Education Department to partner with other agencies for civil rights, disability programs

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) - The U.S. Department of Education announced four new interagency agreements on Tuesday focused on civil rights enforcement and student disability programs.

The Education Department will be partnering with the Health and Human Services Department to oversee special education and rehabilitative services, and with the Justice Department to coordinate civil rights enforcement, protect parental and students’ privacy rights, and provide training and advisory services to schools.

Education Secretary Linda McMahon told Alaska’s News Source the partnership with HHS would not affect funding for the Individuals with Disabilities Act, which is mandated by law.

“Children in the classroom or parents or teachers won’t have any idea really that we are partnering or working with other agencies, because it will be seamless,” McMahon said. “We want to make sure children in the classroom continue to receive all the services they need.”

Regarding DOJ partnerships, McMahon said she had no doubt the agency had the resources to partner successfully with the Education Department on civil rights enforcement and student privacy protections.

“The Department of Justice is the enforcement agency relative to any of those infractions, and absolutely they will be on top of it and will be moving forward with it as quickly as possible.”

Since the announcement, critics have characterized the partnerships as a part of the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle the Department of Education.

Rachel Gittleman, president of the union representing the department’s employees, said in a statement run by the Associated Press that the DOJ partnership will leave vulnerable students and families without the services they need when they face discrimination.

McMahon denied this would be the case and disagreed with the framing that it was removing these programs entirely from the Education Department’s oversight, and instead was dismantling the “bureaucracy of education in Washington D.C.”

“We are not transferring programs out of the Department of Education,” McMahon said. “We are working with other departments to make sure we can be as efficient as possible in returning education to the states.”

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