Headline Roundup • March 21st, 2025
How Are Universities Changing Under the Trump Administration?
Summary from the AllSides News Team
President Donald Trump has recently frozen funding for two Ivy League schools.
The Details: Columbia University faces an end-of-Friday deadline to meet Trump's demand to address purported antisemitism or lose $400 million in funding. The administration also froze $175 million in funding for the University of Pennsylvania over its transgender athlete policy. Several schools dismantled their Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs following an executive order from Trump, and the University of California system nixed its diversity statement requirement in its hiring process on Wednesday. Dartmouth's new general counsel is a Trump ally and the former chief counsel of the Republican National Committee.
From the Right: A Washington Examiner (Lean Right bias) piece framed the developments as Ivy League schools struggling “to balance prioritizing inclusive policies and complying with civil rights laws,” implying that Trump is bringing schools into compliance with non-discrimination laws.
From the Left: A New York Times (Lean Left) piece argued Trump was undertaking a siege on core ideals of education — “Rigorous thinkers who were grounded in the age’s great debates. Researchers whose breakthroughs could transform societies. Universities that extended their missions far beyond their gates.” Trump had a narrower vision for higher education, it said: “Teach what you must, defend 'the American tradition and Western civilization,' prepare people for the work force, and limit protests and research.”
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Featured Coverage of this Story
Columbia University’s interim president, Katrina Armstrong, faces no easy way forward.
If she cedes to White House demands over campus antisemitism allegations, she risks revolt from faculty fearing a loss of academic freedom. Refuse, and lose $400 million in federal grants and contracts, threaten the work of scores of Columbia scientists, and invite further sanctions that could imperil the entire university.
Sophie Park for The New York Times
In October 2023, three days before Hamas fighters attacked Israel, Columbia University’s new president stood outside Low Library and posed a foundational question.
“What,” she asked, “does the world need from a great university in the 21st century?”
The president, Nemat Shafik, argued that the world required much. Rigorous thinkers who were grounded in the age’s great debates. Researchers whose breakthroughs could transform societies. Universities that extended their missions far beyond their gates.
Some universities are attempting to balance prioritizing inclusive policies and complying with civil rights laws as the Trump administration threatens to cut funding to their institutions.
The Trump administration cut millions of dollars worth of funding to two Ivy League institutions it found in violation of civil rights laws this month, while another school in the conference hired a Trump ally as its top lawyer.
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