10 Extreme Challenges Facing Schools

TL;DR

*Schools face 10 extreme challenges
- assessment
- funding
- deportations
- opposition to trans students
- mental health
- AI/AGI world
- a struggle to engage students
- too many hats
- war risks
- resource redistribution and civil conflict
*These extreme challenges create interlocking and cascading impacts that worsen them all.

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People are often very harsh on schools for not doing X, Y, and Z (and also A, B, C, D, E, F, and G….).

However, there are 10 extreme challenges that schools are simultaneously facing and managing daily, which makes change difficult.

(1) Assessment. This is repetitive: Most school assignments can be (substantially) completed with AI tools. Most schools have not reacted to this. Many lack the time or resources. Others have been given bad advice about the power of AI. Many were bought under the spell of AI-writing detector companies. Student use of generative AI, even when prohibited by simple or complex guidance, continues to accelerate, and the capabilities of tools they have access to for $20/month continue to grow. DeepSeek now affords them access to a model on par with ChatGPT-01 for free.

(2) Funding cuts. Public schools have no idea what funding will look like for this year, let alone next.

Trump has “temporarily” frozen tens of thousands of grants, directly and indirectly, supporting schools, from kindergarten to university research. K-12 schools with the most financially challenged and disadvantaged populations receive more grants, so they will be the most affected.

Yesterday, a judge put the freeze on hold, but as of this writing, it’s not clear that Trump will comply with the decision, as the financial portal is still closed. And it’s only a reprieve. Regardless, “grant activity that uses or promotes the use of DEIA (diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility) principles and frameworks” (both very ideas that include many activities) can’t continue. [That’s from an email sent to many grantees yesterday].

Shit, they don’t even want things to be accessible. My gut reaction is to tell them the same thing a Greyhound bus driver said to an ICE agent, but that won’t resolve the issue.

Going forward, even beyond freezing money that Congress has already committed, $2.5 trillion in spending cuts are on the table, with no reductions planned to Defense, Social Security, or Medicare, and increases in other areas.

There is no way to take $2.5 trillion from the budget without significantly impacting schools. Saving funds currently spent on “illegal immigrant” children isn’t going to offset the loss of hundreds of billions of dollars of federal funds.

The entire federal budget is approximately $6 trillion.

$1.5 trillion is spent on Social Security
$1 trillion is spent on Medicare
$1 trillion (almost $800 billion) is spent on the military.

That’s $3.5 trillion. If you want to cut $2.5 trillion in a $6 trillion budget, not borrow more money, protect current tax cuts, and increase spending on deportations and other agenda items, it’s pretty clear the rest of the budget is facing massive cuts.

And it’s not just direct education spending that is under fire. Many nonprofits (“NGOs”) also support schools, and conservative interests are after their money.

At the university level, universities were already facing challenges due to the demographic cliff and other factors; now, many research grants are in limbo.

The future of federal education spending is uncertain. At best, schools can hope that most of it will fall.

(3) Deportations. Schools used to be off-limits for deportations, but they are no longer. Whether you agree with that or not, it’s another issue school administrators have to deal with: following procedures when the feds come knocking to look for students to deport. 

Also, enforcement used to be limited to ICE, but now the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the US Marshals Service are all involved.

This will probably make schools more hesitant to cooperate with law enforcement. In the past, if the ATF showed up at a school, schools would likely think they still needed to follow procedures but that there was a potentially serious issue they had to address with the ATF. Now, most (not all) will feel they must do what they can to prevent Johnny and Alice from being deported. Regardless of what one thinks of the issue, managing deportations is another thing that is now on many school administrator’s plates.

Also, many were initially convinced that the feds would only deport criminals and accused criminals. Still, there aren’t that many “illegal” immigrants who are criminals, even if you count the accused (the total for both groups is no more than 500,000). So, if you are going to deport millions of people, you can’t just go after the criminals.

On January 28th, both the administration and the Heritage Foundation started to shift the definition of “criminal” immigrants to everyone who is here unauthorized.

So, yes, they are coming for everyone. Support it or not, this will have a significant impact on schools.

