“Honestly, if it wasn’t for the publicly available resources that the Ministry of Education had provided students with disabilities like me, I probably wouldn’t go to college,” says Giazdski, who is now a graduate of the college and a defender of disability rights.
“And I would definitely not wait for the legal school to start this fall if it wasn’t for these resources.”
But the role of the US Department of Education in the support of students with disabilities may change soon.
President Trump said his administration was will move The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) ‘Special Needs “(HHS), an agency that recently announced their own drastic cutsS His administration has not indicated exactly which programs will be moved and whether the idea is among them, but the conservative policy book Project 2025 Offers to move an idea to HHS.
The spokesman of the Ministry of Education, Madi Biederman, said: “The department is actively examining where (the educational department) programs can be managed responsibly to serve the best students and families.
Experts tell NPR every move to be incredibly complicated. Special education laws are “intertwined” in the education department, says Katie Nees, a former deputy assistant secretary at the Special Educational and Rehabilitation Services Office of the department.
“To split from a broader institution of education, I just be fooled,” says Nees, who now runs ARC, an advocacy organization for people with disabilities. Neas says the relocation of some of the legally protected programs to another agency will also require an act of Congress.
But some conservatives wonder if the federal government was even so useful when it comes to special education.
“I want to say that parents are making their (educational plans) with local teachers, right? With their school and their school area. They don’t do it with Washington,” says Jonathan Backer, an education researcher at the Inheritance Foundation that helped to form a 2025 project.
With so many issues that revolve around the future of federal participation in special education, here’s a look at how the Ministry of Education has traditionally contributes to the education of students with disabilities.
Help of schools to follow federal laws aimed at disabled students
The Ministry of Education monitors many federal laws that regulate how students and disabled students try school.
But the idea is one of the main ways in which the federal government contributes to the education of students with disabilities. The law covers the right of every child to “free and appropriate public education” and says that students with disabilities are entitled to individual educational programs (IEPS) who present the services to which each child is entitled. The idea is also the vehicle through which the federal government sends money to schools to help pay these services.
“Not only does the Ministry of Education provide funding for staff and resources for individual school units, but I want to say that this is your accountability framework,” says Mark Burnett, Chief of Carroll County State Schools in Rural Southwestern Virginia. He says almost one fifth of his students are eligible for services under the idea.
Throughout the country, the idea serves about 7.5 million students or 15% of the K-12 student population. During the fiscal 2024, the Congress earned $ 15.4 billion for an idea. The education department is responsible for the distribution of this money to countries that then pass these funds to qualified school districts.
The means of the idea are used to pay teachers and staff of special education, technology to meet the individual needs of students, instructional materials, transport and more.
“A child who has hearing damage may need a translator in sign language or inscription to really follow what is happening in class,” says Neas. “These are the things that allow a disabled child to really learn the same material as their peers who are not damaging.”
The Ministry of Education is responsible for monitoring whether countries and school districts follow ideas and other laws aimed at students with disabilities. This includes section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, which says students are entitled to reasonable premises, such as planned vacations for a child with diabetes, to have breakfast or check insulin levels.
The department also provides guidance on the ideas of state leaders and collects data that helps to determine the eligibility for ideas of ideas.
Implementation of special education legislation and civil rights of students with disabilities
The civil rights service or OCR is the management of the education department. When students face discrimination at school, they can file a complaint to OCR, which can lead to a federal investigation.
This office is responsible for complaints of discrimination based on race, gender, national origin and other categories, but OCR data Displays discrimination with disabilities historical compositions the largest share of complaints.
Suelli Giazdovski wants to take advantage of OCR during her studies.
“The official complaint process would allow me to be a child,” she says.
This would allow her to be responsible for the implementation “in the tours of lawyers and investigators who are paid to do so in the civil rights service.”
In recent years, the number of OCR’s complaints has reached record maxima and Many have dragged through the system For months. But recently OCR’s ability to deal with all these cases was further strained: when US Secretary of Education Linda McMahon reduced the education department’s workforce almost half, OCR also lost more than 40% of their staffTogether with seven of its 12 regional offices.
The Trump administration has promised to keep “resources for children with special disabilities”. But the mass cuts also affected the service for special educational and rehabilitation services where Neas worked. Teams conducting special education research helps to determine the admissibility of ideas of ideas and those that provide legal guidance to state and local leaders were also influenced.
“If you do not have any kind of standards of accountability or someone to report, it leaves room for people to take advantage of the programs and not to provide the services they need to provide,” says Burnet, the chief.
Michael Gilberg, a special education lawyer in New York and Connecticut, who also has autism, says one of his clients with disabilities has recently filed a complaint to OCR.
“Without not functioning, the Ministry of Education in this area puts (their case) in stagnation,” he says.
Gilberg notes that without OCR, “the only resort to the family would have to be theory to judge the school district or in the federal court or of the state court … and it takes a lot of time and a lot of money.”
The Federal Government’s future role in special education
Several of the NPR experts spoke with expressive concern about moving special educational programs to HHS and far from the education department, an institution that specializes in helping all students study.
Alison Barcof, who runs HHS disability programs until last year, says the division of special educational programs into various agencies “is really counterproductive about what the idea and goals of special education are dealing with, which is a disabled student, as part of their schools, part of their classrooms.
Jonathan Messar from the Inheritance Foundation sees the proposed movements as an opportunity to improve the role of the federal government in the life of students.
“I think moving it to another agency is an appropriate move because I do not think we have evidence that the US Department of Education has served effectively for these families,” he says.
“Change is difficult, so this does not happen very often at the federal level, but this is an opportunity to optimize federal processes.”
Disabled Defender Seli Giazdovski says The story has shown The dangers of dividing the rights of students with disabilities from non-damage students.
“When teaching students with disabilities is not considered part of the normative general education that seemed like this? It seems like institutionalization.”
She is worried if education is specially moved to HHS, the disability can be categorized as a concern for health, not as an integrated part of public life, including in schools.
