By Izayah Morgan Opinions Editor The Department of Education (ED) prides itself on student achievement and accessibility to all students on a merit-based system - open to all races, genders, sexualities, and religious affiliations. This provides equitable access for all involved and helps to shrink the already significant wealth disparity in America. It’s not a perfect system to fix the problems within the education system, but I believe it's better than leaving it entirely to the states. Currently, the ED is in shambles, and universities all over the country are panicking. According to the New York Times, the Department of Education has fired 1,300 workers. This is a part of the Trump administration's initiative to dismantle the ED. The argument this current administration is making is that it wants to leave educational funding up to the states. While this statement sounds fine on its own, it leads to drastic disparities in what states offer and what opportunities students can have. Looking at myself as an example, I grew up in Section 8 housing with a single Black mother. Living off one check a month from social security, I was only able to attend college because most of my schooling was paid for by grants and scholarships. Millions grow up in situations just as bad or worse than mine. I have friends who grew up in the same apartment complex and lost themselves to drugs or the law. Education is one of the most potent ways to bring yourself out of that situation. However, if we leave it up purely to the states, then we will see a drastic difference in how people are educated. I mean, we already do. Do you think someone going to a school in a wealthy district gets a comparable education to someone in a poorer district? The potential dismantling of the ED poses to set us back to a time when education was only for rich people - more specifically rich white men - leaving the rest of the population to become even more uneducated. Limited education leads to idealization and devoted loyalty to those in power, something that authoritarian leaders in our past have used to gain mass followings. When Trump won the GOP in Nevada in 2016, he said something that stuck out to me stating, “We won the evangelicals. We won with young. We won with old. We won with highly educated. We won with poorly educated - I love the poorly educated. We’re the smartest people. We’re the most loyal people.” To me this was the plan from his first term - to attack education. Again, the argument is that the administration wants to leave education up to the states, but this already is the case. The Department of Education is there to make sure everyone gets a fair chance. Due to systemic discrimination, communities of color have lower household income compared to white communities. Education is one of the most potent ways to even that gap. It's not a coincidence that as education is becoming more diverse, in terms of its students and staff, it's under more scrutiny than ever. Anti-intellectualism is on the rise. Anti-intellectualism breeds an uneducated population and ignorant people, leading to a cycle of poverty and lack of empathy.