Felicita Piñón weighed just 1 pound at birth. She was later diagnosed with cerebral palsy that requires her to use a power wheelchair, and she also has learning and emotional challenges. Yet despite these obstacles, Felicita, now an eighth grade student, is just like any other happy, active teenager who hasn’t let her disability limit her. She also did something remarkable that’s not typical of most teens – in 2025, she testified against a school voucher bill at the Texas Capitol.

But in 2024, when Felicita wanted to join a cheerleading team at her Crowley, Texas, middle school, her mother, Liz Piñón, said the school was not willing to make accommodations for her, as she felt federal disabilities laws required. She believed the school was discriminating against her daughter on the basis of her disability, as well as her race. She also noted that she knew of other nearby schools that had girls in wheelchairs who participated on cheerleading teams.

As a result, Piñón – like thousands of others that year – filed a complaint with the federal Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights.

For decades, the Office for Civil Rights, or OCR, served as a critical safety net when local schools failed to meet federal disability standards. Now, sweeping budget and workforce cuts have restructured the office, leading to the dismissal of thousands of complaints without investigation and raising urgent questions about who will enforce federal special education laws when states fall short.

And while large caseloads, according to disability rights advocates, are not new for the Office for Civil Rights, parents at least used to receive confirmation that their complaint was received and being looked at. Today, however, it is not uncommon for parents to not receive confirmation – or any follow-ups to their case – even after it’s been dismissed.

Piñón’s complaint was rejected in July 2024, denied access to this link before President Donald Trump took office and ushered in the cuts at the Department of Education. It wasn’t the outcome she wanted, but it did provide her with important information and closure, and gave her comfort that she had a place to turn.

“Even though the department wasn’t perfect,” Piñón told me, “they still provided an extra layer of rights, guidance and technical assistance for schools and districts.”

As a teacher and district administrator in West Baltimore and in Washington, I’ve seen firsthand how difficult it can be for states, districts and schools to implement special education law on their own. And now as a professor and researcher at the University of Texas, I focus much of my work on improving schools for students with disabilities. I have talked to parents, advocates and school officials, many of whom are greatly concerned that cuts to the OCR will be harmful.

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