DoEd’s six new agency partnerships will give parents freedom, break up bureaucracy

By Tate Miller
The Center Square

An education organization is applauding the U.S. Department of Education’s six new agency partnerships announced this week, stating that parents will have more control over their children’s schooling and that such parental freedom is necessary to break up bureaucracy.

Director of strategic initiatives at Defending Education Paul Runko told The Center Square that with the department’s announcement, “parents will have more control because these partnerships cut out unnecessary bureaucracy.”

Defending Education is a group dedicated to keeping indoctrination out of the classroom and off campus in order to reestablish “quality, non-political” education.

Runko said that “with fewer agencies involved and less red tape, schools and families can make decisions more quickly and directly.”

“For example, tribal communities will now deal with fewer federal offices, which makes it easier for parents and teachers to influence how education dollars are spent and what programs their children receive,” Runko said.

Runko told The Center Square that “it’s important to note for parents that the funds of these programs are not changing.”

“This is a new and better way to deliver funds and programs to parents and teachers,” Runko said.

According to a Department of Education (ED) press release, the six interagency agreements (IAAs) are with four agencies: the Departments of Labor (DOL), Interior (DOI), Health and Human Services (HHS), and State.

The IAAs are intended to “break up the federal education bureaucracy, ensure efficient delivery of funded programs, activities, and move closer to fulfilling the President’s promise to return education to the states,” the release said.

“By partnering with agencies that are best positioned to deliver results for students and taxpayers, these IAAs will streamline federal education activities on the legally required programs, reduce administrative burdens, and refocus programs and activities to better serve students and grantees,” the release said.

ED and DOL together are establishing the Elementary and Secondary Education Partnership and the Postsecondary Education Partnership.

Meanwhile, DOI and ED are establishing the Indian Education Partnership.

ED and HHS are establishing the Foreign Medical Accreditation Partnership and the Child Care Access Means Parents in School Partnership.

Lastly, ED and State are establishing the International Education and Foreign Language Studies Partnership.

Runko told The Center Square that “to fully break apart the bureaucracy in education, we need to keep giving parents and teachers more freedom to make decisions that fit their students, not more rules from DC that are obviously not working to advance academic achievement.”

“One important change that needs to happen is expansion of waivers that states can request from burdensome federal regulations,” Runko said.

“It is much easier for parents to advocate for custom approaches in education at the local level,” Runko said.

“The more flexibility districts and schools have, the more they can respond directly to parents, teachers, and students rather than navigating layers of federal red tape,” Runko said.

President of the American Principles Project Terry Schilling told The Center Square: “No country spends more on education than America, but under our centralized bureaucracy we have seen the focus of our schools shift from teaching children to indoctrinating them.”

“Secretary [Linda] McMahon’s plan to decentralize education will not only improve the well-being of children, but empower parents,” Schilling said.

“Linda McMahon recognizes that children are struggling more than ever, and that education bureaucrats are more concerned about their own careers than they are students,” Schilling said.

“Secretary McMahon may be the most consequential figure in American education in history,” Schilling said.

When reached, the Department of Education referred The Center Square to its press release on the partnerships.

The department also referred The Center Square to several statements from “folks on the hill,” including Congressman Burgess Owens, who posted on X: “This is how we return education to the states and put America’s students first.”

Sen. Mike Rounds likewise posted on X that he is “pleased to see Secretary McMahon and President Trump moving forward with a plan to dismantle the Department of Education.”