It's been a week.

There's been a lot of news here in the U.S. related to the new presidential administration. Most of the attention in higher education has been focused on M-25-13, the memorandum issued Monday by the Office of Management and Budget freezing disbursement of "all Federal financial assistance." No one seemed entirely sure what that might include, but it certainly seemed to include grants and other funding that colleges and universities depend on and were in fact promised by the federal government. Then the memo was rescinded but the freeze wasn't rescinded and a federal judge blocked implementation of the freeze but apparently the freeze is still happening.

If you find this confusing, you're not alone.

I read this article by Jeffrey Mervis at ​Science, posted yesterday evening, and it cut through some of the mud. The National Science Foundation is reviewing all of their existing grants per M-25-13 and "has blocked grantees and trainees from accessing funds while the review is underway." Mervis describes this as "wreaking havoc across the academic research community." Given what I know about how research works in higher ed, that sounds like a reasonable assessment of an across-the-board NSF funding freeze. There are all the ongoing research projects, especially but not exclusively in the life sciences, for which even a short-term funding freeze would be disastrous. And there are all grad students and postdocs and faculty and staff who won't get paid due to the freeze. I've lived paycheck-to-paycheck as some of these individuals do, and this will be a real hardship for many, both professionally and personally.

And that's just the NSF slice of "all Federal financial assistance."

This freeze doesn't even seem to be legal, given that the Impoundment Control Act of 1974 explicitly forbids this kind of action. Not surprisingly, there are calls to resist. Here's cosmologist Katie Mack on Bluesky yesterday:

And education professor Jeff Greene on Bluesky this morning:

Mack and Greene are responding to the current freeze, but there are longer term stakes here. M-25-13 makes clear that the freeze is to give federal agencies time to review all grants and similar programs to ensure they are in line with the new administration's priorities. This means potentially dramatic shifts in what kinds of research grants are funded by the federal government along with potentially much lower levels of grant funding for institutions across the board. Just as changing demographics are going to have a significant impact on tuition-dependent colleges and universities, reduced federal research funding poses a big problem to research universities. In a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats), these are what we call threats, existential ones at that.

Frankly, this is all overwhelming. I feel like I've spent the last week in flight-or-fight mode.

Sidebar: I learned from Liz Norell's new book, The Present Professor, that we humans have two other ways of reacting to stress: freeze or fawn. That makes a lot of sense. I've definitely seen some fawning this past week.

How can we help our colleagues across higher ed? I called my congressional representatives, as one does, and actually talked to a person on one of those calls, which I didn't expect. Where else can I maybe do some good? I spend a lot of time thinking about teaching and learning, so how might I leverage those skills?

I mentioned the new administration's priorities above, one of which includes ending "DEI" efforts across the federal government. I put "DEI" in quotes because there's clearly some confusion over what that term means. The initialism, of course, means "diversity, equity, and inclusion," but it seems that not everyone uses the term to refer to the same kinds of actions. Some seem to think it means hiring individuals because of their minoritized identities instead of hiring more qualified candidates. I can imagine that sometimes happens, but that's certainly not what DEI means in the contexts where I've worked and taught. More typically in higher education, DEI means working to include more people of different identities in various educational and career pipelines and/or creating structures that better support all individuals in succeeding in those pipelines.

When I'm running a job search and I work with my HR recruiter to post the job ad in places where minoritized candidates are more likely to see it or when I revise that job ad to make the application process more transparent to candidates who might be unfamiliar with academic hiring practices, I'm not lowering the bar on the hiring that I do. Rather, I'm increasing the pool of strong candidates the search committee and I can consider. And when I add structure to my course or grade for mastery learning or provide wise feedback to my students, I'm not setting lower standards for my course. Rather, I'm providing students of all backgrounds with the support structures they need to meet my high standards. Those are the DEI initiatives I see in my work, and they result in a stronger workforce and more students succeeding in their educational goals.

Maybe the term DEI is too contested to be useful anymore, but when it comes up, we should make sure everyone in the conversation knows how we're using it. We should argue that those goals of broadening educational and career pipelines and better supporting all the individuals in those pipelines are good goals. Those of us involved in this work need to be telling the stories that explain this work. Lots of people won't listen, but some will, and I think that's where we can move the needle.

Listen to my 2023 interview with Kelly Hogan and Viji Sathy for more advice on how to talk about DEI work with students and parents and administrators and other stakeholders. And listen to my 2024 interview with Emily Affolter for encouragement to continue doing the work of inclusive teaching even in these conflicted times.

In Case You Need It

If you need a little break from all this, I highly recommend checking out the Bluesky feed of the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District. It's both educational and entertaining! Two samples:

And this:

You're welcome.

Thanks for reading!

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