When the U.S. Secretary of Education claims that a 43-day government shutdown “proved just how little the Department of Education will be missed,” educators, school psychologists, families, and mental health advocates have an obligation to set the record straight. Not with partisan talking points but with facts, context, and the lived realities of our students.

The Department of Education is not a convenience bureaucracy. It is a civil rights agency, a protector of vulnerable students, a bulwark for families with disabilities, and a lifeline for under-resourced districts.

When the secretary argues that states can simply “take it from here,” she leaves out the people most harmed when states are left to their own devices: students with disabilities, multilingual learners, rural families, low-income communities, and anyone who depends on consistent federal protection when political winds shift.

This is not a hypothetical. It is history.

1. Schools did not “keep running smoothly.” They absorbed the shock—again.

It is true that children continued to attend school during the shutdown. However, to claim that this evidence suggests the Department of Education is unnecessary misunderstands how schools actually operate.

Public schools are mission-driven institutions: they show up no matter what. During COVID, teachers taught through trauma. During funding freezes, they paid for supplies out of their own pockets. During the shutdown, districts continued daily operations even as uncertainty rippled across federal grant timelines, technical assistance centers, FAFSA support, and research funding pipelines.

The system “not collapsing” is not proof of resilience. It is proof of overburdened, exhausted systems absorbing yet another disruption.

If firefighters continue to show up during budget cuts, the solution is not to eliminate the fire department.

2. The argument that the federal government is just a “pass-through” ignores the entire history of civil rights in schools.

Federal oversight in education exists because states repeatedly and predictably failed to protect students’ rights:

• It took federal action to desegregate schools.
• It took federal law to ensure students with disabilities can attend school (IDEA).
• It took federal protections to ensure girls and women could access athletics and education (Title IX).
• It takes federal monitoring to prevent students of color from being disproportionately disciplined.
• It takes federal intervention to support homeless students, migrant students, and English learners.

These protections cannot be left to voluntary compliance or the discretion of politicians. Children’s civil rights are not optional.

Claiming that “critical functions will continue” without the Department of Education is like suggesting that we can protect voting rights without the Department of Justice.

3. “Returning education to the states” is not decentralization—it is deregulation without guardrails.

States do not have equivalent capacity, resources, or political stability. A student’s access to reading specialists, school psychologists, AP classes, or mental health supports should not depend on their ZIP code.

Here’s what “leave it to the states” means in practice:

• Funding gaps between wealthy and low-wealth districts grow wider.
• Special education services become even more uneven.
• Rural students lose access to federal programs that subsidize transportation, technology, and broadband.
• State-level political controversies spill into curriculum decisions, often targeting marginalized students.
• Students who need the most support get the least—because inequity compounds when oversight evaporates.

Federal involvement is not micromanagement. It is guardrails, minimum standards, and a promise that no child gets written off.

4. Student mental health is a national crisis—one that states cannot manage alone.

Right now:

• 1 in 5 children experiences a mental health disorder.
• School psychologists are stretched at ratios of 1:1,200 or worse in many states (the recommended ratio is 1:500).
• Rural districts often share a single mental health professional across multiple schools.
• States rely on federal funding streams—Project AWARE, ESSA Title IV, School-Based Mental Health Grants—to hire counselors, expand SEL programs, and reduce suicide risk.

Eliminating or weakening the federal agency that coordinates these supports is not an efficient approach.
It is abandonment.

The shutdown already stalled technical assistance centers that help schools respond to trauma, review crisis plans, and support students experiencing anxiety, depression, or family instability.

If your stated goal is to help students thrive, removing their mental health infrastructure is not how you do it.

5. The Department of Education is not the cause of student struggles in reading, math, or affordability.

Secretary McMahon’s argument suggests that national test scores and student debt are evidence of federal failure. But the challenges she lists are:

• Rooted in state-level funding disparities
• Driven by poverty and community-level inequities
• Exacerbated by shortages of teachers, counselors, and psychologists
• Worsened by inconsistent state policies on curriculum and assessment

In other words, these challenges require more coordination, consistency, and federal guardrails, not fewer.

You do not solve reading gaps by dismantling the agency that enforces IDEA.
You do not solve college costs by eliminating the office that protects borrowers.
You do not fix workforce pipelines by weakening oversight of for-profit colleges.

6. What the shutdown actually proved: Without federal oversight, the most vulnerable students are at risk.

During the shutdown:

• FAFSA processing stalled—jeopardizing college plans for first-generation students.
• Guidance for schools on disability rights, bullying prevention, and discrimination was delayed.
• Federal research centers that study literacy, school climate, and mental health were frozen.
• Rural districts lost access to technical help for recruiting special educators.
• Homeless student programs lacked clarity on fund disbursement.

Students didn’t “stop going to school.” But the supports that ensure education is equitable were jeopardized. These are the heart of what public education is supposed to guarantee.

7. A final point: The shutdown was not a natural experiment. It was a manufactured crisis.

The secretary uses a disruption caused by political brinkmanship as evidence that we don’t need the agency her department leads.
This logic is equivalent to:

• Cutting water to a hospital, then declaring it unnecessary because nurses continued to care for patients.
• Unplugging a traffic system, then claiming roads don’t need coordination because people still drive.

Education needs stable, consistent, evidence-based, and equity-focused leadership. Our children deserve no less.

We cannot confuse short-term survival with long-term success.

Schools functioned through the shutdown not because the federal Department of Education is irrelevant, but because educators are committed beyond measure.

To dismantle the department is to dismantle:

• National civil rights protections
• Special education guarantees
• Student mental health investments
• Research and innovation
• Federal safeguards against discrimination
• Equitable funding for low-income and rural schools

State autonomy matters. Local control matters. But equity, civil rights, and student well-being require a strong federal partner.

The shutdown didn’t reveal how unnecessary the Department of Education is. It revealed how essential it has always been.