Committee, is a defendant in the lawsuit.
Credit: Luis Garcia / California State University, Northridge
A federal judge has thrown out a lawsuit against the United Teachers Los Angeles and the organization that created a controversial ethnic studies curriculum adopted by at least two dozen school districts in California.
U.S. District Judge Fernando Olguin’s scathing ruling on Nov. 30 criticized what he concluded was a lack of evidence and unpersuasive arguments made on behalf of the two Jewish teachers and parents in Concerned Jewish Parents and Teachers of Los Angeles, the group that brought the litigation.
The plaintiffs’ complaint “is difficult to understand and contains a morass of largely irrelevant — and sometimes contradictory — allegations, few of which state with any degree of clarity precisely what plaintiffs believe defendants have done or, more importantly, how plaintiffs have been harmed,” wrote Olguin of the Central District of federal court in California. His 49-page pretrial ruling dismissing the lawsuit “with prejudice” precludes the plaintiffs from refiling another similar lawsuit in federal court. The lawsuit was filed in 2022.
The lawsuit alleged that the Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum Consortium, the teachers union, its president Cecily Myart-Cruz, and two members of the LAUSD-UTLA Ethnic Studies Committee encouraged the adoption of instructional materials used in several LAUSD classrooms, that they also “covertly” trained teachers in the “liberated” ethnic studies curriculum, which condemns capitalism, white privilege, and Zionism, and characterizes Israel’s existence as “based on ethnic cleansing and land theft, apartheid and genocide,” according to Olguin’s summary of the lawsuit.
The lawsuit also alleged that teachers who identified as Jewish or Zionist were not welcome in classrooms where ethnic studies was taught and “personally experienced the official hostility” of UTLA to Israel and to the concept of Zionism.”
Denying they are antisemitic, educators affiliated with the consortium — mainly instructors and professors in ethnic studies departments at California State University and University of California — have made anti-Zionism and opposition to Israel a focus of their curriculum. They characterize Israel as a settler, colonialist nation, similar to European nations’ oppressive occupations of Africa and Asia in the 19th and 2oth centuries.
The “liberated” approach to ethnic studies has drawn scrutiny since its leaders formed the consortium in protest after the State Board of Education rejected as ideological and one-sided a draft curriculum that some of them had authored. In passing Assembly Bill 101, creating a mandate requiring high school students to take ethnic studies to graduate, the Legislature, at the encouragement of the Legislative Jewish Caucus, specified that school districts should not use unadopted portions of earlier drafts of the model curriculum.
Advocates of liberated ethnic studies charged the clause and other “guardrails” in the law were intended to squelch their free speech. The largely unfunded graduation mandate is set to take effect in 2029-30.
In an online celebration Monday, Theresa Montaño, a defendant in the lawsuit who is also a member of the LAUSD-UTLA Ethnic Studies Committee and secretary of the consortium, said, “The end of this two-and-a-half year lawsuit means vindication, affirmation, and victory.”
“This is a win for liberatory critical ethnic studies and academic freedom. It’s a testament to the power of solidarity and liberation, whether that be in South Los Angeles or in Gaza,” said Montaño, a professor of Chicano/a Studies at CSU Northridge. “And so it’s a signal to us that we will not stop, that we will persist until authentic ethnic studies is guaranteed to every student in this state.”
The attorney representing the defendants, Mark Kleiman, told teachers on the press call, “The moral of this story for people in the other school districts is, you don’t have to be afraid of these kinds of attacks. Given half a chance in a fair courtroom, you will be vindicated.”
Meanwhile, the legal director for the Deborah Project — the law firm that filed the lawsuit — said, “We absolutely will be appealing the decision and are confident that the decision will be reversed on appeal.” The appeal must be filed by Dec. 30.
The ruling, said Lori Lowenthal Marcus, “is deeply flawed, as it ignores crucial allegations in plaintiffs’ complaint, fails to address arguments plaintiffs made in their briefs, and even ignores binding precedent from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.”
