By SUSAN JONES
In a generally cordial appearance before the state House Appropriations Committee, Pitt Chancellor Joan Gabel did face a few tough questions on antisemitism on campus.
She also took the lead on responding to how a cut in National Institutes of Health funding, proposed by the Trump administration, would impact the three large state-related universities — Pitt, Penn State and Temple.
And in what has become a perennial question, each of the higher education leaders, which also included Lincoln University’s president, were asked if they would pledge to freeze tuition if they got all the money they were seeking, along with bonus funds determined by a new Performance-based Funding Council (see related story).
Pitt has requested at 6% increase (around $9 million) over the $151.5 million it has received each of the past five years. Gabel said this increase “would offset the cost of attendance for in-state students, and has been tied to inflation.”
The performance-based funding, she said, “is for us to make the partnered investments in the programs and outputs … that serve the Commonwealth. They weren't described as the amounts that would hold tuition flat, although we have held tuition flat on all the regional campuses.”
The other three schools did pledge to freeze tuition if they get the increases and the bonus funds. For Penn State, that would mean a 12% increase or around $40 million.
Fighting antisemitism
Rep. Abigail Salisbury, whose district covers the eastern part of Allegheny County and who has law and master’s degrees from Pitt, said she and Sen. Jay Costa (D-Allegheny) met with Pitt Provost Joe McCarthy in December to discuss concerns about reports of antisemitism on the Oakland campus.
She said they discussed an article in the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle in which Barton Branstetter, a Pitt professor of radiology, talked about a social media group set up for medical students to help them study that became increasingly antisemitic. Jewish students, Branstetter said, became afraid and were told to start their own group.
Gabel said she was aware of the article and it was very distressing. “The University has consistently, vocally and actively condemned antisemitism and hate in all forms.” The chancellor said that all violations of students conduct had been pursued either internally or with law enforcement.
Gabel said the medical school has completely reformatted how that information is shared, and medical school students and administrators are going through training to be culturally competent to deal with these issues.
Salisbury also cited an incident Branstetter mentioned about a student going on an antisemitic rant during a pinning ceremony at the med school, and not being stopped.
Gabel said that and other incidents on campus are what led to the formation of the chancellor-level antisemitic working group. Paul Wallach from the medical school is co-chair of the group, along with Jennifer Murtazashvili from the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs. That group is still being populated with members and has not started working yet, Gabel said.
Salisbury said she’s also heard of professors offering extra credit to students who participate in anti-Israel protests, but not for pro-Israel gatherings.
Gabel said that any professor who has asked a student or suggested an activity outside the classroom, whether a protest or anything else that is not tied to the curriculum of the course, “is acting against the AAUP standards for what academic freedom contains and has received a conversation accordingly.”
NIH funding
Rep. Kyle Mullins (D-Lackawanna County) shared a very personal story when he asked about how cuts in NIH funding would impact the schools. Mullins’ father was diagnosed with ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease) in 2020 and died in 2023. “Outside of the comfort of whatever your faith is, the only hope here on Earth is for a cure or a treatment to emerge from one of your world-class research institutions.”
He pointed to plans approved last year by the state to support research into neurological diseases, while at the same time the Trump administration has proposed massive cuts to NIH funding.
Gabel spoke for the group when she outlined the impact of the funding in Pennsylvania.
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$2.2 billion in NIH funding to all schools in the state
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$5.24 billion in economic activity.
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21,784 jobs supported by NIH funding
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Around 7,000 NIH grants
“To say it’s a win-win for this investment to be made in your research universities goes without saying, but bears repeating,” she said
The proposed reduction in funding is for indirect costs, “which makes it sound as if the funding is not part of the critical epicenter of what makes this research possible,” Gabel said.
“It refers to if you’re running a lab, there’s also an electricity bill and somebody who has to fill out the paperwork to make sure you’re compliant. … We can’t do the research without it.”
Gabel said she and the leaders of Penn State and Temple would all agree that the process could be more streamlined and transparent. “But the idea that this isn’t a worthy investment is something we would passionately advocate against.”
“The impact of our world-leading position in being the best innovators across the board, but in particular in health sciences, biomedical engineering, treatments, cures, diagnosis, the way we train our clinicians, we are, without question, the global leader in this space, and the absence of the ability to invest in this space, I think, is a grave area of concern from a national security point of view as well,” Gabel said.
“We are grateful to our delegation in D.C., and to all of you for supporting the value of this work, for the treatments it secures and for the students who study and work in this area, also a very high need in terms of workforce.”
Susan Jones is editor of the University Times. Reach her at suejones@pitt.edu or 724-244-4042.
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