The U.S. Department of Education seems to be putting its long-awaited Title IX athletics rule on the back burner, according to a regulatory update from the Office of Management and Budget on Friday.
In its Spring 2024 Unified Agenda — which also included updates for high-profile forthcoming regulations on student debt relief — OMB moved the athletics proposal to a “long-term action” without a rough deadline, meaning the agency doesn’t expect a regulatory action within at least the next year.
The controversial rule is expected to provide a framework for colleges and schools to include or exclude transgender students from athletic teams aligning with their gender identities.
Previously, the department had listed the regulation as being in the “final rule stage,” or one step away from release. Now, however, its final deadline is “to be determined,” per the agenda. The department did not respond to K-12 Dive’s request for comment on the indefinite delay.
The development comes as part of a regular administration update showing which agencies plan to issue rules in the long and short term.
The Title IX rule was originally proposed in April 2023. It was expected to be finalized later that same year alongside the broader Title IX rule, which was made final in April 2024 and provided protections for LGBTQI+ students. However, the department has delayed the athletic rule’s release multiple times, citing the high volume of public feedback the proposal garnered.
“The Title IX [athletics] proposal was submitted nine months later” than the broader Title IX proposed rule, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said last month. “It would have been great to put them together. But the reality is we would have had to delay the other one to get through this one.”
The athletics proposal garnered over 150,000 comments, compared to the more than 210,000 received by the broader rule. The broader rule took nearly two years to release after it was proposed in June 2022.
Although The Washington Post previously reported that the department had delayed the athletic rule’s release due to election year politics, the secretary vehemently denied those claims.
“It’s not because of the election,” Cardona said during the Education Writers Association’s National Seminar held last month in Las Vegas.
Even if the department issues a Title IX athletics rule, however, the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning the longstanding Chevron doctrine complicates its path — and the path of many other agency rules. The court’s decision, issued in late June, chips away at federal agencies’ wide powers to interpret and apply statutes, often carried out through rules and regulations. Now, that power will be tipped to the courts.
Regulations for student debt relief expected in the fall
Earlier this year, the Education Department released a regulatory proposal to provide student debt relief for certain groups of borrowers, such as those who have been in repayment for over two decades or those grappling with ballooning interest.
The draft regulations mark the department’s second attempt at mass student loan forgiveness after the Supreme Court struck down the Biden administration’s earlier plan last year. That plan would have wiped away up to $20,000 of student loan debt for borrowers with incomes under $125,000.
The Biden administration expects the new proposal will clear accrued interest on federal student loans for 23 million borrowers, fully cancel debt for over 4 million borrowers, and provide at least $5,000 in loan forgiveness for over 10 million borrowers.
The Education Department plans to release the final regulations for these plans in October, per the agenda.
The Biden administration also plans to release a separate debt relief proposal for borrowers experiencing financial hardship, such as those at risk of default. That regulatory draft is expected in September, according to the agenda.
December deadline for Title VI
OMB’s regulatory update also shows new deadlines for other education policy areas, including racial discrimination.
The Education Department has set a December 2024 deadline for releasing a proposed Title VI rule on protecting students from discrimination based on shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics, in addition to other forms of racial discrimination. The department’s attention to including shared ancestry under Title VI protections predates the latest Israel-Hamas war, but has increased in the wake of it.
“In this area, [the Office for Civil Rights] has received complaints of harassment and assaults directed at Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, and other students based on their shared ancestry or ethnicity,” the update says.
The high caseload related to these civil rights complaints, handled by the Office for Civil Rights, even contributed to the secretary’s request to Congress for more OCR funding in May.
New dates for other key regulations
Earlier this year, the Education Department brought together representatives from the higher education sector — including those from financial aid offices, accrediting agencies and colleges — to hash out the details of new policies in a process known as negotiated rulemaking.
The negotiators met several times from January to March with the goal of reaching consensus on a wide range of regulations, including those governing accreditation, state authorization and distance education. However, the negotiators largely failed to reach full agreement, giving the Education Department the freedom to write its own rules.
Now, the department plans to release draft regulations on distance education this July. It expects to release proposals on accreditation and state authorization in November, per the agenda.
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