Today, U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon delivered remarks as part of her “The Next 250: American Education” speaking series. The Secretary is delivering these speeches to highlight Trump Administration’s K-12 education, workforce, and higher education accomplishments, and to lay out the vision for the next 250 years of education in our nation.
Secretary McMahon delivered her speech on the Trump Administration’s efforts to make higher education more affordable and accessible at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona, to students, educators, and local leaders. Her speech highlights how the Administration’s policies are lowering costs, providing much-needed transparency, and improving outcomes for students. Secretary McMahon also commended colleges across the nation, including Arizona State University, for delivering a high-value, world-class American education and leading the charge to restore higher education’s purpose as an engine of upward mobility.
Some highlights of the speech include:
“For generations, American universities were engines of national possibility – opening the doors of economic mobility to millions. They gave farmers’ children the chance to become inventors, teachers’ children the opportunity to become surgeons, and Americans from all backgrounds the confidence that higher education could set them on a path toward their own American Dream.”
“But in recent decades, corrosive trends have overtaken many of our campuses.”
“America is rich in talent – in grit, in young people with the power to build meaningful lives and contribute immeasurably to our nation.
Higher education cannot continue to squander their potential by saddling them with low-value degrees, staggering costs, and paths that do not match who they are and what they are called to do.”
“Now, thanks to President Trump’s leadership, we are delivering the most decisive realignment of higher education incentives in a generation.”
“The Trump Administration is reorienting higher education to ensure that there is no ‘lesser than’ degree or credential. Any pathway that offers an affordable route to a good career and a good life deserves to be celebrated, even if it doesn’t fit the traditional mold of a four-year degree sought in-person on a legacy campus.”
Watch the Secretary’s full remarks here(link is external) .
Read the full remarks here .