President Trump and his choice to be the next Secretary of Education have indicated that dismantling the U.S. Department of Education remains a priority. They argue that much of what the department does should properly be left to state and local governments. If the new president and his team are serious, it is important that certain programs presently administered by the department that contribute to national security be preserved.

Republicans have advocated the abolition of the U.S. Department of Education virtually since it was created in 1979. Efforts to act on their advocacy have, however, run aground in successive Republican administrations. The reasons vary, but the reality is that the Department has survived and grown. When the Department was established, it had 3000 employees and a budget of $12 billion. In 2023, its staff was around 4400, and its budget had grown to around $68 billion.

The U.S. Department of Education manages the Title VI program, which supports grants for the study of foreign languages and culture and funding for National Resource Centers in support of this study. The department also administers the Fulbright-Hays program, which underwrites support for graduate students and faculty who want to study abroad. The Title VI program was created through the National Defense Education Act (NDEA) of 1958 and expanded in 1961 “to build foreign language and area studies programs at American Universities.” The Fulbright-Hays program, a subset of the much larger Fulbright program established in 1946, was a product of the Mutual Education and Exchange Act of 1961. Both programs, in short, were established before the creation of the Department of Education as a stand-alone cabinet agency. Neither was a creation of the Department of Education. 

These two programs were established in recognition of the fact that the U.S. needed to understand the challenges of the post-World War II world and to be able to communicate directly with friends and foes alike. Congress created and has since sustained these programs because national security challenges require us “to ensure trained manpower of sufficient quality and quantity to meet the national defense needs of the United States.” That is not a task for state governments.

Education Department funding for Title VI and Fulbright Hays programming is very modest. In 2024, it was around $86 million, and the request for 2025 was about the same. That sum is more than a rounding error in the context of the department’s full budget; it is a small price to pay for programs that make an essential contribution to our national security. However, the impact of this modest funding is significant as it facilitates foreign language and cultural study at a range of colleges and universities that might otherwise not be undertaken. Moreover, it does so without requiring the federal government to bear the full financial burden as the universities receiving Title VI grants or Fulbright-Hays awards provide the faculty and facilities. The federal grants defray only some of the associated costs but by no means all. Preserving them would not significantly undermine the new administration’s commitment to bringing down the cost of government. Terminating them would have a greater negative impact than the presumed savings would justify.

Can the new administration follow through on its plans to get rid of the U.S. Department of Education? The move would have the support of a particularly vociferous segment of the newly elected president’s base, one which was both aggravated and activated by what they considered federal overreach into local education during the Biden administration. Just as important, with majorities in both houses of Congress, the new Trump administration will, theoretically, have the legislative support the president would need to get it done.

The question, therefore, becomes how programming that derives from the conviction that language and cultural studies are important for national security should be preserved if the agency that administers the grants to support such programming is to be dismantled. The short answer is that the programs could be moved to another agency.

One option would be the Department of State. State’s Bureau of Education and Cultural Exchange already administers most Fulbright resources and maintains extensive contacts with universities in the United States and around the world, as well as with foreign Fulbright commissions, many of which generate additional funding locally to encourage exchanges with the United States. 

Another option would be the Department of Defense, which created the relatively modest Minerva Social Science Initiative that funds academic research to help “…improve DoD’s basic understanding of the social, cultural, behavioral, and political forces that shape regions of the world of strategic importance to the U.S.” DoD’s Defense Language Institute in Monterrey, California would also be a good fit, especially for Title VI, provided the Defense Department is committed to sustaining the interest and participation of the U.S. universities.

In short, if the new Trump administration finally decides to abolish the Department of Education, it will be important that we do not throw out the baby with the bath water. The Title VI and Fulbright-Hays programs predate the department and should survive it. They are an important and cost-effective tool for developing the kind of internationally literate workforce we will need going forward, particularly if we have entered a new, more complex, competitive, and dangerous global environment. 

Patrick Duddy is a retired American foreign service officer now working as a senior advisor for global affairs at Duke University. During a long diplomatic career, he served as the U.S. ambassador to Venezuela, deputy assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere, and consul general in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and elsewhere. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the American Academy of Diplomacy, and a fellow in the Caribbean Policy Consortium. The views expressed in this article are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of Duke University.

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