With help from Caitlin Emma, Kimberly Hefling and Michael Stratford

DEVOS SEIZES THE MOMENT ON SCHOOL CHOICE: After a rocky first month on the job, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’ big moment has finally arrived. Donald Trump’s budget blueprint calls for a major investment in charters and private schools, and DeVos — the billionaire who spent years championing such policies — is set to sell the plan to Congress. DeVos heads to Capitol Hill next week to answer questions about the proposal from the House Appropriations Committee — her first public appearance since the contentious confirmation process that transformed her into a punching bag for the left. She said Thursday she’s eager to get to work: “This budget is the first step in investing in education programs that work, and maintaining our Department’s focus on supporting states and school districts in providing an equal opportunity for a quality education to all students,” DeVos said in a statement.

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— Trump’s plan may be a small down payment on his campaign promise to invest $20 billion in school choice programs but it represents a radical departure for education policy. The question is whether DeVos can convince not just lawmakers but the American public that taxpayer money should be used to help families pay for private school tuition. In fact, she may have a hard time persuading moderates in her own party, some of whom have rejected such ideas in the past and who are sure to balk at cuts to other programs viewed as essential by educators and parents in their districts.

— Making her task more difficult: DeVos will have to justify the administration’s 13-percent hit overall to the Education Department — including to many popular programs designed to boost public schools, such as after-school programming and teacher training. A broad swath of the education world blasted Trump’s budget proposal on Thursday. “Either we support public schools or we undermine them, the children that attend them and the nation,” Thomas J. Gentzel, executive director and CEO of the National School Boards Association said.“That is the choice before us.” We lay out the fight to come here.

— Republican budget writers in the House, meanwhile, have already voiced skepticism about Trump’s proposed cuts to early childhood education and campus-based aid programs that help low-income students. “I’m not going to try to defend it,” Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) said of Trump’s budget, noting that it’s “a recommendation only.” Michael Stratford has more on that here.

SCOOP: Rokita’s working on the next step of “school choice” expansion. Rep. Todd Rokita (R-IN), chair of the House subcommittee on K-12 issues, told Morning Education that a bill he’s introduced to create a federal tax credit scholarship program to enable working class children to attend private schools, has attracted the interest of the Trump administration — and Rokita “absolutely” expects the effort to get traction. “I would be astonished if that bill wouldn’t move. We’re working hard on it,” Rokita, who is also vice chair of the House budget committee, said. He also predicted DeVos will “be well received” in the House despite the skewering she received from Senate Democrats during her confirmation. He called the Education secretary “the best spokeswoman out there on those ideas.”

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY AND WELCOME TO MORNING EDUCATION. If anyone is in Austin for SXSW and can grab some of these Twin Peaks goods, I will pay you to mail them to me. Bonus points if you somehow get these donuts to Arlington. Tips? Feedback? Hit me up: bwermund@politico.com or @BenjaminEW. Share event listings: educalendar@politicopro.com. And follow us on Twitter: @Morning_Edu and @POLITICOPro.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION REVERSES OBAMA BAN ON STUDENT LOAN FEES: The Education Department announced Thursday it was reversing an Obama administration directive that prohibited student loan collectors from charging certain fees. The 2015 guidance had prohibited guaranty agencies that collect federally-backed loans from imposing collection fees when borrowers default on their debt but quickly agree to start repaying. The guidance affected hundreds of millions of dollars in fees for tens of thousands of student loan borrowers.

— The decision came as the Education Department faced a deadline on Thursday to tell a federal judge overseeing a legal challenge to the guidance where the new administration stood on the case. The department’s ruling is a win for the plaintiff in that challenge, United Student Aid Funds, a guaranty agency that had also lobbied Congress to reverse the Obama administration’s guidance.

— Earlier this year, USA Funds agreed to pay $23 million to settle a related case, although it did not admit wrongdoing. The class-action settlement in that case provides for reimbursements for some 35,000 borrowers. The plaintiff was a woman charged $4,547 in collection fees after she defaulted on about $18,000 in outstanding debt even though she quickly agreed to repay her loans and bring them out of default.

