Tag: education

Ed Department: Nearly 2,000 Minnesota ‘Ghost Students’ Fraudulently Received $12.5 Million

In Minnesota, home to the largest population of Somali immigrants in the U.S. and the site of numerous fraud investigations, fraudsters received $12.5 million in student loan and education grant money, according to a letter Education Secretary Linda McMahon sent to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

The letter calls on Walz to resign, and states that a new fraud prevention system at the department has found over $1 billion in “attempted financial aid theft,” including by international fraud rings and artificial intelligence (AI) bots.

“[Y]our careless lack of oversight and abuse of the welfare system has attracted fraudsters from around the world, especially from Somalia, to establish a beachhead of criminality in our country,” McMahon wrote. “As President Trump put it, you have turned Minnesota into a ‘fraudulent hub of money laundering activity.’”

“At the beginning of this year, the U.S. Department of Education became aware that fraudulent college applicants, especially concentrated in Minnesota, were gaming the federal postsecondary education system to collect money that was intended for young Americans to help them afford college,” she said.

McMahon referred to the fraudsters as “‘ghost students’ because they were not ID-verified and often did not live in the United States, or they simply did not exist,” and noted that, “[i]n Minnesota, 1,834 ghost students were found to have received 12.5 million in taxpayer-funded grants and loans.”

They “collected checks from the federal government, shared a small portion of the money with the college, and pocketed the rest–without attending the college at all,” according to the letter.

The letter comes after Somalis in Minnesota, in particular, have been exposed as having massively defrauded American taxpayers. They have even reportedly funded terrorists back in their country.

The news surrounding Somali fraud includes allegations of multiple scams, including claims that an autism “provider” enrolled Somali children who did not have an autism diagnosis in a welfare fraud scheme.

The outrage, among many other cultural problems with Somalis, has resulted in President Donald Trump intending to cancel some Somalis’ temporary protected status.

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Ending the Woke Monopoly: White House Takes Aim at Higher Ed’s Ideological Capture

Last week, the White House convened an education roundtable with U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon titled, “Biased Professors, Woke Administrators, and the End of Free Inquiry on U.S. Campuses.”

Secretary McMahon opened the event by stating, “It was an honor to be at the White House today with this dedicated coalition of students, faculty, institutional leaders, and policy advocates to highlight the issue of woke ideology and the capture of our institutions of higher education. DEI policies have turned universities from free marketplaces of ideas to purveyors of manufactured ideological conformity, chilling free speech and undermining academic rigor.”

She explained, “We are committed to working with higher education leaders to reverse course from these decades of decline.”

The Secretary highlighted actions taken by the Trump Administration, including dissolving DEI programs, enforcing merit-based practices, and guiding universities to comply with federal law, noting that over 400 institutions have made substantive changes. The U.S. Department of Education is working to incentivize universities to operate with fairness, academic rigor, and civil discourse.

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Trump Education Department Announces They’ve Found More Than a BILLION in Student Aid Fraud

The Trump Education Department has been focusing on identifying student loan fraud and they have a lot to show for their efforts. They just announced that they have uncovered more than a billion dollars in fraud.

Trump’s Education Secretary, Linda McMahon, may be the last cabinet official of her kind if Trump has his way. Like many Republicans going all the way back to Ronald Reagan, Trump wants to do away with the department completely.

McMahon and Trump have successfully done away with a number of horrible Bide-era policies on student loans and financial aid, which has helped them to identify all of this fraud.

The Education Department released this statement:

U.S. Department of Education Prevents More Than $1 Billion in Federal Student Aid Fraud This Year, Additional Crackdowns Expected in 2026

The U.S. Department of Education (the Department) today announced that it has prevented $1 billion in Federal student aid fraud since January 2025. Earlier this year, the Trump Administration implemented enhanced fraud controls governing how institutions of higher education distribute financial assistance, including mandatory identity verification for certain first-time student applicants. This effort has halted more than $1 billion in attempted financial aid theft by fraudsters, including coordinated international fraud rings and AI bots pretending to be students.