4. Alienated trans students. Just yesterday, Just today, Trump signed an executive order that severely restricts gender-affirming care for transgender minors under age 19, prohibiting federal funding for such medical care and requiring federal agencies to withdraw from organizations that provide transgender healthcare guidelines. The impact of these anti-transgender policies has been devastating for mental health. Crisis hotlines have seen an overwhelming surge in calls from distressed transgender youth - the Rainbow Youth Project reported receiving over 5,500 crisis calls in just 10 days, compared to their usual 3,700 monthly calls.

Transgender students face increased bullying, with some being told they will be forced "back in the closet." Trump intends to exclude transgender students from Title IX protections affecting pronouns, bathrooms, and locker room access.

Research has shown a direct link between anti-trans laws and increased suicide attempts among young people in states that have passed such restrictions. The constant political attacks and the threat of losing access to essential healthcare have created an environment where transgender youth feel targeted and unsafe.

5. Mental health. Many teachers are still waiting for education to return to its state before the pandemic. They complain that kids aren’t focused and that behavior problems have increased. But, for better or worse, students are reoriented, and 2019 isn’t returning. The only thing some schools have come up with so far is cell phone ban bandaids.

6. Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) refers to AI systems that can learn, reason, and apply knowledge across various tasks at or beyond human-level intelligence. Unlike today’s narrow AI, which is programmed to excel at specific tasks such as language translation or image recognition, AGI could quickly adapt to new challenges and domains, essentially “thinking” for itself and exceeding the abilities of all humans at all knowledge work.

If AGI arrives—and many experts suggest at least a 50% chance it could happen within the next five years (with some say as early as 2026)—it would radically redefine our society. Current projections about the future of work would be completely upended: jobs that require routine or even complex intellectual skills might be automated far faster than we expect.

With machines able to learn and adapt better than humans, this shift could lead to mass displacement of workers, necessitating a new “social contract”—one that might include measures like universal basic income (UBI) or large-scale retraining programs to help people navigate a world where human labor is no longer needed to the same extent. As OpenAI’s Sam Altman notes

(T)he whole structure of society will be up for debate and reconfiguration.

Given the current political structure, there would not appear to be any support for universal income.

A significant concern is that schools are not trying to prepare children for this potential reality. Education typically focuses on traditional paths (college degrees leading to stable careers), but those paths could change or disappear if AGI emerges and reshapes the economy. Indeed, the question “What decently-paying job will certainly exist 5 years from now?” is becoming increasingly challenging to answer confidently. Even careers considered “safe” today—like medicine, law, or software engineering—could be profoundly impacted by a rapidly advancing AGI, leaving experts uneasy about making any guarantees.

Americans are not even ready for robots walking on the street, as is becoming more common in China, let alone AGI.

7. We don’t talk to students. In many schools today, the most pressing and relevant issues that directly affect students—such as school funding, escalating political conflicts, and rapid advancements in artificial intelligence—rarely get the attention they deserve in the classroom and are sometimes even “off limits” as topics for faculty to discuss with students.

Instead, school curriculums are often constrained to “safe” or traditional academic topics: math, reading comprehension, history in broad outlines, etc. While these subjects are important, ignoring the biggest real-world concerns sends a signal to students that their immediate challenges and anxieties are either inconsequential or that schools are disconnected from reality.

Students live in a digital age with near-constant exposure to news cycles, social media, and real-time discussions. They see headlines about budget cuts for their very own schools, hear polarizing political statements, and witness incredible breakthroughs in AI every day. They understand, at least intuitively, that these are not distant “grown-up” problems: decisions made now will directly impact their future—where they will go to college, what careers will be available, and how secure they’ll feel in their communities. They also think the adults have screwed things up pretty badly and don’t exactly think the decision-making should be left to them.

Beyond that, kids know there is a slight disconnect between school and the future. In an age where billionaires aspire to colonize Mars and scientists push the boundaries of AI to create what some describe as “superhuman” cognition, society seems poised for a massive transformation. At the same time, teachers are spending countless hours trying to catch students who might be using chatbots to write their papers. While we strive for astonishing feats in space travel and intelligence augmentation, we are clinging to a broken-down version of Turnitin.

8. Lots of hats. Schools are increasingly caught between conflicting expectations from parents, communities, and policymakers. Some parents demand a return to “traditional” education, while others push for more progressive, tech-integrated approaches. At the same time, schools are expected to address societal issues like mental health, diversity, and safety, often without additional resources or support. Some do not believe public education is succeeding and are actively trying to undermine it. Balancing these competing demands is a significant challenge for administrators and educators.

