Compiled by SUSAN JONES

There has been no break in the news coming out about upheaval in higher education. If you’ve taken a break from the news this summer, we have you covered.

July 24: Butler University, a private school in Indianapolis, will no longer require students to take a class on social justice and diversity before graduating. Administrators made the decision, in part, to protect Butler’s eligibility for federal and state funding including financial aid, according to the email obtained by Mirror Indy.

July 25:

• Nearly 600 employees have accepted buyouts at Duke University, opting into a voluntary separation incentive program prompted by threats to federal research funding, WRAL reported. Duke officials said they also plan to start involuntary layoffs in August, even though 599 staff members took buyouts. Another 250 faculty members are also reportedly considering opting in.

• A federal judge in New York blocked the Trump administration's cancellation of $175 million in National Endowment for the Humanities grants allegedly related to diversity, equity and inclusion; gender ideology; or “environmental justice,” Inside Higher Ed reported. Judge Colleen McMahon said the agency violated the First Amendment in ordering the cancellation of grants “based on the recipients’ perceived viewpoint, in an effort to drive such views out of the marketplace of ideas.”

• The head of the U.S. Department of Justice’s civil rights division sent a letter requesting that George Mason University’s rector provide “all written communications” regarding a resolution its faculty senate passed last week in support of President Gregory Washington. Dated July 25, the letter signed by Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon says that the department was informed of the resolution commending “Washington’s efforts to ensure ‘faculty and staff demographics … mirror student demographics’ at GMU,” according to her letter.

July 28:

• The U.S. Department of Education announced that it has opened a civil rights investigation into Duke University and its law journal, based on allegations that the institution racially discriminates to select the publication’s editors. Separately, the Education Department and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services also sent a letter to university officials saying they’re reviewing allegations that Duke’s medical school and Duke Health racially discriminate in their hiring, admissions, financial aid and recruitment practices. 

• Brown has secured a $500 million loan amid federal cuts to research and financial aid in recent months, marking at least the second major loan the university has taken out in the span of four months, according to the Brown Daily Herald. The university originally struck a deal for a $300 million loan in April after the Trump administration announced it would freeze $510 million in federal funding to Brown.

• Higher Ed Dive reported that in the first half of the year, 16 states enacted 22 bills designed to censor higher education, according to an analysis released by PEN America, a free expression group. 

July 29:

• The White House Office of Management and Budget halted payments from the National Institutes of Health to researchers around the country, according to a memo sent to the institute and center directors at the agency the afternoon of July 29, STAT reported. Then late in the evening, after protests from members of Congress and patient advocacy groups, the Trump administration reversed the move and reinstated the funding. 
• Northwestern University plans to cut about 425 staff jobs— amounting to roughly 5% of the private school’s staff — senior leaders said in a community message. Nearly half of the jobs are vacant, while others will be cut through layoffs, which administrators are working to complete within 48 hours of the announcement, Higher Ed Dive reported. The Illinois university is navigating a host of financial challenges, including federal research funding cuts and a potentially higher endowment tax under the Republicans’ new spending law.
• The Justice Department alleged that UCLA violated civil rights law by failing to do enough to protect Jewish and Israeli students from harassment. The findings stem from UCLA’s approach to a pro-Palestinian encampment that students erected on the university’s campus in the spring 2024 term. UCLA officials declined to disband the encampment for nearly a week, citing the need to balance free speech protections with student and employee safety. The federal government is withholding an estimated $300 million in research grants from UCLA over the allegations.

July 30:

• More than three months after a federal court struck down an Education Department directive that barred any practices that consider race at colleges across the country, the Department of Justice declared that diversity, equity and inclusion practices are unlawful and “discriminatory,” Inside Higher Education reported. The DOJ memo suggests that programs that rely on what they describe as stand-ins for race, like recruitment efforts that focus on majority-minority geographic areas, could violate federal civil rights laws. The directive applies to any organization that receives federal funds, and DOJ officials warned that engaging in potentially unlawful practices could lead to a loss in grant funding.

• Brown University agreed to pay $50 million to Rhode Island workforce development organizations in a deal with the Trump administration that restores lost federal research funding and ends investigations into alleged discrimination, officials said. The Associated Press reported that the university also agreed to several concessions in line with President Donald Trump’s political agenda. Brown will adopt the government’s definition of “male” and “female,” for example, and must remove any consideration of race from the admissions process.

July 31

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey has announced plans to propose legislation that would devote $400 million to support research across the state amid federal funding uncertainty, Higher Ed Dive report. The money would be split evenly across two funds: a multiyear research funding pool to support projects at universities, hospitals and research institutions, and an additional funding reserve to support research and jobs at the state’s public colleges

Aug. 1

• The Senate confirmed Nicholas Kent, President Trump’s pick to oversee higher education policy by a 50-to-45 vote. Kent, who has deep ties to the for-profit college industry, will serve as undersecretary at the Department of Education and oversee billions in federal financial aid and is charged with ensuring America’s colleges provide a quality education, USA Today reported.  He said in his first letter to the department’s staff that his priorities include controlling student debt, building public trust and ensuring students experience a positive return on investment.

• Historian Rashid Khalidi, the Edward Said professor emeritus of modern Arab studies at Columbia University, has cancelled plans to teach this fall in response to the school’s recent agreement with the Trump administration. Khalidi made the announcement in an open letter to Columbia’s acting president published in the Guardian.

• George Mason University’s Board of Visitors gave Gregory Washington, its politically embattled president, a raise amid a series of federal investigations over his efforts to racially diversify its faculty ranks.