“We are in the midst of soaring antisemitism in education throughout the U.S., and this is no time for anyone — much less a federal court — to allow publicly funded public schools to be used to indoctrinate children to hate the Jewish commitment to Israel,” she said. “Contrary to the ruling, that’s not ‘education’ about a ‘controversial’ issue. It’s prejudice, pure and simple.”
Uncertain implications
It’s unclear what impact, if any, the ruling might have on other litigation in California involving ethnic studies and allegations of antisemitism and indoctrination which include a potentially stronger lawsuit that the Deborah Project filed last month against the Sequoia Union High School District in Menlo Park, its superintendent, and administrators at two high schools. The plaintiffs in this case are the parents of Jewish students who claim that the district ignored parents’ repeated complaints of antisemitic taunts and bullying by students and biased lessons on the Israeli-Gaza conflict, taught by two history teachers.
On Friday, an Orange County Superior Court judge will consider a motion to invalidate four ethnic studies courses in Santa Ana Unified. In their lawsuit, the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law claims that district staff wrote the courses, with the participation of school board members, in violation of the California open meetings law. They did so in order to hide the content from Jewish community members who had repeatedly offered to participate in the process and offer their perspectives. Documents reveal that staff members referred to the Jewish Federation of Orange County as “racist Zionists” and made other bigoted remarks about Jews.
The lawsuit against UTLA and the consortium did not include LAUSD as a direct defendant, which may have weakened the case because the district has not adopted the Liberated Ethnic Studies curriculum, and there is no indication if and when it would. That made the plaintiffs’ concerns speculative and, therefore, their proposed remedies invalid, Olguin wrote, noting that the participation of Montaño and Guadalupe Carrasco Cardona, an LAUSD teacher and a member of the consortium’s leadership team, in an advisory committee is not evidence of the district’s endorsement of the curriculum.
Olguin further ruled that the plaintiffs could not substantiate that teachers and other plaintiffs had yet faced any actual harm, nor did they demonstrate that the eventual adoption of the curriculum would violate civil rights. The judge continued that although plaintiffs claimed the curriculum was “infected from top to bottom with racism,” they didn’t show any evidence to support their assertion.
“It is far from clear that learning about Israel and Palestine or encountering teaching materials with which one disagrees constitutes an injury,” Olguin wrote.
The plaintiffs had asked Olguin to issue injunctions prohibiting LAUSD from including language critical of Israel or Zionism in teaching materials; preventing the district from paying teachers who used the liberated curriculum; and prohibiting the district from using materials from liberated curriculum in classrooms and teacher training paid for by public funds.
Olguin ruled that the plaintiffs had not substantiated claims that their First Amendment guarantee of religious freedom and their right to equal protection under the U.S. and California constitutions were impeded. However, their request for an injunction would have raised an unconstitutional prior restraint on the defendants’ First Amendment speech rights, he concluded.
While a district can “reasonably” curtail teachers’ speech rights in a classroom, “those limitations are fundamentally different from speech restrictions imposed by a court at the behest of a group of private citizens,” he wrote.
In language certain to alarm Jewish organizations worried that antisemitic and anti-Israel bias is gaining a foothold in California schools, Olguin wrote, “It would be of great concern for the educational project and for academic freedom if every offended party could sue every time they did not like a curriculum or the way it was taught.”
Of course, the racist, homophobic, xenophobic Trump administration threatened to cut off Harvard’s federal research grants if they didn’t do more to combat anti-Semitism, a phony issue. Trump demanded an apology from Harvard for “egregious anti-Semitism.” Garber, the President of Harvard, is Jewish.
The administration also demanded that Harvard abolish all programs to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion. But then it demanded that Harvard hire new professors to guarantee “diversity” of viewpoint. Is Trump for or against diversity?
