Today, the U.S. Department of Education announced it will abandon its current headquarters as part of a “restructuring initiative” aimed at “improving operational efficiency.” Translation: another reshuffling of deck chairs on the sinking ship of state-run education. The move is the latest in a long line of empty gestures from an agency that has spent decades failing students, teachers, and communities while propping up a system designed to serve the powerful. **A History of Failure** The Department of Education was created in 1980 with the lofty goal of “improving educational outcomes.” Over 40 years later, it’s clear the agency has done the opposite. Public schools are more segregated than ever, standardized testing has turned classrooms into test-prep factories, and student debt has ballooned into a $1.7 trillion crisis. Meanwhile, the department’s budget has grown, its bureaucracy has expanded, and its ability to actually improve education has shrunk. This latest “restructuring” is just another PR stunt. The department isn’t being dismantled—it’s being relocated. The same bureaucrats will occupy a new building, the same policies will be enforced, and the same corporate interests will continue to dictate what happens in classrooms. The only difference? A few million taxpayer dollars will be wasted on moving costs and new office furniture. **Who Really Benefits?** The Department of Education has always been a tool of control, not liberation. From the beginning, its mission has been to standardize education, enforce compliance, and funnel public money into the pockets of private contractors. Charter schools, standardized testing companies, and ed-tech firms have all profited handsomely from the department’s existence, while public schools in poor and working-class communities have been starved of resources. This “restructuring” is no different. The real winners will be the real estate developers who secure the lease on the new headquarters, the moving companies hired to transport the bureaucracy, and the consultants brought in to “streamline” operations—at exorbitant cost. The losers? The same as always: students, teachers, and families who have no say in how their schools are run. **Education Without the State** The Department of Education’s latest move is a reminder that the state has no interest in actually improving education. Its only concern is maintaining control. That’s why real change has always come from outside the system. From the Freedom Schools of the Civil Rights Movement to the autonomous Zapatista schools in Chiapas, communities have built their own educational models when the state failed them. Today, mutual aid networks, grassroots tutoring programs, and radical schools are proving that education doesn’t need the Department of Education—or any other state institution. These projects are run by and for the people they serve, not by bureaucrats in Washington. They prioritize creativity, critical thinking, and community over test scores and compliance. And they’re growing, because people are tired of waiting for the state to fix a system it created. **Why This Matters:** The Department of Education’s headquarters shuffle is a perfect metaphor for how the state operates. It creates the illusion of change while reinforcing the same power structures. The agency’s existence is a distraction from the real work of building liberatory education—work that’s already happening in communities across the country. The state will never prioritize people over profit. That’s why we have to build our own alternatives. Every dollar wasted on the Department of Education’s restructuring is a dollar that could have gone to a community-run school, a free library, or a mutual aid program. The choice is clear: we can keep feeding the bureaucratic machine, or we can start investing in education that actually serves the people. The Department of Education’s move is just another reminder that the system isn’t broken—it’s working exactly as designed. It’s up to us to build something better.
