“We can’t exit this decade with students, in particular low-income students, performing worse than they were performing when they entered the decade,” said Kevin Huffman, CEO of Accelerate, a nonprofit funding academic recovery efforts. “My biggest fear is just that people will use the Department of Education as a battering ram for other issues and not use it as a force to take on academic outcomes for kids.”

The Republican nominee, declaring this the “golden age of America,” in battleground states, like Georgia and Florida, than he did in 2020. As expected, Republicans flipped the Senate and will hold at least a 52-seat majority, with a few races left to call. Control of the House remains undecided. 

Observers expect Trump to immediately nullify the Biden administration’s Title IX rule that extends protections against discrimination to LGBTQ students. 

Those who campaigned for Trump, and agree with his promises to end in schools, celebrated his comeback.

“American parents voted for their children’s future,” Tiffany Justice, co-founder of the conservative Moms for Liberty advocacy group, . Her name is already among those being tossed around as a possible . She told �鶹��Ʒ that she “would be honored to serve the next president of the United States of America.”

Most clues about Trump’s early priorities come from the conservative Heritage Foundation’s , or Project 2025. In addition to eliminating Title I funding for low-income students and Head Start for preschoolers from poor families, the plan would remove references to LGBTQ people throughout federal policy.

But even if Washington ends up with a GOP trifecta and federal appointees handpicked by Heritage, the president-elect might not be able to deliver on some of his more bold promises to dismantle the education department and of illegal immigrants.

“Some of this rhetoric will be tempered with reality once the administration changes,” said Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union. “This is a president that we are very accustomed to. I understand people are nervous; they’re very concerned. But when it comes down to it, there’s also the reality of governing.”

Eliminating the education department, for example, would require 60 votes in the Senate and would likely be unpopular in the House as well, even if Republicans are still in control, said David Cleary, a former Republican Senate education staffer now working for a left-leaning lobbying firm.

“The votes wouldn’t materialize,” he said.

Michael Petrilli, president of the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute, added that “draconian cuts” in spending would also be difficult to pass. That’s why Trump is expected to accomplish some of his conservative agenda through executive orders.

“Let’s assume that there is no grand reawakening to the problems that America faces and people stay in their partisan foxholes,” Cleary said. “Trump will have to take a page out of [President Joe Biden’s] playbook and do a lot by executive action and regulatory plans.”

That would include halting enforcement of Biden’s Title IX rule — which, because of litigation from Republican-led governors, currently applies to only 24 states. Officials would likely restart the process of restoring the 2020 regulation completed under former Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, which narrowed the definition of sexual assault and expanded due process rights for the accused.

One LGBTQ advocacy organization called Trump’s victory “an immediate threat.”

“Today, many in our community feel a profound sense of loss and concern for the future,” Melanie Willingham-Jaggers, executive director of GLSEN, said in a statement, pointing to Heritage’s Project 2025 as the blueprint for how Trump would roll back policies that allow trans students to play on sports teams or use restrooms that match their gender identity. “With these changes, our young people could face increased discrimination, reduced access to safe spaces and diminished legal recognition.”

Trump, a and, at 78, the oldest candidate ever elected president, is also expected to push for private school choice, perhaps along the lines of the $5,000 that passed a House committee in September. But despite the GOP’s enthusiasm for vouchers and education savings accounts, which allow parents to use public funds for private school tuition and homeschooling expenses, some advocates would like to see greater support for the charter sector.

Petrilli, a self-described “never-Trumper,” said he’s worried about returning to “the political dynamics” of Trump’s first term, which didn’t benefit charter schools.

“Reform-oriented Democrats were sidelined or silenced,” he said. “Given that there are a lot of kids in blue states like California, New York, and Illinois who desperately need high-quality educational options, this would be a terrible development.”

But Rodrigues sees some bright spots in Republicans’ focus on parental rights and school choice. “Those things can be positive when not taken to the extreme,” she said.

She’s encouraged by the prospect of Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana becoming chair of the Senate education committee, where he has already highlighted the importance of improving . 

While the National Parents Union has had close interaction with Education Secretary Miguel Cardona and the White House, she said leaders have had ongoing “deep conversations” with those on both sides of the aisle.

“Progress will be made for children in any and all conditions, regardless of what happens in the House and the change up in the Senate,” she said. “I think the depth of our relationships are not confined to one particular party.”

