Latest U.S. Department of Education News

A push for school choice fell short in Trump's first term. He may now have a more willing Congress

Nov. 09, 2024 00:32 AM EST

WASHINGTON (AP) — The election of Donald Trump returns an ally of school choice to the White House, this time with a Republican-controlled Senate — and potentially House — that could be more supportive of proposals that fizzled during his first term. Although proposals to...

Trump's win brings uncertainty to borrowers hoping for student loan forgiveness

Nov. 08, 2024 23:43 PM EST

Savannah Britt owes about $27,000 on loans she took out to attend college at Rutgers University, a debt she was hoping to see reduced by President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness efforts. Her payments are currently on hold while courts untangle challenges to the loan...

AP Race Call: Republican Marlin Stutzman wins election to U.S. House in Indiana's 3rd Congressional District

Nov. 05, 2024 20:08 PM EST

Republican Marlin Stutzman won election to a U.S. House seat representing Indiana on Tuesday. Stutzman, who previously held the seat from 2010 to 2017, reclaimed it with a win over educator and nonprofit executive Kiley Adolph, a Democrat. Stutzman succeeds Rep. Jim Banks, who was the GOP nominee for U.S. Senate...

Trump's protests aside, his agenda has plenty of overlap with Project 2025

Oct. 14, 2024 00:21 AM EDT

ATLANTA (AP) — Donald Trump insists that Project 2025, a nearly 1,000-page blueprint for a hard-right turn in American government and society, does not reflect his priorities for a White House encore. “I haven’t read it. I don’t want to read it — purposefully,” the...

National grantmakers bet this rural education program can scale

Oct. 07, 2024 15:15 PM EDT

In 2010, Dreama Gentry met Geoffrey Canada, founder of Harlem Children’s Zone, a much-lauded nonprofit that supports youth from birth through college in a roughly 100-block area of central Harlem. The program was an inspiration for Gentry, who had launched a college-access program in rural...

NYC teacher grazed by bullet fired through school window

Sep. 04, 2024 17:00 PM EDT

NEW YORK (AP) — A New York City teacher was struck in the hand by a stray bullet Wednesday as he set up his classroom for the start of school, police said. The 33-year-old teacher was inside his sixth-floor classroom at a middle school in the Bronx just before noon when a bullet...

School choice and a history of segregation collide as one Florida county shutters its rural schools

Aug. 22, 2024 00:10 AM EDT

MADISON, Fla. (AP) — Tens of thousands of students have left Florida’s public schools in recent years amid an explosive expansion in school choice. Now, districts large and small are grappling with the harsh financial realities of empty seats in aging classrooms. As some...

Education official announces last-ditch spending strategy for federal COVID-19 funds

Aug. 21, 2024 17:15 PM EDT

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — With roughly $1.5 million in pandemic-era education funding set to expire next month, Superintendent of Public Instruction Elsie Arntzen announced a plan Tuesday to route those federal dollars directly to classrooms across Montana. The spending strategy,...