Secretary of Education Linda McMahon testifies at the Capitol in Washington, DC, May 21. The Trump administration wants schools to sign a “pact” in exchange for priority access to federal grants.
Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images
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Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images
Monday is the deadline for a handful of universities to agree to a list of commitments aligned with the Trump administration’s policy priorities, in exchange for preferential access to federal funds.
The Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education was sent Oct. 1 to nine colleges — private and public — and would require schools to ban transgender people from using the restroom or playing sports that match their gender identity, freeze tuition for five years, limit the enrollment of international students and require standardized testing for admission, among other things.
Of the initial nine schools that received the document, as of Sunday evening, six indicated they did not plan to sign it.
MIT was the first school to issue a public statement: The document “includes principles with which we do not agree,” MIT President Sally Kornbluth wrote in a letter to Education Secretary Linda McMahon on October 10. “And fundamentally, the premise of the document is inconsistent with our fundamental belief that scientific funding should be based solely on scientific merit.
Following this rejection, President Trump wrote on Truth Social that all colleges could join, not just those who had received the letter.
Brown University, the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Southern California followed, with statements “respectfully” declining the offer.
On Friday, the White House held a virtual meeting with colleges that had not yet sent denial notices, including the University of Arizona, the University of Texas at Austin, Vanderbilt University, Dartmouth College and the University of Virginia. Three additional schools were also invited: Arizona State University, Washington University in St. Louis and the University of Kansas, according to The Wall Street Journal.
“Today’s conversation with national higher education leaders is an important step toward defining a shared vision, and we look forward to continued discussions in the weeks to come,” McMahon wrote on X after the meeting. She said participants had a “positive, wide-ranging conversation about the Compact.”
But following that meeting, two schools, the University of Virginia and Dartmouth College, announced they would not sign the agreement either. Dartmouth President Sian Leah Beilock said in a letter to students and faculty Saturday that she does not believe “an agreement — with any administration — is the right approach to achieving academic excellence.”
UVA said it did not want “any special treatment” when it came to federal funding.
“A contractual agreement basing evaluation on anything other than merit will undermine the integrity of vital, sometimes life-saving, research and further erode confidence in American higher education,” wrote UVA interim president Paul Mahoney. He said the university provided feedback to the administration and agreed with many of the principles outlined in the pact.
The former UVA president resigned this summer under pressure from the Trump administration following the university’s response to President Trump’s order to end diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
The White House did not respond Sunday to a request for comment on its plans for the future of the pact. An automated email response said there were staffing shortages due to the government shutdown and blamed Democrats.
Since Trump took office, the administration has canceled billions of dollars in federal research grants at numerous universities on a number of issues, including transgender policies, diversity, equity and inclusion programs, and anti-Semitism on campus.