Over the last several months, �鶹��Ʒ has taken a look at some of the biggest education issues at play during the 2024 election cycle. Here’s an overview of the federal, state and local races and ballot measures that are poised to impact students, teachers and families the most. 

The White House 

In the first presidential debate of this election season between former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden, the candidates were asked a question that was top of mind for parents and child advocates:

“In your second term, what would you do to make child care more affordable?” asked Trump during that June debate. 

But rather than focus on children, many critics said the two candidates behaved like them.

Even after Biden dropped out of the race and Vice President Kamala Harris stepped in as the Democratic party’s presidential nominee and tapped Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, a former public high school teacher, as her pick for the vice presidential candidate – education and child care still did not make it to the center stage of election season conversations.

Instead, most clues about Trump’s education policy have come from The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, an ambitious Republican agenda to transform the federal bureaucracy under a second Trump presidency. While Trump has denied any involvement in the creation of Project 2025, experts say the plan reflects many of the ideologies held by the former president and, if enacted, would have considerable fallout in the world of education. 

Project 2025’s chapter on education, for example, offers prescriptions for eliminating Title I grants to high-poverty schools, revising accreditation requirements under the Higher Education Act and dismantling the Department of Education, among other things. Overall, the plan seeks to reimagine the US government as a guardian of parents’ rights and supports school choice. 

Publicly, Trump has also said that he would pull funding from any schools that teach critical race theory or support transgender rights. 

Meanwhile, Harris has not offered much in terms of her education policy. She has made it clear that she thinks Trump’s plan to eliminate the Department of Education would be a terrible idea and has criticized his attacks on curricula taught in schools.

One item that could be on the table during a Harris presidency is a pay hike for teachers. Few may remember it now, but Harris took the biggest swing on education policy of any Democrat in the 2020 presidential primary: a $315 billion to raise teacher pay and overhaul the profession. The American Federation of Teachers, the nation’s second largest teachers union, was the first group to voice their support of Harris as a presidential candidate this summer. 

While the two candidates have vastly different aims when it comes to education, there is one area both camps seem to (mostly) agree on: Expanding the Child Tax Credit. Both the Harris and Trump campaigns have embraced proposals to expand the program, which offers relief to parents of kids under 17 years old. Depending on the election outcome, neither party may hold enough power to enact its vision, however. 

National Issues

Bible teachings in public schools: Republicans have spent a lot of energy getting the Bible into public schools. Much of the spotlight has been on Oklahoma state Superintendent Ryan Walters, who mandated that schools stock classrooms with Bibles. Louisiana passed a law requiring schools to post the 10 Commandments in classrooms, the subject of , while the Texas Education Agency has proposed a Bible-infused reading curriculum that includes stories from the Old and New testaments. 

Whether those ideas will resonate with Christian voters is harder to answer. One recent poll suggests it won’t. On a long list of concerns influencing churchgoers’ views in this election, public schools ranked near the bottom as a reason why they would pick a presidential candidate. Instead, the economy and border security topped the list. 

School boards: Moms for Liberty, the conservative advocacy group, hasn’t been able to repeat its success at the polls since 2022, when its school board candidates were scoring victories across the country. Some say voters are clearly tired of what one researcher called the “politics of disruption.” Others believe the group’s leaders are more focused on adding members and mobilizing voters for Trump than winning local races. There have also been efforts to recruit moderates to run against conservative candidates like those from Moms for Liberty. 

A good indicator of who will win school board seats is whether the candidate has the endorsement of a teachers’ union. According to research out of Ohio State University and Boston College, a union endorsement increases support for candidates by as much as 20 percentage points among various voting blocs, with the effects particularly concentrated among Democrats and those who favor organized labor. Almost no group, including Republicans, responds negatively to the endorsements, the authors found.

School choice: A high-stakes political battle is brewing around school choice. GOP groups are funneling millions of dollars into state races to defeat critics of education savings accounts. In Texas, observers say, the victories by pro-ESA candidates could lead to a more conservative legislature or a potential Democratic backlash. 

It’s worth noting that voters have a history of rejecting private school choice measures at the ballot box. Recent voucher proposals garnered less than a . But advocates in three states are hoping to break that trend on Election Day. In , voters will decide whether to preserve or overturn 2023 legislation that created a private school scholarship program. Initiatives in and , if approved, could pave the way for lawmakers to create vouchers or education savings accounts in the future.

