The Federal TRIO Programs are educational opportunity outreach programs designed to motivate and support students from disadvantaged backgrounds. TRIO includes six outreach and support programs targeted to serve and assist low-income, first-generation college students, and students with disabilities to progress through the academic pipeline from middle school to post-baccalaureate programs. TRIO also includes a training program for directors and staff of TRIO projects and a dissemination partnership program to encourage the replication or adaptation of successful practices of TRIO projects at institutions and agencies that do not have TRIO grants.

Department of Education currently administers a budget of about $67.2 billion per year—$57.5 billion in discretionary appropriations and $9.7 billion in mandatory appropriations—and operates programs that touch on every area and level of education. The Department's elementary and secondary programs annually serve more than 14,000 school districts and approximately 56 million students attending some 94,000 public schools and 28,000 private schools. Department programs also provide grant, loan, and work-study assistance to more than 10 million postsecondary students.