The Biden Administration’s decision to require identity verification from less than one percent of students created a prime opportunity for fraudsters to exploit the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA®) process and steal taxpayer funds. Colleges and universities across the country reported being under siege by highly sophisticated fraud rings and requested the Trump Administration for help.

“American citizens have to present an ID to purchase a ticket to travel or to rent a car – it’s only right that they should present an ID to access tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars to fund their education,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “From day one, the Trump Administration has been committed to rooting out waste, fraud, and abuse across the federal government. As a result, $1 billion in taxpayer funds will now support students pursuing the American dream, rather than falling into the hands of criminals. Merry Christmas, taxpayers!”

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Palantir Quietly Lands In Education Department Through Foreign Funding Portal

Palantir is expanding its reach into the Education Department, where the data analytics and software giant is helping develop the agency’s new portal for universities across the country to report foreign donations.

The quiet move marks the technology company’s latest expansion into federal government work, particularly in data management services.

An Education Department spokesperson confirmed Palantir was involved as a subcontractor for its revamped foreign funding portal, which is set to be rolled out early next month.

The agency announced the portal project this week, but did not name the vendors behind it. The portal will serve as a central place for schools to disclose to the department any foreign-source gifts and contracts worth $250,000 or more, the agency said.

Palantir is a subcontractor to Monkton, a northern Virginia-based computer and network security company, the spokesperson told FedScoop. According to federal spending records, the Education Department awarded a contract to Monkton in September that obligated $9.8 million for the design, development, and deployment of a “Section 117 Information Sharing Environment Capable of Providing Greater Transparency.” Palantir, however, is not publicly listed as a subcontractor on the project.

Section 117 of the Higher Education Act requires schools to disclose foreign gifts and contracts over $250,000.

The contract with Monkton could cost the agency up to $61.8 million, more than six times the cost of the modernization project for the ed.gov website, which was allocated $10 million in 2022.

Speculation over the portal began after the agency’s Office of the Chief Information Officer registered a new federal domain, foreignfundinghighered.gov, which was discovered by a bot tracking new government domains.

When FedScoop visited the link shortly before 10:30 a.m. ET on Thursday, the website showed a blocked network alert, which read, “The network connection you are using is not in your enrollment’s ingress allowlist. Please contact your enrollment administrator or Palantir representative.”

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Book Aimed at 5-Year-Olds Claims Abortion Is ‘Superpower’

A radical abortion group is selling a children’s book that frames killing unborn babies in abortions as a “superpower.”

Shout Your Abortion has been promoting a book aimed at children five to eight years old called “Abortion is Everything,” which will begin shipping to purchasers in January 2026. A description on the organization’s website says the book tells children “about what abortion is, how it might feel, and why people have abortions.”

The description of the book reads:

With accessible, inclusive language, Abortion Is Everything frames abortion as the actualization of a uniquely human superpower: our capacity to imagine the future and make choices that lead us towards the life we envision. Abortion is a tool that allows human beings to shape our destinies, and which has shaped the entire world around us,” the description of the book reads.

Parents, caregivers, and educators who work with children have long been searching for a tool to talk with kids about abortion, especially given the volume of political noise currently surrounding the issue.

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Outrage: University of Utah Student Suspended For Exposing Anti-White Professor’s Rhetoric

According to a report at Campus Reform, “A student is facing discipline after exposing a university professor’s extensive history of racist, anti-white social media posts.”

A student named Craig Jones was suspended from campus for two whole years simply for posting flyers exposing the anti White, hateful tweets of Professor Ashton Avila, according to Libs of TikTok.

A letter sent to Jones accused him of “intimidating and threatening behavior by repeatedly targeting and calling out a University of Utah Asia Campus faculty member.”

In other words, at the University of Utah, it’s forbidden to call out race-baiting and anti-White hate if a professor is engaging in this type of bigotry.

Jones was given a choice between accepting the sanctions or taking his case to a hearing with a neutral decision-maker.

The professor accused of racist tweets teaches in the Department of Film and Media Arts.

