The Hidden Crisis in Rural Education
Rural communities across the United States are facing a growing crisis that threatens to undermine the very foundations of their educational systems. This crisis is not just about funding or policy changes; it’s about the future of students, families, and entire towns that have long relied on public schools as a lifeline. In places like Bell County, Kentucky, where the coal industry has declined and economic opportunities have dwindled, the impact of potential federal education cuts could be devastating.
The decline of the coal industry in Bell County has left many residents in poverty, with few well-paying jobs or prospects. The community, once a vital part of the nation’s energy production, now faces empty storefronts and the stark beauty of the Appalachian Mountains. It’s a place where the “America First” message of President-elect Donald Trump resonated, but where his proposed policies could hit hardest. Trump’s promise to eliminate the Department of Education and slash federal funds to public schools poses a significant threat to these communities.
Bell County’s school district typically receives 10% of its budget from federal dollars, though this percentage has been higher in recent years due to pandemic relief funds. A reduction in these funds could lead to teacher layoffs, larger class sizes, and less attention for vulnerable students. Superintendents like Tom Gambrel, who has worked his way up from school custodian to leading the district, are deeply concerned about the implications of such cuts.
A CNN analysis revealed that all of the 15 states that relied most heavily on federal support for their public schools in 2022 voted for Trump, while all but two of the 15 states that received the least federal dollars as a percentage of their overall revenue voted for Vice President Kamala Harris. This trend highlights the potential impact of Trump’s policies on his own base, particularly in rural areas where education funding is critical.
Gambrel, like many in Bell County, voted for Trump with his students in mind. He believes that no one in the county wants to cut school funding and hopes that Trump’s plans to reduce federal education funding won’t come to pass. If they do, he says it would be “catastrophic.”
The Role of Federal Funding in Rural Schools
The schools in Bell County provide more than just an education; they are a lifeline for families. The district is one of the biggest employers in town and offers after-school care, which is essential for working parents. The schools are also where children come to stay warm and where they eat most of their meals. All of Gambrel’s students qualify for free breakfast and lunch, and some go hungry if they don’t come to school.
“I would be confident in saying that when they leave on Friday, they might not eat again until Monday,” Gambrel said, explaining how the schools try to send home backpacks with food for struggling families to bridge the weekend days.
The reliance on federal funding is particularly acute in rural districts like Bell County. While Trump has not shared many details of his proposals, critics warn that Republicans have long proposed slashing federal education spending. In 2023, House Republicans faced heavy pushback when they proposed an 80% cut to Title I, a program that largely pays teacher salaries in low-income and underserved communities. Last year, they proposed a 25% cut to the same program. With a majority in both the House and Senate in the next administration, Republican-led policies are more likely to succeed, which is a daunting prospect for rural schools like those in Bell County.
Gambrel said about 10% of his teachers are funded through Title I and Title II, another federal program, and losing that federal support would have significant implications. “It certainly wouldn’t allow us to have an adequate number of teachers in classrooms every day,” he said.
The Impact of Project 2025 on Education
While Trump’s plans for education during his second term lack specifics, many experts look to Project 2025 for more guidance. The more than 900-page “conservative promise” commissioned by the Heritage Foundation lays out a blueprint for the next Republican president to shape all corners of American society, including education.
Project 2025’s education proposals include expanding school choice and turning federal funding, such as Title I and IDEA – which supports students with disabilities – into no-strings-attached block grants to states. Experts warn that this could end up redirecting funds away from the marginalized communities they were intended for.
Weadé James, senior director of education policy at the Center for American Progress, noted that a lot of these proposals are impacting the most vulnerable students. No-strings-attached block grants remove federal oversight on how the funds are spent, allowing states to spend money that is now specifically intended for low-income or special needs students however they want. This uncertainty has created fear that it would hurt the most vulnerable populations.