State and local races and ballot measures 

Arizona: The outcome of Arizona’s legislative races could upend what has been one of America’s most welcoming environments for school choice. Democrats, who already hold the governorship, could take control of both legislative chambers by flipping just four seats, which would make Arizona voters the first in the nation to hand over governance of an ESA program to its opponents. 

California: A single, heated school board race in Los Angeles could help decide the fate of the nation’s largest charter school sector and the LA Unified School District. Upstart vows to bring a pro-charter voice to LA Unified’s board, but faces stiff opposition from union-backed incumbent . 

Delaware: With at least eight high-level reports over the last 25 years calling for a wholesale overhaul of a Jim Crow-era school funding formula that gives more state aid to wealthy districts and shortchanges disadvantaged kids, whoever wins Delaware’s governor race will have their work cut out for them. 

Illinois: October was already destined to be a tumultuous chapter in Chicago politics, as voters prepared for the first school board elections in the city’s history. But the abrupt resignation of the city’s existing school board, and the related crisis of governance over the country’s fourth-largest school system, has magnified local divisions over finance and the role of the powerhouse Chicago Teachers Union. Now locals are wondering if the mayor can keep the district solvent — and his own administration afloat. 

Indiana: In Indiana’s governor race, GOP U.S. Senator Mike Braun, who’s been endorsed by Donald Trump, wants to expand the state’s school choice voucher program. If elected, Braun and his running mate, far-right , have pledged universal school choice for every Indiana family while focusing on parental rights and school safety. His opponent, former state schools chief Jennifer McCormick, who has the backing of the state teachers union, seeks to expand affordable child care, fight what she believes is excessive state-mandated testing and call for an equitable school funding formula. 

Massachusetts: In Massachusetts, Ballot Question 2 asks voters to decide if the MCAS exam should remain a high school graduation requirement. If it passes, Massachusetts would have no statewide graduation requirements, making it an outlier nationally. Instead, its some 300 districts would determine requirements locally. Those in favor of repealing the requirement — largely backed by the state teachers union — argue it narrows curriculum and harms students with disabilities and English language learners. Those who want to keep the test, including Gov. Maura Healey, say it’s an important accountability measure. 

Minnesota: If Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are elected in November, Minnesota’s lieutenant governor Peggy Flanagan, will become the first Indigenous woman governor in U.S. history. The daughter of a Hubert H. Humphrey campaign strategist and an Ojibwe land-rights activist — Flanagan was the youngest person elected to the Minneapolis School Board. She has promoted free school lunch and Indigenous curriculum.

North Carolina: North Carolina’s race for governor has been marked by scandal. In September, that Republican nominee Mark Robinson called himself a “Black Nazi” and posted “slavery is not bad” anonymously on a porn site. Beyond the controversies, Robinson has kept education debates centered on eradicating the presence of “politics” and “indoctrination” in schools, and . His challenger, Democratic candidate Josh Stein, told that his top priority as governor would be to improve public education. He has also supported to address the youth mental health crisis, and wants to expand access to community colleges and Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Whoever is elected as the state’s leader will appoint individuals for , subject to confirmation by the assembly. 

Another pivotal race in North Carolina will be for superintendent. Republican candidate Michele Morrow, a homeschooler who rallied outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan 6, has a history of disparaging public schools with choice words like “indoctrination centers.” She faces Democrat Maurice “Mo” Green, a lawyer and former district superintendent. Whoever wins will be responsible for more than 2,700 schools and a $13 billion education budget. 

Rhode Island: Providence, Rhode Island’s school board has been appointed by the mayor for decades, but voters will be able to pick board members again this election. The catch is that state control of the district was just extended to 2027, limiting what the new board can do. New members will still have to navigate their way out of state control as well as handle challenges with low test scores, falling enrollments, school closures and demand for more charter schools. 

EDlection 2024: Follow our analysis as winners are declared at  — and get the latest results, news and investigations delivered straight to your inbox by signing up for �鶹��Ʒ Newsletter.

The union’s political action committee began the 2024 cycle with $4 million in cash on hand, raised $12 million and has spent $13 million – leaving it with roughly $2 million to dole out before Election Day, according to the latest data from , the non-partisan organization that tracks money in politics.