• The accreditor that oversees Harvard University said that it’s considering removing language from its standards that refers to diversity, equity, and inclusion, the Chronicle of Higher Education reported. The New England Commission of Higher Education — which accredits more than 200 colleges, primarily in the Northeast — is one of several major institutional accreditors that are reconsidering if and how members should demonstrate how they’re meeting diversity goals. In addition, nine Democratic lawmakers in the House and Senate who also are Harvard University graduates said they will investigate the Ivy League university if it agrees to a settlement with the Trump administration, Axios first reported.

Aug. 5:

• The Department of Health and Human Services, led by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., announced this week it is beginning a "coordinated wind-down" of federally funded mRNA vaccine development. This includes terminating awards and contracts with pharmaceutical companies and universities and canceling 22 investment projects worth nearly $500 million. While some final-stage contracts will be allowed to be completed, no new mRNA-based projects will be initiated, the HHS said. Pitt said in a statement: “In examining our grant databases, at this time we are not aware of any cuts to mRNA vaccine research that would directly affect us.” Infectious disease experts told ABC News that mRNA technology has been very successful in preventing severe disease, hospitalization and deaths, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

• Carnegie Mellon University laid off 18 staff members in its School of Computer Sciences this week in administrative and academic support roles, according to a statement reported on by WESA-FM. Staff were offered severance packages based on years of service. A spokesperson said it was a unit-level decision from the computer sciences school and not part of any university-wide restructuring. The university said the layoffs were made “to reduce costs and streamline resources to more efficiently operate in an evolving higher education landscape.”

Aug. 6:

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression sued top Trump administration officials, alleging their attempts to deport student visa holders over speech have violated the constitutional right to free expression and due process, according to Higher Ed Dive. The free speech advocacy organization filed the lawsuit on behalf of Stanford University’s independent student newspaper and two unnamed plaintiffs who entered the U.S. on student visas. It accuses the Trump administration of illegally deporting those it deems to have “anti-American or anti-Israel” views, creating a “pall of fear” that is “incompatible with American liberty.” 

Aug. 7:

• President Trump is now requiring grant-making agencies to senior political appointees who will review new funding opportunity announcements and grants to ensure that “they are consistent with agency priorities and the national interest,” according to an executive order. And until those political appointees are in place, agencies won’t be able to make announcements about new funding opportunities.

• Trump issued an executive action mandating colleges and universities submit data to verify that they are not unlawfully considering race in admissions decisions, according to Inside Higher Education. The order also requires the Department of Education to update the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System to make its data more legible to students and parents and to “increase accuracy checks for data submitted by institutions through IPEDS,” penalizing them for late, incomplete or inaccurate data. It's unclear who will be analyzing this data, given the cuts in the Education Department.

Aug. 8:

The University of Nebraska System is offering buyouts this fall to tenured faculty members eligible for retirement across its four campuses as the institution’s leaders look to shave $20 million from its budget, according to Higher Ed Dive. More than 500 faculty members will qualify, according to reporting from Channel 8 News. 

Aug. 12:

• The University of Chicago’s Arts and Humanities Division is reducing how many new Ph.D. students it admits for the 2026–27 academic year across seven departments — Art History, Cinema and Media Studies, East Asian Languages and Civilizations, English Language and Literature, Linguistics, Music (composition), and Philosophy — and completely halting Ph.D. admissions elsewhere, Inside Higher Education reported. Multiple language programs are among those affected.

• The Justice Department accused George Washington University of violating civil rights law by “acting deliberately indifferent” to instances of antisemitism on campus, according to NBC News. In a letter to the Washington, D.C., university, the DOJ said that Jewish and Israeli students and faculty were subjected to a hostile environment that was “offensive, severe and pervasive.” Citing clashes between pro-Palestinian protesters last spring and Jewish students, the agency said that the school failed to take appropriate action despite multiple complaints. George Washington University spokesperson Shannon McClendon said the school was reviewing the letter. “GW condemns antisemitism, which has absolutely no place on our campuses or in a civil and humane society. Moreover, our actions clearly demonstrate our commitment to addressing antisemitic actions and promoting an inclusive campus environment by upholding a safe, respectful, and accountable environment.”

• The National Science Foundation restored grants it recently suspended for researchers at UCLA, following a court order, a spokesperson for the agency said. The Los Angeles Times reported that roughly $81 million was restored. It’s a blow to the Trump administration, which had multiple agencies cut off more than $500 million in research funds to UCLA earlier this month and, according to the UC system, demanded a $1 billion settlement payment, Inside Higher Education reported.

Aug. 14:

A federal judge struck down the Department of Education’s guidance that threatened to strip colleges and K-12 schools of their federal funding over diversity, equity and inclusion practices it deemed unlawful, according to the New York Times. The federal government, the judge wrote, sought to “substantially alter the legal obligations of schools and educators” without providing enough notice or seeking public comment. The department’s missives caused “millions of educators to reasonably fear that their lawful, and even beneficial, speech might cause them or their schools to be punished,” she added.

Aug. 20:

• UCLA has paused faculty hiring for the next academic year and is consolidating its cross-campus information technology teams as the public institution weathers financial attacks from the Trump administration on top of existing budget woes. 
• The Department of Education is investigating Haverford College in Eastern Pennsylvania over allegations the institution hasn’t done enough to respond to campus antisemitism, according to Higher Ed Dive.
• The Department of Education said it plans to bring back more than 260 Office for Civil Rights staff that it cut as part of its March reduction in force, returning groups of employees to the civil rights enforcement arm in waves every two weeks Sept. 8 through Nov. 3. 

Aug. 21:

The University of Texas System Board of Regents voted to disband the system’s long-standing faculty senates in compliance with Senate Bill 37, the sweeping Texas higher education law that gives university boards and presidents control over faculty governing bodies.

Susan Jones is editor of the University Times. Reach her at suejones@pitt.edu or 724-244-4042.

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