President Donald Trump’s plan to reduce the Department of Education’s workforce by nearly 50 percent and eventually dismantle it could delay and complicate GW’s financial aid distribution, experts predict.
As Trump works to dismantle the department by laying off employees and relocating the department’s core operations to other agencies, higher education policy experts said current and prospective students’ financial aid packages are subject to delays and inaccurate processing due to reduced staffing in the cabinet-level department. Since his 2016 presidential campaign, Trump has deemed the department unnecessary in a country where states and school districts primarily control public education, including who they hire and what they teach.
The department, which manages the $1.6 trillion federal student loan portfolio for college and postsecondary students, laid off roughly 1,300 of its 4,000 employees on Friday at Trump’s direction, per a release. An additional 600 staff also accepted voluntary resignation opportunities and retirement over the last seven weeks, the release states.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon said workforce reductions will impact “all divisions,” but student loans, funding for special needs students, competitive grantmaking and Pell Grants — a need-based federal grant — will not be affected.
“Today’s reduction in force reflects the Department of Education’s commitment to efficiency, accountability, and ensuring that resources are directed where they matter most: to students, parents, and teachers,” McMahon said in a release.
University spokesperson Shannon McClendon said the University prioritizes students’ access to timely financial aid without delays and that students should continue to apply with support from GW’s financial assistance team.
She said the University will continue to share information through GW’s weekly federal update emails and the federal agency guidance website, while remaining in compliance with the law.
The University is as “steadfast as ever” and “unwavering” in its commitment to providing an inclusive and equitable environment for students including through its anti-discrimination policies, accessible reporting mechanisms, specialized educational programs on religious tolerance, investigative procedures and comprehensive support services, McClendon said.
“Above all, the University upholds its educational mission, ensuring every community member feels welcome, prepared and empowered to reach their full academic potential,” McClendon said in an email.
Officials said they have not scheduled meetings with the Trump administration since the Department of Justice antisemitism task force announced earlier this month that it will visit GW and nine other universities that they said have experienced “antisemitic incidents” following the onset of the war in Gaza.
Officials also said the University has also not received details or communication on the Trump administration’s recent orders and actions, adding that there are “currently no indications” that the layoffs and potential dismantling of the department will impact core federal aid programs, like the Pell Grant, Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant or federal work-study.
Antoinette Flores — the director of higher education quality and accountability at New America, a left-leaning think tank — said Trump’s proposal to dismantle the department is “deeply unpopular,” with only one in four Americans in favor of its elimination, according to the organization’s February polling.
Flores said Trump’s executive order he signed on Thursday that directed McMahon to take “all necessary steps” to facilitate the closure of the department was “symbolic in nature.”
Trump needs approval from the majority of Congress to pass an act to dismantle the department, and any effort to abolish it would likely be challenged by Democrats in the slimly Republican-controlled Senate, which requires 60 votes to overcome filibusters.
For such an act to pass, Republicans would have to flip at least seven Democrats, but the party has denounced Trump’s order due to concerns that the dismantling could impact low-income families who rely on federal funding in schools.
“Yes, the administration needs Congress in order to formally get rid of the department, but it is already taking steps to do that with or without Congress,” Flores said. “It’s hard to say what the path forward looks like from here, and it makes it even harder to say when you have an administration that disregards and doesn’t follow the law.”
Flores said funding for college students through grants and student loans covers almost 70 percent of the department’s budget, and the layoffs impact one of its “most critical functions.” Preliminary reports of the department show many Federal Student Aid Office staff, who manage the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, lost their jobs.
“When you cut that amount of staff and the staff cuts occurred across every single office, you are putting all of that at risk,” Flores said. “There could be impacts on students’ ability to access federal financial aid, to be able to repay their loans, to file their FAFSA. Those are some of the biggest potential impacts from students at a school like GW.”
Felecia Commodore, an associate professor of education policy and organization and leadership at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, said the layoffs will hinder the department’s ability to disperse federal funds and process financial aid applications because there are fewer people to process requests.
She said this delay will reduce universities’ enrollment because students will be less likely to afford college and pay for any outstanding tuition bills if the department doesn’t process their applications in time.
Hundreds of users reported issues with accessing FAFSA the day after Trump announced cuts to the department. Students must complete the form by June 30 to receive federal financial aid at colleges and universities. Students have submitted more than 8 million 2025-26 FAFSA forms — a 50 percent increase from the number of applications submitted this time last year, the department said in a press release last Monday.
University officials said GW’s Student Financial Assistance office can create estimated financial aid packages to ensure students receive timely information about their eligibility if FAFSA is delayed, as the office did in 2024, but there are no current signs that such contingency measures will be necessary.
“Just because something is open does not mean that it’s operating in a way that is efficient and effective,” Commodore said. “You need a certain level of workforce. You need certain level professionals and service providers in order for the department to function at its optimal peak.”
Commodore said the department’s decision to lay off staff will not fix the bureaucratic challenges the department has faced, but there are methods for “better optimizing” the department’s resources that don’t include mass layoffs.
“There are some folks who approach kind of straightening out or ironing out wrinkles in bureaucratic processes through a kind of a tear up and destroy or downsizing process,” Commodore said. “I don’t know that that was the best approach here.”
David Blazar, an associate professor of education policy at the University of Maryland, College Park, said community members should pay attention to which departments programs are housed under, if the programs continue to exist and the amount of funding they continue to receive.
Trump announced on Friday that the federal student loan portfolio, which was housed under the department, will move to the Small Business Administration, which is responsible for helping small business owners and entrepreneurs succeed by providing counseling, capital and contracting expertise.
Trump also announced he was moving “special needs” and nutrition programs out from the Education Department and moving it under the Department of Health and Human Services.
Blazar said it’s “reasonable” to assume it will be “challenging” for the department to execute its core functions, like overseeing the federal student loan program, after laying off more than 1,000 staff members.
Blazar said universities could be indirectly impacted by the Trump administration, which has withheld funding from institutions that have implemented policies it disagrees with — including what the administration see as failures to protect Jewish students from antisemitism and transgender athlete policies.
Columbia University — which endured a $400 million cancellation in federal grants and contracts under Trump earlier this month — on Friday agreed to a series of demands set by his administration that they called a “precondition for formal negotiations.”
Blazar said the Trump administration can withhold funding through indirect rates on research grants, which are “critical” mechanisms for supporting the functions of higher education institutions because GW has contracts with the federal government.
“Those will be litigated as well,” Blazar said. “But again, all of this is creating disruptions in the meantime.”
