Members of the Washington Teachers’ Union spent about 30 minutes on Tuesday morning handing out fliers to inform families what changes to the Education Department could mean for their students.
Jacqueline Pogue-Lyons, the union’s president, said Tuesday marked a “national day of action” for WTU and the American Federation of Teachers “because we’re also upset about the fact that President Trump is trying to close the U.S. Department of Education.”
Educators handed out fliers, titled “Trump’s Education Cuts Will Impact You.”
In D.C., according to the fact sheet, funding from the federal education agency helps over 98,000 students, invests in college programs, supports students’ mental health and helps to address teacher shortages.
Pogue-Lyons attended Tuesday’s rally outside the Office of Personnel Management, which protested Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency’s changes to the federal workforce.
President Donald Trump vowed to close the Department of Education during his campaign, and in a memo this week, newly appointed Education Secretary Linda McMahon promised to return power back to states and cut out bureaucratic red tape.
School leaders across the D.C. region have been warning about the impact of cuts to the department, including what it could mean for school meal programs and special education.
“It will be felt in every local school, in every community,” Pogue-Lyons said. “Because we want to make sure our students with special needs, our kids who are on Medicaid, it even affects Title IX. These are all things that come under the U.S. Department of Education.”
The Education Department, she said, “ensures that our children with special needs get the support that they need. They ensure that our students who are ELL students get the support that they need in classrooms, also our career and technical education programs.”
Changes to the way grants are distributed, Pogue-Lyons said, could also create challenges, because it may mean “in our individual states, in our individual districts, that we’ll be able to meet the needs of our kids.”
The AFT flier said over $219 million in funding that supports students will be cut, as will over $47 million helping school employees.
Broadly, Pogue-Lyons said federal workers are “the ones who keep the national parks open, support our veterans, make sure our parents and our aunts and uncles receive their Social Security checks, that they get Medicaid. And we’re just sad that they’re being attacked for the hard work that they do every day for the American people.”