The vast majority of its spending this election cycle – roughly $9 million – was donated to super PACs supporting Democrats and to local, state and federal candidates and parties. Among the top receivers: $3 million to the Senate Majority PAC, $1.6 to House Majority PAC, $445,000 to the Harris Victory Fund ($300,000 of which was originally donated to the Biden Victory Fund before the president stepped aside), and $420,000 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.  

The AFT is traditionally one of the biggest supporters of Democrats, lending both the power of its PAC’s purse for advertising and mailings, and its strength in numbers for boots-on-the-ground get-out-the-vote operations.

Among the top 20 PACs based on contributions to Democratic candidates, total fundraising, total spent, and total spent in independent expenditures and communication costs, the AFT’s PACs place 8th. It’s donated $1.5 million to democratic congressional candidates, including to 196 House Democrats and 19 Senate Democrats.

“Kamala Harris and Tim Walz believe in the promise of America and will spend their time solving problems, not sowing fear, so every American can partake in that promise,” AFT President Randi Weingarten said in a . “But it’s not just what we can gain, it’s also what we will lose with Trump and Vance: our democracy, our freedoms, our public schools, our right to have a union, a vote and a voice. Extending the ladder of opportunity or destroying it.” 

“Union members get this,” she said. “And that’s why we will fight every hour of every day for the next fortnight to get out the vote to elect candidates who proudly stand for freedom, democracy and opportunity.”

Earlier this month, the AFT teamed up with the National Education Association, the Service Employees International Union and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees – the nation’s largest public service unions – in a coordinated, multi-state voter outreach initiative across battleground states.

“This joint action represents a significant escalation of labor’s political engagement, with the unions pooling resources and mobilizing their combined membership of several million workers and includes people of all backgrounds working across the public service – as nurses, child care providers, sanitation workers, first responders, teachers, education support professionals and higher education workers, among others,” the of the effort reads.

Notably, labor unions play an outsized role in many of the election’s most crucial swing states: 21% of votes cast in Michigan in the 2020 presidential election were from union households, representing approximately one-fifth of the electorate, according to the union. The same is true for Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, where union households accounted for 18% and 13% of votes cast, respectively.

“My first-grade teacher, Mrs. Wilson, encouraged me when I was her student,” Harris back in 2021. “Years later [she] cheered me on when I graduated from law school.

“This year and every year, we celebrate America’s teachers, who make a lifelong impact on America’s students.” 

Here’s what else Harris has had to say about Mrs. Wilson: 

Other recent EDlection coverage from �鶹��Ʒ: 

• Polling Data: Presidents Split the Public on Schools
  
• Endorsing Harris: Nation’s Second-Largest Teachers Union Endorses Harris for President
  
• Project 2025: Plan Would Cut Education Department, Fulfill Conservative K-12 Wish List Under Trump
  
• Get the Latest Updates on the Election & Education: Sign Up For �鶹��Ʒ’s Newsletter 

“I spoke in support of the resolution — for our students, our patients, our families, our communities, our democracy and ourselves!” union President Randi Weingarten wrote on from the AFT’s 2024 convention in Houston. “Let’s win this!”

The delegates ratified the AFT Executive Council’s unanimous vote Sunday evening to endorse Harris, mere hours after President Joe Biden upended the race with his historic announcement that he was giving up his embattled candidacy. The council’s swift action positioned the country’s second-largest teachers union as one of the first major labor organizations to get behind the vice president.

“Vice President Harris has fought alongside Joe Biden to deliver historic accomplishments and create a better life for all Americans,” Weingarten said in the statement released early Sunday evening.

“Trump left his successor a country in crisis and chaos, with soaring inflation and an economy in free fall,” she added. “Joe Biden and Kamala Harris turned it around. They stabilized schools, saved pensions for hundreds of thousands of retired union workers and remade the economy.” 

The AFT has placed its significant political heft alongside other key unions supporting Harris, including the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the nation’s largest private sector union, and the United Farm Workers, the nation’s largest farm workers’ union.

The labor endorsements followed Biden’s own for Harris and were promptly joined by a chorus of other , including former House speaker Nancy Pelosi, Bill and Hillary Clinton and several governors, who were either being considered themselves as potential Biden successors or , such as Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer, California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania. U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona also came out in support of Harris on Sunday.