Among the professors outrageous tweets are “The only thing stronger than white fear is white guilt, “Yes, I want to walk into every room with the confidence of an average white man”, But I’d also like average white men to walk into every room feeling like none of their qualifications will ever be enough but they still need to find a way to prove they deserve to be there.”

She also made positive posts about the alleged killer of the United Healthcare CEO, the alleged killer being Luigi Mangione.

“She reposted one tweet that read, “Luigi Mangione is going to win Dancing with the Stars,” wrote another that said, “Y’all, this is it. Luigi is going to announce Reputation,” and asked in another, “Ok, but can Biden add Luigi to the pardon list?”

Avila calls herself a “queer Mexican-American writer-director” and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Film Media and Gender & Women’s Studies.

This professor’s most recent work includes directing a season of the “LGBTQIA+ series Guys Like You.

She also played a part in anti-Christian films, including “Have a Little Faith”.

Have a Little Faith is about “A rebellious teenager is determined to get kicked out of her new Christian High School and teach the new boy she meets there what it really means to ‘have a little Faith.’

In addition to her work their its clear this professor is left wing  “She teaches a “Diversity in Film” class, which “will focus on topics including but not limited to: feminism, gender, sexuality, race and economic class systems.”

In addition to this course, Prof. Avila put together a “Queer Representation with Cinematographer Savannah Bloch” event during Pride Week.

It should be clear at this point that the student in question did nothing wrong and, on the contrary, exposed the hate being espoused by a person tasked with education at the University of Utah.

Clearly, things are backwards in academia.

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House Democrats Vote Overwhelmingly Against Crackdown on Foreign Influence in American Schools

Two separate bills were voted on in the House of Representatives on Thursday which were aimed at cracking down on foreign influence in American schools. They both passed, but more than 160 Democrats voted against them.

Why would Democrats vote against these bills? What are they trying to protect? Do they want more foreign influence in our schools?

It’s just amazing that whenever something comes up that is aimed at putting Americans first, Democrats always seem to be against it.

FOX News reports:

More than 160 House Dems vote against crackdown on foreign influence in US schools

More than 160 House Democrats voted against a pair of bills Thursday aimed at keeping foreign influence out of U.S. schools.

Both pieces of legislation passed with bipartisan support, though Democrats’ top ranks opposed each one.

“We just want to educate our children, focus on reading, writing and arithmetic, developing a holistic child, giving the ability to them to think critically,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., told Fox News Digital when asked about the pushback.

“We’re not going to be lectured by a group of Republicans who are dismantling the Department of Education in real-time. Literally 90% of the Department of Education as it existed last year is now gone.”…

One of the two bills was led by House GOP Policy Committee Chairman Kevin Hern, R-Okla., and would block federal funds from elementary and secondary schools that have programs, cultural exchanges or other class-related activities that get dollars from the Chinese government…

The second piece of legislation, led by Rep. Aaron Bean, R-Fla., would require every public elementary and secondary school to notify parents that they have a right to request information about any “foreign influence” in their child’s school.

The House GOP put out this video highlighting the bills and raising awareness about the influence of China’s Communist Party in American schools.

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Germany: Over 1,100 teachers sign explosive letter stating many schoolchildren cannot tie their shoes or use toilet paper anymore

More than 1,000 teachers in the German state of Hesse have called for comprehensive changes in an incendiary letter, which has been delivered to the state’s Ministry of Culture. In the letter, they state that many elementary school children are not able to complete simple tasks such as tying their shoes or use toilet paper.

“Keeping order, recognizing and adhering to rules, using the toilet independently,“ are all listed as tasks students cannot do in the new resolution, which includes using toilet paper themselves.

Students can also no longer “cut, glue, sit (upright), or tie their shoes,“ the report reads, which was reported widely in the German media, including Welt.

Citing the letter, Junge Freiheit also reports that “independent personal hygiene is not always a given – colleagues even reported students who did not know how to use toilet paper.”

The letter also states that the children feature serious attention deficits, with the teachers writing: “Many children are no longer able to listen or follow instructions for long periods of time.”

The damning letter comes at a time when Hesse is experiencing unprecedented mass immigration, including into its school system. Already in 2022, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Integration reported that an estimated 50 percent of all children under the age of 6 were foreigners or had a foreign background. In the last three years since the report, many of these children have entered the elementary school system.

