They don't help anything. They make things worse. They let government infringe on personal liberty and property ownership. Seven cents out of every school dollar spent in Massachusetts comes from the federal government, but they impose the lion's share of mandates and regulations and strings. The Constitution does not authorize the federal government to involve itself in education in any way, shape or form.
Federal involvement makes things worse.
Our illiteracy rates keep going up, our dropout rates keep going up. We need to get the federal government completely out of education. This is why we need a new bold direction. We need to make government small. We need to remove all the big government programs that don't work and return the taxes to the people.