Research in Action
The NAEd is committed to connecting education research to practice and policy. Below are NAEd’s recent efforts to mobilize research knowledge to address current educational developments.
Lawsuit Challenging the Decimation of the Work of IES
In April 2025, the National Academy of Education (NAEd) and the National Council on Measurement in Education (NCME), represented by the Legal Defense Fund, jointly filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education. The lawsuit challenges the Department’s decision to cripple the collection of critical educational data—a move that significantly undermines evidence-informed research efforts to identify educational inequality as well as best practices which advance educational opportunities for all students.
The lawsuit argues that this decision severely hampers researchers’ ability to conduct timely research critical to producing evidence-based insights that inform educational policies and practices. For instance, extensive research has demonstrated the disproportionate educational disparities experienced by Black, Latino, and Native American students; students with disabilities; English language learner/multilingual learners; and socioeconomically disadvantaged students. Eliminating the collection of educational data jeopardizes efforts to monitor progress, assess the efficacy of pedagogical interventions, and ensure equal learning opportunities for all students.
Process: In May 2025, the NAEd and NCME filed a preliminary injunction accompanied by 11 declarations of NAEd members. On May 16, 2025, there was a hearing. On June 3, 2025, the court denied our motion for a PI. On July 21, 2025, we filed an amended complaint. The government filed a motion to dismiss. On February 25, 2026, the federal court allowed the lawsuit to move forward, rejecting the U.S. Department of Education’s attempt to have the case dismissed. The ruling finds that NAEd and NCME have plausibly alleged concrete harms from the termination of key federal education research studies and data programs, including the loss of nationally representative data and long-standing trend studies. The Court concluded that the organizations and their members rely on these studies and data to fulfill their research missions, and that the alleged harms are both specific and legally cognizable. With the motion to dismiss denied, the discovery phase of the lawsuit begins. The Department must produce internal documents and data explaining these decisions, and our counsel will likely get to question key Department decision-makers. This phase will give NCME, NAEd, and the broader research community a clearer picture of how the cuts affect data access, research, and evidence-based educational policy. NAEd and NCME believe this development marks an important step toward restoring the federal research infrastructure that supports the advancement of high-quality measurement research and evidence-based educational policy.
Amicus Brief Opposing Censorship Law and Urging Inclusive Curricula
In September 2025, the NAEd filed an amicus brief with the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit opposing Oklahoma’s classroom censorship law. Oklahoma’s law (H.B. 1775) limits public school curricula, pedagogy, and dialogue related to race and sex—running counter to well-established research on how students learn. The Act’s disruption of evidence-based pedagogical strategies severely restricts educators’ ability to teach core concepts, thereby denying students’ First Amendment right to access information that supports their learning. The Act clearly denies the next generation of Oklahomans access to inclusive curricula and pedagogical practices that further their successful cognitive, social, and emotional development, academic achievement, and preparation for democratic civic engagement. The NAEd brief, supported pro bono by Holland & Hart LLP, advocates for a multiracial group of students and educators – including the Oklahoma State Conference of the NAACP and the American Indian Movement Indian Territory – represented by the ACLU, the ACLU of Oklahoma, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and McDermott Will and Schulte LLP in their efforts to quash this harmful legislation.
Responses to Requests for Information (RFIs) from the Federal Government
Response to GSA Proposed SAM Certification Changes
On March 30, 2026, the NAEd, together with 28 other scholarly and professional societies representing more than 165,000 individual members and more than 170 colleges and universities, submitted a comment urging the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) to withdraw proposed changes to the System for Award Management (SAM) certification requirements for applicants and recipients of federal financial assistance. In particular, the comment raises concerns about proposed provisions related to so-called “DEI” activities, immigration-related conduct, public safety, executive branch guidance, and heightened false claims liability.
Response to ED Definition of Professional Student for Purposes of Student Loans
In March 2026, the NAEd filed a response to the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Postsecondary Education’s Request for Information regarding the proposed definitions of “professional student” and “graduate student” in connection with the implementation of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBA). Specifically, the NAEd explained how ED’s proposed operationalization of “professional” to excluded most graduate programs in education, school-based professions, and education-adjacent professions: (1) lacks coherence with the criteria of the proposed definition of “professional student;” (2) foreseeably harms the K-12 educator workforce supply; and (3) negatively impacts graduate access and career pathways, particularly for first-generation students and students from low-income households.
Response to IES Modernization
In October 2025, in its response to the RFI seeking input on “how IES can modernize its programs, processes, and priorities to better serve the needs of the field and American students,” the NAEd underscored that any redesign must comply with IES’s Congressional mandates. The NAEd also endorsed recommendations from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM)’s report, The Future of Education Research at IES: Advancing an Equity-Oriented Science, and offered additional recommendations to ensure that IES continues to play “a critical role in supporting the development of scientifically warranted research to inform the practice of education within schools and across community sites of practice.”
Response to ED Priority of Promoting Patriotic Education
In October 2025, responding to the Department’s priority of promoting patriotic education that will guide its grantmaking, the NAEd drew upon robust research evidence from its synthesis report Educating for Civic Reasoning and Discourse and related efforts and called for a more expansive approach to “patriotic” education. In addition to suggesting changing the name of the priority to “civic education,” the Academy also provided the research support concerning the benefits of civic education. The Academy’s recommendations urge the Department to expand its priority to ensure that “education in the United States…cultivate[s] a sense of national unity while also embracing the rich cultural diversity and heterogeneity of points of view that define the American experience of democratic pluralism.”
Response to ED Decision to Abandon State Reporting on Disproportionality Under the IDEA
In October 2025, the NAEd submitted a formal response objecting to the U.S. Department of Education’s proposal to no longer require states to report “Significant Disproportionality” data or alterations to their methodologies for calculating such data pursuant to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). There is a long history of racial disparities concerning students with disabilities, including the overidentification of students of color in certain disability categories; the placement of these students in particular (and often restrictive) educational settings; and the disciplinary actions imposed on them. Congress – acknowledging these concerns – added provisions addressing “significant disproportionality” in the 1997 reauthorization of the IDEA and further strengthened these requirements in 2004. Pursuant to the IDEA, states are required to collect, report, and evaluate data on significant disproportionality. The NAEd response articulates the history and importance of collecting and evaluating “significant disproportionality” data. Additionally, it questions how the Department can perform its monitoring and enforcement mandates without this critical data. Ultimately, the NAEd urges the Department to reconsider its decision so that it can carry out its statutorily required obligations, as well as its mission of “fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access.”
Letter to DHS and ICE Addressing Educational Implications of Immigration Enforcement Actions
On February 17, 2026, the NAEd sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) urging them to enact practices to ensure that all students feel safe and secure attending school and all parents and guardians feel safe bringing their children to and from school. Education has long been recognized as the backbone of our American democracy, and we have a strong legal and moral tradition of educating all children, regardless of their or their family’s immigration status. Historically, schools have been protected spaces in our society designed to nurture healthy development and educate and socialize future generations to democratic values. Grounded in research on child development, school climate, and student well-being, the letter summarizes evidence showing that heightened enforcement activity negatively affects student attendance, achievement, engagement, and mental health. Research documents increases in absenteeism following enforcement raids, as well as long-term harms associated with fear of family separation including toxic stress. Moreover, these effects extend beyond students in immigrant families and impact entire school communities.
Letter Urging the Civil Rights Data Collection
In July 2025, the NAEd, along with other education associations, issued a joint letter to ED, urging the Department to take immediate action to institute the 2025-26 Civil Rights Data Collection.