Teachers also report in the letter that they need to spend an enormous amount of time teaching children simple skills, many that were once taken for granted.

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Mum taking legal action against SA government after teen exposed to ‘bestiality’ and ‘incest’ in public school presentation

A mother is taking legal action against the South Australian government over claims her 14-year-old daughter was exposed to a school presentation referencing bestiality and incest.

In an exclusive television interview, Nicki Gaylard broke down as she explained why she plans to sue the state in the District Court of South Australia to ensure no other family has to suffer the same distress as hers.

The impending lawsuit is being funded by faith-based legal organisation Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) International, which is working with Ms Gaylard’s local Adelaide lawyers.

The hour-long presentation was part of a Respectful Relationships program meant to “promote LGBTQIA+ inclusivity and acceptance” that was delivered to year 9 girls by an external provider in March last year at Renmark High School in regional South Australia.

Ms Gaylard, a mother of six, wept as she recounted how her daughter Courtney felt so upset by the presentation, she left halfway through and went to the school’s sick bay.

Her mother collected her from school early and withdrew all her children attending the school that same day.

They now attend a local Catholic school.

“The first thing she said was: ‘They’re talking about having sex with animals’, so it took me a few minutes to get my jaw off the floor,” Ms Gaylard told Sky News.

“She said they just presented this list of words… Bestiality was one of the words and she said: ‘No one knew what that was, Mum.’ One of the girls asked: ‘What is bestiality?’

“(The presenter) said: ‘Oh, it’s having sex with animals, but don’t Google it girls’.

“When your daughter comes home from school, you don’t expect them to tell you things like how uncomfortable, how unsafe and how trapped they felt.”

She said Courtney had told her the first thing the students saw when they walked in the room was a slide that read: “We can see queer-ly now” and the students were left with three external presenters and no teacher present.

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Homeschooling Hits Record Numbers

Whether called homeschooling or DIY education, family-directed learning has been growing in popularity for years in the U.S. alongside disappointment in the rigidity, politicization, and flat-out poor results of traditional public schools. That growth was supercharged during the COVID-19 pandemic when extended closures and bumbled remote learning drove many families to experiment with teaching their own kids. The big question was whether the end of public health controls would also curtail interest in homeschooling. We know now that it didn’t. Americans’ taste for DIY education is on the rise.

Homeschooling Grows at Triple the Pre-Pandemic Rate

“In the 2024-2025 school year, homeschooling continued to grow across the United States, increasing at an average rate of 5.4%,” Angela Watson of the Johns Hopkins University School of Education’s Homeschool Hub wrote earlier this month. “This is nearly three times the pre-pandemic homeschooling growth rate of around 2%.” She added that more than a third of the states from which data is available report their highest homeschooling numbers ever, even exceeding the peaks reached when many public and private schools were closed during the pandemic.

After COVID-19 public health measures were suspended, there was a brief drop in homeschooling as parents and families returned to old habits. That didn’t last long. Homeschooling began surging again in the 2023-2024 school year, with that growth continuing last year. Based on numbers from 22 states (not all states have released data, and many don’t track homeschoolers), four report declines in the ranks of homeschooled children—Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, and Tennessee—while the others report growth from around 1 percent (Florida and Louisiana) to as high as 21.5 percent (South Carolina).

The latest figures likely underestimate growth in homeschooling since not all DIY families abide by registration requirements where they exist, and because families who use the portable funding available through increasingly popular Education Savings Accounts to pay for homeschooling costs are not counted as homeschoolers in several states, Florida included. As a result, adds Watson, “we consider these counts as the minimum number of homeschooled students in each state.”

Recent estimates put the total homeschooling population at about 6 percent of students across the United States, compared to about 3 percent pre-pandemic. Continued growth necessarily means the share of DIY-educated students is increasing. That’s quite a change for an education approach that was decidedly not mainstream just a generation ago.

“This isn’t a pandemic hangover; it’s a fundamental shift in how American families are thinking about education,” comments Watson.

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