9.War risks. Growing military conflicts and geopolitical tensions are creating ripple effects that impact schools directly and indirectly. The war in Ukraine, rising tensions between China and the West, and other regional conflicts have increased defense spending, often at the expense of domestic programs like education. At the same time, geopolitical tensions can create fear and uncertainty, influencing classroom discussions and shaping students' perceptions of the world.

While seemingly unrelated to education, Trump’s controversial demand to acquire Greenland reflects a broader trend of nationalist and expansionist policies that can strain international relations and divert attention from domestic priorities like education. Similarly, challenges in critical global infrastructure, such as the Panama Canal and Trump’s interest in taking it back, highlight the overall instability of students' living age.

10. Resource distribution and civil conflict. At its core, politics revolves around who gets what in society - from wealth and opportunity to power and influence

While minor adjustments to this distribution can typically be managed through established channels of negotiation and policy-making, radical reallocations—particularly those involving trillions of dollars—pose a far more significant challenge to societal stability. Such dramatic shifts threaten the delicate balance that maintains social cohesion, often triggering intense resistance from those who stand to lose their advantages while emboldening those who might gain to push more aggressively for change.

Adding to this complexity, as noted, the emergence of powerful AI technologies promises to reshape our economic and social structures, redistributing more resources to the top. In American politics, this technological disruption, combined with existing pressures around resource allocation, creates a perfect storm of societal tension that reverberates through every institution and risks wider conflict.

Educational institutions are particularly vulnerable to these converging forces of change, and large public schools involve daily interactions with conflict-affected communities. 

Schools and administrators must now navigate an increasingly complex dynamic where their traditional mission of education becomes entangled with managing civil strife and community tensions. The learning environment, which requires stability and focus for effective teaching, risks being compromised by security concerns, polarized community sentiments, and the immediate effects of rapid economic and social transformation. This places educators in the challenging position of trying to maintain educational quality while managing the spillover effects of broader societal upheaval, potentially compromising the educational prospects of the next generation. These tensions are probably more likely to impact teaching and learning than any change within the curriculum.

Compounding and Cascading Challenges

Managing these ten challenges simultaneously creates a web of interconnected problems that amplify each other, making traditional solutions ineffective. 

A fundamental resource contradiction is at the core of this complexity: Schools face severe funding cuts while simultaneously expanding their responsibilities. They must now provide mental health support, manage deportation procedures, support transgender students, and adapt to AI in education—all with (potentially radically) diminishing resources. This creates an impossible situation where schools must do more with less.

The uncertainty surrounding these challenges paralyzes long-term planning efforts. With funding in flux, the looming possibility of AGI disrupting the job market, and growing geopolitical and domestic tensions, schools struggle to prepare students for a future that becomes more uncertain by the day. Traditional career guidance becomes questionable when AI might dramatically reshape the job market, understanding of what it means to be human, and how we interact with each other before current students even graduate.

Community tensions further complicate these challenges. Schools must delicately navigate political polarization around transgender rights, immigration enforcement, and resource distribution conflicts. These issues create friction between different community groups, making it harder for schools to maintain trust with all stakeholders. The inability to openly discuss these challenges with students further erodes trust and relevance, creating a disconnect between education and reality.

The AI assessment crisis has ripple effects throughout the system. It intersects with mental health issues, as students feel increased pressure and confusion about academic integrity and using AI to prepare for work. Due to resource limitations, developing new assessment methods requires time and money that schools lack. This challenge connects directly to broader AGI concerns as schools struggle to define which skills remain relevant to assess in a rapidly changing technological landscape.

The operational environment itself has become unstable. The combination of deportation enforcement, security concerns, and civil conflicts creates an unpredictable learning environment. This instability makes it harder to address mental health challenges or maintain focus on academic goals with the dwindling resources schools have. Schools must constantly shift between crisis management and attempting to maintain normal operations, forcing them into a reactive rather than proactive stance. Addressing any single challenge often inadvertently exacerbates others due to limited resources and competing priorities, creating a seemingly intractable situation for educational institutions.

Be kind to school administrators and teachers. They manage a lot. Other parents and leaders may also tell them to do the opposite of what you ask them to do.