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Written by Jennifer Rainville, Education Policy Attorney at SC Appleseed Legal Justice Center
One of the major goals outlined by the upcoming presidential administration is the elimination of the U.S. Department of Education. Over the next few months, we will be releasing a series of blogs that will look at several key initiatives and programs that the U.S. Department of Education is responsible for and how these proposed changes may impact our students in South Carolina. Some of these programs you may or may not be familiar with. It is our intent to explain as clearly as possible what these programs do so that you can better understand how these programs impact children in South Carolina’s schools.
A History of the U.S. Department of Education
The U.S. Department of Education as we know it was created in 1979 and opened in 1980. The federal government began expanding funding on education in the 1960s in response to the cold war, Sputnik, and Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty. The initial intent was to expand education for low-income students. In the 1970s there was a concerted effort to help racial minorities, women, people with disabilities, and non-English speaking students gain access to equal education.
As part of this effort, Congress passed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) in 1965. The ESEA dramatically increased federal funding for education and has been reauthorized every five years since its passage. The ESEA is 1,061 pages long and is a complicated federal law. In this month’s blog we are going to focus on ESEA’s Title I program.
Title I was created to aid disadvantaged children and address the problems often found in poorer urban and rural areas. Title I funds have “strings” attached to them. This means that states must comply with certain rules to be able to receives the funds. For example, in the 1960s, districts had to comply with the Civil Rights Act by desegregating their schools to receive Title I funds. In more recent years, states were required to adopt test-based accountability systems under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), during the reauthorization of ESEA in 2001. In 2015, NCLB was replaced by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). This law allowed more flexibility for the states than NCLB, but still requires academic progress monitoring and requires states to produce and publish state report cards to keep parents informed. You can see the South Carolina State Report Cards here: https://screportcards.com
The Current State of Title I Going into 2025
There has been a lot of speculation about what plans the new presidential administration has for the U.S. Department of Education going forward. The incoming president has been vocal about closing the U.S. Department of Education. That would not mean that these programs would evaporate, but it would change how these programs are implemented and who oversees that implementation. One proposal would remove the rules that states have to comply with to receive Title I funds. This means that states would receive the funding but could spend the money in any way that they want and not be accountable to anyone on how those funds are spent. This would have some significant consequences in South Carolina immediately.
South Carolina has always struggled with school funding that ensures students get the education that they are entitled to as outlined by our state Constitution and in state law. Without any accountability or rules tied to federal funding we may not have the data to show if the funds are being appropriately spent in ways that are helping students that these funds are designed to help. This could lead to dangerous misuse of funds. When it comes to investments worth millions of dollars, reliable data that showcases that the funding is being spent in the best interest of students is as important as accountability.
Additionally, there are calls that Title I funds to the states should be reduced to a smaller dollar amount each year until it is extinguished within the next 10 years, which would impact South Carolina in some catastrophic ways. Elimination of Title I funds would result in increased classroom sizes, less qualified teachers, reduction in programs that help students struggling with homelessness, reduction in parental involvement programs, and likely a reduction in the amount of instruction that students receive during the school day.
According to SC’s most recent school report card (2023) our pupils in poverty index number is 61.6. Every single public school district in South Carolina receives Title I funding. Statewide SC receives a little over 266 Million in Title I funds.
Here is a list of the Title I schools in our state.
What Losing Title 1 Would Mean for South Carolina Students
The data shows us very clearly that students in areas with high poverty typically do not perform as well academically as their peers. There are countless reasons behind this problem. Students who are hungry or worried about where their next meal is coming from are not going to learn the same as a peer with a full belly. Students who are worried about where they are going to sleep, or if they will have basic utilities like heat/AC, water, and even electricity are not going to be as ready to learn as their peers. Students who do not have access to high quality preschool programs are going to be behind their peers that attended those programs. These are just a few of the many issues we see with students in poverty without even factoring in students with disabilities that are slipping through the cracks. Losing or reducing Title I funds would be devastating to our students and would widen the educational divide between students and districts with economic advantages.
There are a lot of ways that school districts can use Title I funds and the specific programs that each school district offers is different. For example, districts can use the funds for additional teacher training and staff development programs to help address the needs of students. Schools can develop specific programs targeted at increasing literacy or math skills. Title I funds are also used to address the additional needs of students who are experiencing homelessness or unstable housing. Title I funds are also used to increase family engagement in the schools. When schools build positive relationships with parents and families, this strengthens the school community and academic achievement increases.
When implemented well, Title I programs have been shown that they can and do work in helping address students’ needs. We have schools across the state that have developed amazing programs for students and students in poverty are performing on par with their peers who are not in poverty. We still have a long way to go, but this funding is a critical piece of the puzzle.
A quality public education for students is one of the foundational building blocks to breaking the cycle of poverty in our communities. Schools need the resources, tools, and well-trained staff to meet the high needs of students living in low-income households. Students need schools that can meet their needs, foster a sense of belonging for them and their families, and show students that by getting a good education you can succeed. Students who are well-educated will be in higher demand in the workforce and will attract better employers to our state, which benefits all citizens. Education is the key to prosperity in South Carolina.
If we strip away the resources and funding that are already in place, our most vulnerable students will fall even further behind and that is something that we simply cannot allow. We must push education forward and make education our priority if we want our children to meet their full potential.
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