Dear Friend,
The first observance of American Education Week was back in 1921. This past week may well have been the last. Meant to boost public support for schools and recognize the countless professionals who help students succeed, this year’s celebration took a turn…
About those professionals? Well, MAGA’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” placed caps on student borrowing—up to $100,000 for graduate students and $200,000 for professional programs. Instead of investing in the professionalization of education as more successful nations have, the U.S Department of Education announced it will be divesting by redefining which post-baccalaureate degrees qualify as “professional.”
Among the soon-to-be “unprofessional” fields: Education, nursing, counseling, social work, occupational and physical therapy, public health and health administration, audiology, speech-language pathology, arts, and more. The reclassification, effective next July, will impact an inestimable number of current and future students by restricting their access to federal loans and loan forgiveness programs.
Almost all of these professions are already in critically short supply across the country. If prospective students are denied the aid necessary to pursue advanced training, they won’t. And so it follows they won’t become the qualified professionals our school and health care systems desperately need—especially in rural communities and underserved urban areas.
It probably did not escape your notice that most of these fields are dominated by women. But I neglected to mention: Theology does still qualify for $200,000. So, never fear: Our schools may be emptied of mental health professionals, but at least we’ll have chaplains! (If you’d like to learn how deprofessionalization relates to Christian Nationalism, check out this piece.)
Meanwhile, the White House’s approach to honoring American educators was to suggest they be replaced by artificial intelligence and to lambast public schools as “laboratories for deranged social experiments, socialist political agendas, and divisive ideologies.” The president promised to root out “hollow dogmas” and restore “truth, merit, and patriotism.”
Because nothing says “in with the truth, out with the dogma” like a Ten Commandments poster on the classroom wall.
The biggest twist this American Education Week, though, came Wednesday in the form of an ominous message from the Department of Education’s official social media accounts: “The clock is ticking…” (And, no, it wasn’t striking thirteen.)
The department was counting down to its own dismantling. Later that day, the White House declared: “DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION: ABOLISHED.” President Trump, they said, shut it down. Time of death: 5:18 PM.
To be clear, the executive branch does not have the authority to eliminate the department. Only Congress does. Still, this administration is doing all it can to irreparably hobble it (just like Project 2025 told them to). Their big announcement this week was that major departmental functions will be outsourced to other, non-education federal offices, including the Departments of Labor, Interior, State, and Health & Human Services.
Which is a little confusing given Education Secretary Linda McMahon’s insistence that this overhaul is all about “returning education to the States” and eliminating the “federal education bureaucracy.”
Try as they will, disinformation and doublespeak will never replace this truth: Millions of Americans understand public education is a public good, and we respect and appreciate all the professionals who keep our community schools ticking despite mounting challenges.
Countless teachers, paraeducators, counselors, librarians, and nurses are refusing to give up on students. They’re demonstrating every day that expertise and empathy still matter, especially now. I refuse to give up on them, and I hope you will, too.
Together—with our dollars, our votes, and our voices—we get to decide what endures. And this sad, surreal American Education Week doesn’t have to end in a funeral… not if enough of us keep fighting.
Melina Cohen
Director of Strategic Communications & Policy Engagement
American Atheists is a 501(c)(3) non-partisan, nonprofit educational organization that relies on the support of members like you. Contributions are tax-deductible. Our Federal Tax ID Number is 74-2466507 and our Combined Federal Campaign number is 52217.
American Atheists
225 Cristiani Street
Cranford, NJ 07016
United States