— The Trump administration’s decision to undo the Obama prohibition on fees comes after Democrats, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass), had urged the Education Department to keep the guidance in place as a consumer protection measure.

CONGRESS SEEKS ANSWERS FROM DEVOS ON FAFSA TOOL SHUTDOWN: The leadership of three Congressional committees wants more information about the IRS and Education Department’s sudden decision earlier this month to suspend an online tool that helps students apply for financial aid. The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that the IRS Data Retrieval Tool – which allows students to automatically input tax information onto their aid form – was taken offline as a result of “criminal activity.” The Journal also reported, citing a congressional aide, that the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration had “opened a criminal investigation into the potentially fraudulent use of the tool.”

— The Republican and Democratic leadership of both Congressional education committees sent a letter to DeVos on Thursday, seeking a briefing about the decision to take down the tool. The lawmakers said they wanted to know “the cause and scope of the outage and the steps the [Education] Department and the IRS will take to assist students and families that are impacted.” Read the letter here.

— Democrats and Republicans on the House Oversight Committee and House education Committee also sent letters to DeVos and IRS Commissioner John Koskinen on Thursday expressing concern about the decision. The letters say that federal law requires the committees to be notified of “major incident[s]” relating to information technology within seven days. The lawmakers seek a range of documents and information about the shutdown of the tool by the end of the month. Read the letters here and here.

— The suspension of the online tool, which millions of students use each year to file their Free Application for Federal Student Aid, has already caused officials in Indiana and Texas to delay state-based deadlines for financial aid.

** A message from Pearson: Pearson is proud to partner with the Aspen Institute on the Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence, recognizing colleges redefining what student success looks like. Learn more about a previous winner of the Prize and a student’s story here: http://bit.ly/2n7AzMM **

TRUMP TALKING VOCATIONAL TRAINING TODAY: The president is set to lead a roundtable discussion on vocational training with U.S. and German business leaders this afternoon as part of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s visit. The meeting comes two days after Education Secretary Betsy DeVos told the National Lieutenant Governor’s Association that students too often are pushed toward four-year colleges. "I believe we should break the stigma that career options aren’t valid avenues," she said.

BUDGET A ‘SLAP IN THE FACE’ OF BLACK COLLEGES TRUMP TRIED TO WOO: When Trump signed an executive order last month aimed at supporting historically black colleges, he called the schools "a grand and enduring symbol of America at its absolute best." But the order failed to deliver on a major request from those college leaders: A call for more money for the schools. Things got worse with the release of Trump’s budget proposal, critics say.

— The blueprint calls for preserving funding for historically black colleges and other minority-serving institutions, even in the face of a steep 13-percent cut to the Education Department. But it also recommends cuts to programs that help low-income students pay for college — and which are particularly critical for these colleges. “He’s not genuine in his support of HBCUs in particular because he was willing to put forth a budget like this,” said Marybeth Gasman, who runs the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Minority-Serving Institutions. She called the proposed cuts “a big slap in the face” to the schools Trump claims he wants to help. “You can’t make all those cuts and then tell me that you support African American education — because you don’t.”

— “Less than three weeks ago, this administration claimed it is a priority to advocate for HBCUs but after viewing this budget proposal, those calls ring hollow,” said Rep. Alma Adams (D-N.C.), a member of the House education committee and the founder and co-chair of the Congressional Bipartisan HBCU Caucus.

— But it matters that Trump specifically preserved direct funding to HBCUs while calling for big cuts elsewhere in the department, said Johnny Taylor, Jr., CEO of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, which represents the nation’s 47 public and publicly supported HBCUs. “If you look at that in the context of cuts everywhere else — I don’t know that I’d celebrate it, but … it could have been worse,” Taylor said. Now the colleges can turn to lobbying Congress for the money that Trump didn’t give them, Taylor said.

— But the budget Trump proposed Thursday is “not reflective” of what Trump told HBCU leaders when he met with them last month, said Michael L. Lomax, president and CEO of UNCF, which represents many of the nation’s historically black colleges. “Without strong federal investments, President Trump’s commitment to HBCUs and the rebuilding of African American communities will be promises unfulfilled.”