An analysis by the Center for American Progress found that phasing out Title I funding – as described in Project 2025 – would eliminate nearly six percent of teachers nationwide, worsening the existing national teacher shortage and affecting the country’s most vulnerable student groups. The hardest-hit areas in that scenario would be those that overwhelmingly voted Republican in the last election.
The Political Ties to Project 2025
Although Trump distanced himself from Project 2025 on the campaign trail, one of his first decisions as president-elect was to tap Tom Homan, a Project 2025 author and the architect of Trump’s controversial family-separation policy in his first administration, as “border czar.” He also nominated key Project 2025 author, Russell Vought, to lead the Office of Management and Budget, in addition to about a half-dozen other high-profile jobs he’s given to people involved in the plan.
At least 140 people who worked in the first Trump administration had a hand in Project 2025, according to a CNN review, including more than half of the people listed as authors, editors, and contributors.
The Fear of Budget Cuts
Some believe Trump’s rhetoric – including repeated promises to cut federal funding to schools with vaccine mandates – combined with proposals from congressional Republicans and Project 2025 will almost certainly mean cuts to federal education spending; others have gone so far as to prepare for budget cuts.
The Kentucky Association of School Administrators sent out a spreadsheet to all superintendents in the state last month outlining what budget cuts could look like in their districts, in an effort to raise awareness among stakeholders and legislators. Some school districts, such as the one in Floyd County just north of Bell County, stand to lose millions of dollars if the GOP House proposal from last year went into effect. KASA’s projections for Gambrel’s district is a loss of around $600,000.
“It would be easy just to look at this from the perspective of a loss of Title dollars and the impact on the schools, but at the end of the day, we’re harming children and families,” said Rhonda Caldwell, KASA’s CEO.
The Debate Over School Choice
Despite voters’ dismissal of such programs, Trump said expanding school choice would be a top priority for his administration. “Linda will fight tirelessly to expand ‘Choice’ to every State in America,” Trump said in a statement announcing McMahon as his pick for education secretary at the end of November.
For many parents in rural counties – like most of Kentucky, including Bell County – school choice is a false choice as private schools are few and far between in their communities. “This is one of these cases where (Republican) policies are stabbing their base right in the heart and will directly impact their kids,” said Will Ragland, vice president of the Center for American Progress.
The Broader Implications
Bell County’s schools aren’t just a place where kids come to learn how to read and write. They strive to provide children – a third of whom live in poverty – with anything they need to help remove barriers to their education. Every school has a family resource center where children can get anything from clothes to toothbrushes and shampoo to school supplies. The center – which is funded in part by state resources and local donations – “is of the utmost importance in our community,” said Jennifer Blankenship, principal of the elementary and middle schools.
When Gambrel – who worked his way up from school custodian to bus driver, coach, teacher, administrator to superintendent of the school district – attended Bell County High School in the 1980s, the school counted around 1,400 students. Today, just over 600 high schoolers walk the beige halls lined with bright blue lockers. The population decline has a direct impact on funding for the school district, as most state and federal funds are based on the number of students.
But when the money goes away, the “teachers’ jobs don’t stop,” Blankenship said.
The Future of Federal Education Funding
Federal investment in K-12 education has been decreasing over time, explained Noelle Ellerson Ng, associate executive director of AASA, The School Superintendents Association. When adjusted for inflation, Ellerson said, the federal government is paying less per high school senior today than it was when those seniors were in kindergarten thirteen years ago.
This means that for years, Gambrel and his staff have had to do more with less. Most federal programs for public schools are meant to level the playing field for students, providing a monetary boost to communities with high needs but a small tax base due to low incomes, low property values, or limited tax revenue from businesses.
In addition to the county’s high poverty rate, a raging opioid crisis has wreaked havoc on families in the community, Gambrel said. On top of that, he added, nearly 20% of students in the district have special needs. “And the supports are not there,” he said.
Gambrel said the looming budget cuts and concern for his students and staff keep him up at night. “Every time that we get a cut,” he said, “we’re going to have to change something, we’re going to have to provide less for our students.”