Garber wrote:
For three-quarters of a century, the federal government has awarded grants and contracts to Harvard and other universities to help pay for work that, along with investments by the universities themselves, has led to groundbreaking innovations across a wide range of medical, engineering, and scientific fields. These innovations have made countless people in our country and throughout the world healthier and safer. In recent weeks, the federal government has threatened its partnerships with several universities, including Harvard, over accusations of antisemitism on our campuses. These partnerships are among the most productive and beneficial in American history. New frontiers beckon us with the prospect of life-changing advances—from treatments for diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and diabetes, to breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, quantum science and engineering, and numerous other areas of possibility. For the government to retreat from these partnerships now risks not only the health and well-being of millions of individuals but also the economic security and vitality of our nation.
Certainly, Garber wrote, Harvard would fight anti-Semitism, but it would not sacrifice its independence.
The administration’s prescription goes beyond the power of the federal government. It violates Harvard’s First Amendment rights and exceeds the statutory limits of the government’s authority under Title VI. And it threatens our values as a private institution devoted to the pursuit, production, and dissemination of knowledge. No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue.
Garner made clear that Harvard would not allow the government to control teaching and learning at Harvard.
Yesterday, Trump threatened to strip Harvard’s tax-exempt status. Doing so is literally illegal but law never gets in Trump’s way.
This is tyranny and a blatant attack on academic freedom.
The ignorant, self-centered Trump wants to wipe out academic freedom from any institution that does not kneel to his wishes.
Be it noted that Elise Stefanik, a graduate of Harvard, cheered on Trump’s attack on her alma mater. She wrote on Twitter: “Harvard University has rightfully earned its place as the epitome of the moral and academic rot in higher education,” she posted on X, and said that Harvard should lose its tax exemption. She obviously was not brainwashed at Harvard. She should return her diploma.
Happily, Harvard has the resources to fight Trump. He picked on the wrong target.
Wisconsin Public Radio reported that State Superintendent Jill Underly has announced that the state will not comply with a letter from U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon in which she directed states to agree with the Trump administration about stamping out diversity, equity, and inclusion. Trump wants to eliminate DEI, which would involve reversing compliance with existing civil rights law. In addition, although McMahon may not know it, she is violating federal law by attempting to influence curriculum and instruction in the schools.
Thank you, Superintendent Underly!
WPR reported:
Wisconsin school districts won’t comply with a directive from the Trump administration to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs until districts have more information.
On Wednesday, state Superintendent Jill Underly asked the U.S. Department of Education for clarification on both the intent and legality of an April 3 directive that schools sign a letter acknowledging they’re following the government’s interpretation of civil rights laws.
This school year, Wisconsin received about $216 million in Title I funds. About $82 million of that money went to Milwaukee Public Schools.
Underly said the request from the Department of Education potentially violates required procedural steps, is unnecessarily redundant and appears designed to intimidate school districts by threatening to withhold critical education funding.
“We cannot stand by while the current administration threatens our schools with unnecessary and potentially unlawful mandates based on political beliefs,” Underly said in a statement. “Our responsibility is to ensure Wisconsin students receive the best education possible, and that means allowing schools to make local decisions based on what is best for their kids and their communities.”
On Feb. 14, the U.S. Department of Education sent a “Dear Colleague” letter giving educational institutions 14 days to eliminate diversity initiatives or risk losing federal funding.
At that time, the state DPI issued guidance to school districts encouraging a “measured and thoughtful approach, rather than immediate or reactionary responses to the federal government’s concerns.”
Secretary of Education Linda McMahon has not clearly defined what the administration considers a violation of civil rights law. The February letter said institutions must “cease using race preferences and stereotypes as a factor in their admissions, hiring, promotion, scholarship.”
In a related document addressing frequently asked questions about how the administration would interpret Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the agency said: “Many schools have advanced discriminatory policies and practices under the banner of ‘DEI’ initiatives.”
The document went on to say that schools could engage in historical observances like Black History Month, “so long as they do not engage in racial exclusion or discrimination.”
