President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday afternoon that aims to eliminate as much of the Department of Education as he can.
The move comes after a decades-long expansion in unilateral federal influence over education without accompanying improvement in student educational outcomes.
“The Department of Education has not improved student achievement. It hasn’t made schools more efficient, and it hasn’t made Washington more successful,” Jonathan Butcher, a senior research fellow in education policy at the Center for Education Policy with The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal.
According to Heritage Foundation policy experts, “The current gap in learning between students from the highest 10% and lowest 10% of the income distribution is roughly four years of learning—the same as it was [in the 1960s] when [President Lyndon] Johnson…