WHAT’S UP WITH THAT TITLE I PROPOSAL? Trump’s “skinny” budget included a vague call for $1 billion in new Title I funds to be aimed at “encouraging districts to adopt a system of student-based budgeting and open enrollment that enables federal, state and local funding to follow the student to the public school of his or her choice.” Caitlin Emma parses what that might mean — including a possible long-shot attempt to make the funds “portable,” allowing them to follow students to the school of their choice, which Democrats and moderate Republicans have blocked in the past.

— Trump’s proposal could also be helped by a new pilot program created by the Every Student Succeeds Act. That pilot would initially allow up to 50 school districts to try out weighted student funding formulas, consolidating federal, state and local funding into one pot that would be allocated based on students’ needs. Jason Botel, the new senior White House adviser for education, said earlier this month that the administration is "excited" about the pilot. Some have interpreted his comments to mean the Trump administration plans to push the pilot as one way to incentivize school choice. An unlimited number of districts would be able to participate in the pilot by 2019-20. Some advocates think the pilot could be a "boon" for school choice.

SMACKDOWN OF MULVANEY OVER AFTER-SCHOOL COMMENTS: Trump’s budget chief Mick Mulvaney defended proposed cuts to after-school programs by telling reporters “we can’t prove” that the programs are actually helping students “get better in school.” Experts were quick to refute that claim. “Yes, actually, we can. So much data out there…” tweeted Joshua Eyler, the director of Rice University’s Center for Teaching Excellence. One study Eyler pointed to, by the Harvard Family Research Project, notes “a decade of research and evaluation studies, as well as large-scale, rigorously conducted syntheses of many research and evaluation studies, confirms that children and youth who participate in after-school programs can reap a host of positive academic, social, prevention, and health benefits.”

— “Anyone who thinks after-school programs aren’t working clearly knows nothing about them,” said Jodi Grant, executive director of the Afterschool Alliance. “We invite Director Mulvaney to visit some afterschool programs and learn more about them.”

HEY CONGRESS: ‘STOP BULLYING’: A group of Seattle middle-school students created a group called DC Bully Busters. Their goal is to “stop the bullying in Washington DC politics by teaching politicians what middle schoolers know about bullying.” They are asking members of Congress to sign a pledge not to bully or be a bystander in bullying tactics. The teens will be discussing the effort at a Capitol Hill event this morning with Washington Democratic Reps. Pramila Jayapal and Suzan DelBene.

REPORT ROLL CALL

— There are roughly half as many magnet schools as charters in the U.S., but they serve millions more students, according to a new Brookings report.

MOVERS AND SHAKERS

— Patrick Dobard, superintendent of Louisiana’s Recovery School District for the last five years, is joining the nonprofit New Schools for New Orleans as CEO. More in The Times-Picayune.

SYLLABUS

— Independent monitor raises questions about the effort to turn Corinthian campuses to nonprofits: The Washington Post.

— Washington Gov. Jay Inslee signs law delaying planned cuts to school tax rates for one year: The Associated Press.

— Six states still spend nothing on preschool: The Hechinger Report.

— Miami-Dade school board declares campuses “safe zones” for undocumented students: Miami Herald.

— A bill that would allow charters in more districts passes Missouri House: The Associated Press.

— Eric Hall, the CEO of Communities in Schools in North Carolina, will run the state’s new Achievement School District, a controversial effort to turn around low-performing schools: The News & Observer.

I know that things can really get rough when you go it alone. So follow the Pro Education team. @caitlinzemma (cemma@politico.com), @khefling (khefling@politico.com), @mstratford (mstratford@politico.com) and @BenjaminEW (bwermund@politico.com).

** A message from Pearson: Pearson is proud to partner with the Aspen Institute on the Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence honoring schools that strive for and achieve outstanding levels of success for all students. Prize Finalists deliver quality education and opportunities for good jobs to students of diverse backgrounds. Learn more about a previous winner of the Prize and a student’s story here: http://bit.ly/2n7AzMM **