Earlier this week, this blog explored what Betsy DeVos hopes will be a major restructure in the U.S. Department of Education. That she is considering the restructure of the department became clear in the President’s FY21 budget proposal, which collapses Title I into a huge block grant with 28 other programs, and cuts funding for these combined programs by $4.7 billion. Title I is the Department’s largest program and the centerpiece of the federal government’s primary role in public education—ensuring that whatever happens in the states, the federal government will supplement programming to assist schools serving concentrations of very poor children. In a related responsibility (through the Department’s Office for Civil Rights), the U.S. Department of Education’s mission is also to protect the educational rights of children our society has historically marginalized. These programs, begun in the 1960s, grew out of the Civil Rights Movement and the War on Poverty.