WASHINGTON — Republican and Democratic members of a House education panel agreed Wednesday that K-12 schools need a stronger focus on improving academic outcomes for students — but they had vastly different views on the direction the nation’s schools should take.
The nearly three-hour hearing, which is the first held by the Education and Workforce Committee in the 119th Congress, covered topics such as school choice, workforce preparation and student loans. But lawmakers and witnesses also addressed what they said was the “elephant in the room”: a push by the Trump administration to close the U.S. Department of Education.
“The irony is not lost on me that we are here to discuss the ‘state of American education’ while the current administration is actively discussing how to dismantle the main federal agency responsible for ensuring safe, quality education for all students,” said Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., ranking member of the committee.
President Donald Trump is expected to issue an executive order to drastically reduce the Education Department’s functions, although specific details have not been publicly released. There’s also not a clear timeline yet for when an executive order will be issued.
However, a succession of executive orders restricting Education Department activities, a temporary pause on federal funding, and efforts to reduce staffing levels are sparking concerns from public school advocates, as well as praise from supporters of reduced federal influence in education.
Some GOP lawmakers said increased funding for the Education Department in recent years has not resulted in better student performance. Recent results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress shows average reading scores dropped 5 points for both 4th and 8th graders from 2019 to 2024. Math test scores also had disappointing drops.
Rep. Robert Onder, R-Mo., said that a “cruel irony” is that over the past decade the country has “spent more and more on education, public education, and gotten worse and worse outcomes.”
Low student performance is one reason more families are seeking alternatives to traditional public schools, said Republican lawmakers. Black families are “lining up” to enroll their children in alternative schools, including private school choice options, because of poor performance of the traditional public school, said Rep. Burgess Owens, R-Utah.
But Democratic lawmakers pushed back, saying a disinvestment in traditional public schools will harm many students, including those with disabilities and those who live in rural areas.
Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa., said current efforts to expand private school choice and curtail civil rights protections are the same actions used to resist school desegregation decades ago.
A panel witness, Janai Nelson, president and director-counsel for NAACP Legal Defense Fund, agreed.
“To the extent that these conservative policies attack diversity, equity and inclusion — basic principles of fairness — those are America last policies,” Nelson said. “Those are not policies that will advance our students to become competitive in an increasingly global marketplace and in an increasingly global economy. We should be leveraging diversity as our greatest strength.”
Lawmakers agreed that preparing K-12 and college students for success in the workforce is critical. In the last Congress, there were bipartisan efforts to reauthorize the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act, a federal law to help employers hire skilled workers and workers find employment.
Panel witness Johnny Taylor, Jr., president and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management, said WIOA reauthorization would create a “generational opportunity” to find solutions to workforce gaps. “Employers are hurting, and it therefore affects American competitiveness,” Taylor said.
Some lawmakers and witnesses said college student loan debt, particularly from predatory loans, is having negative effects on the workforce. Some emphasized the need to expand career and technical education in high schools, develop more affordable college options, and generate greater acceptance of alternate career pathways other than a 4-year degree.
“The best talent doesn’t necessarily — and I want to be clear, because we are not anti-college and university degree attainment — the best talent shows up in different ways with skilled credentials. Ultimately, what we want are people who can do the work,” Taylor said.
“We have to get back to finding out do you have the skills to do the job, not necessarily the paper that says you have the skills to do the job,” Taylor said.
Committee Chair Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Mich., closed the meeting by saying there is agreement among members of both parties that a strong workforce requires “good educational institutions.”
“I don’t oppose public education. I don’t want to decimate public education,” Walberg said. “But I think we also ought to agree that we have problems, and those problems are opportunities.”