After Biden’s announcement, Weingarten scrambled to rewrite some of her planned remarks at the kickoff to the convention, according to reporting from Just earlier that morning she criticized efforts to push Biden out of the race, telling Weekly Education, “This fantasy that billionaire donors are having, that they can yoke this away from the president because they don’t like his performance at the debate, is wrong.” 

By the afternoon, though, she emphasized the importance of uniting around

In Harris’s for president, she advocated for universal preschool and free college and called for a $13,500 raise for every teacher by the end of her first term.

Becky Pringle, president of the nation’s largest teacher’s union, the National Education Association, took a different approach to the game-changing news, leaving out any mention of Harris in her tweets Sunday thanking President Biden for his service. Instead, she noted that the NEA will “renew our efforts to ensure he is succeeded by a leader equally dedicated to building the future our students, educators, and families deserve.”

The can be found below.

“In your second term, what would you do to make child care more affordable?” asked former President Donald Trump, the Republican candidate.

The National Parents Union and Moms First, two nonprofits focused on family issues, petitioned CNN to ask the question, over 13,000 signatures to a producer the day before the debate.  

Tonight, has the opportunity to address the concerns of over 13,000 moms, advocates, & allies who want child care prioritized at the presidential debate.

This is our moment — and we deserve to know how our leaders plan to combat the child care crisis. .

— National Parents Union (@NationalParents)

But rather than focus on children, many critics said the two candidates behaved like them.

Trump ignored the question. He instead denied he’s ever and called his opponent the “worst president in the history of our country.” President Joe Biden’s comeback could be summed up as, “No, you are.” He briefly mentioned increasing the child care tax credit and urging employers to offer workplace child care, but also used some of his allotted time to insult Trump back. 

Their candidate’s performance left some Democrats and led to for Biden to step out of the race. While some party leaders have regrouped and hope to put the president’s bad night , the moment was a thorough for many parents who watched.

“You’re arguing about your freaking golf game and neither one of you has any clue about how hard the child care crisis is hitting American families,” said Keri Rodriques, president of the National Parents Union. “It was just kind of a depressing night overall.”

for child care average $11,000, and for some parents, access to free preschool doesn’t always solve the dilemma. A Las Vegas mom of four boys, Karri Siv has a 4-year-old who attends a federally funded Head Start center while her 6-year-old will start first grade this fall. As a nursing assistant who works 12-hour shifts, she can’t find care in the early morning or late evening. 

“There are a couple of 24-hour daycares, but [they’re] impossible to use because it’s just so expensive,” she said. “I’m literally living check to check.”

As part of the , an organization that supports low-income single mothers who work and go to school, she relies on a network of other moms for backup care. But those arrangements only provide a short-term fix. Siv sometimes misses work to stay home with her kids. “How much more can I call out before I get fired?” she asked.

For now, parents interested in the candidates’ positions on the issue will have study their records.

In 2021, Biden signed the American Rescue Plan, which included $24 billion in relief funds to stabilize the industry during the pandemic. He ​​proposed to cap child care costs at 7% for families as part of his sweeping Build Back Better proposal, but it never got through Congress. 

Earlier this year, he issued an executive order that for about 100,000 families who receive child care subsidies. 

Those efforts encourage Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, executive director and CEO of MomsRising, an advocacy group. She said the Biden administration has “worked tirelessly” to lower child care costs for families.

“Moms know that there’s a chasm between these two candidates on this issue,” she said in a statement. 

The Trump years, however, included significant expansions of programs for children and families. In 2018, Congress passed a $2.4 billion for child care — the largest-ever. Trump proposed a far smaller increase of $169 million and wanted to to other programs, but ultimately signed the budget without the change.

His 2017 tax cut package also doubled the child tax credit to $2,000. This year, a passed the House in January that would increase the refundable amount parents can receive. But the measure has stalled in the Senate, with some Republicans arguing it would allow parents to receive more money even if they work less. 

The proposed increase in the tax credit has been another priority for groups like the National Parents Union. But the candidates didn’t talk about that topic either. 

“There were no winners after that debate — certainly not American families,” the group said in . “Both candidates were embarrassingly short on policy details and left us with zero confidence that we will be better off four years from now than we are today.”