I’m well aware that if you’re reading this, you’ve likely finished high school, moved on to begin your career or even decided to start your own business. So the threat by the Trump administration to dismantle or shut down the Federal Department of Education may not be on your radar. Or if it is, it may be outside of your top five things to care about. Well, hopefully this will convince you to pay a little more attention.

Prior to 1980 there was no Department of Education. It was established by the late President Jimmy Carter through an act of Congress. What should concern all of us, however, is why President Carter thought it necessary to create this new department in the first place.

In 1954 the US Supreme Court would rule on Brown vs. Board of Education. This ruling would outlaw the practice of “separate but equal” schooling in America. As any Black person attending school prior to 1954 could tell you, this was a farce. It was definitely separate, but certainly not equal. Students were subjected to outdated books, run down facilities and no access to the latest math and science tools. Black children, if they were able to get to school, faced barriers and challenges unlike their white counterparts.

At that time, individual state policies would govern who got what, so Jim Crow policies were felt from cradle to career if you were Black in America. Even after Brown vs. Board, many states would fail to comply with the ruling until several years later. Here in South Florida, many districts would not allow Black students to attend school with white students until the 1960’s. Rather than integrate white students into historically Black high schools like Booker T. Washington and George Washington Carver, those were downgraded to junior high schools.

These challenges were not exclusive to the South. Schools in Northern states like New York and Massachusetts had racial clashes around busing throughout the 1960’s and 70’s. Some of the worst states even closed their schools altogether, reopening as whites-only private schools in order to keep Black students from attending.

President Carter had to deal with this firsthand as governor of Georgia. Upon entering office in 1977, he understood that in order for rogue states and school districts to comply, there needed to be a federal agency overseeing the progress of students to receive equitable treatment regardless of race, gender, disability or economic circumstance. First through executive order and then through legislation, the Federal Department of Education was established to make sure that things like Title I, Title IX,  the Americans with Disabilities Act, and Civil Rights protections were guaranteed for all students. That is what DOE has been doing for over 40 years and that is why we cannot allow this current administration to tear it down.

My father endured segregated schools, so that I would not have to. It is our generation’s responsibility and those after to not fall asleep at the wheel and see those wins become footnotes in history.

Dwight M. Bullard is a former Florida state senator and the senior political advisor of Florida Rising.