We’ve all heard about the changes to federal research funding since the beginning of the Trump administration. This episode of our special series Academic Freedom on the Line takes a deeper look at the landscape of federal research funding. How is research funding allocated? What is disrupted when these funds are precipitously cut? What could this mean for the future of research in the United States? To help us answer these questions, we call on experts in the fields of federal bureaucracy and legal studies. Our guests are Mary Feeney and Ethan Prall. Feeney is the Frank and June Sackton Chair and Professor in the School of Public Affairs at Arizona State University and Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration. Prall is an environmental legal scholar and scientist, a Harvard Law School grad, and currently an Abess Fellow, Society of Conservation Biology Graduate Student Fellow, and doctoral candidate in environmental science and policy at the University of Miami. 

Links to resources mentioned in the conversation: 

• AAUP Action Report: Understanding the Law and Policies for Grant Terminations for the National Science Foundation
• NSF Funding breakdown by state:  Workbook: NSF by Numbers
• NIH in your state: NIH In Your State - United For Medical Research 
• Science is US: Do science and engineering drive economic growth?
• Grant Watch tracker compiled by Noam Ross and Scott Delaney: https://grant-watch.us/ 
• 75th anniversary edition of The Endless Frontier by Vannevar Bush  

This episode of our special series in partnership with the Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom  zooms out from the “Trump versus Harvard” headlines to situate attacks on US higher education institutions in a transnational context. We ask an interdisciplinary panel of scholars studying different parts of the world to help us set aside American exceptionalist frameworks and understand what is happening in the US in broader geographical, historical, and political contexts. 

Our guests:
Audrey Truschke is Professor of South Asian History at Rutgers University in Newark, New Jersey. For the last three years, she served as chair of the Rutgers Faculty and Graduate Student Union Academic Freedom Committee. Her latest book, India: 5,000 Years of History on the Subcontinent was published earlier this month (June 2025).
Fatima El-Tayeb is Professor of Ethnicity, Race & Migration and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Yale University. Her research interests include Black Europe, comparative diaspora studies, queer of color critique, critical Muslim studies, decolonial theory, transnational feminisms, visual culture studies, race and technology, and critical European studies. The English translation of her book Un-German: Racialized Otherness in Post Cold-War Europe comes out this month (June 2025).
Eve Darian-Smith is a Distinguished Professor and chair of the Department of Global and International Studies at the University of California, Irvine as well as a fellow at the Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom. She is an interdisciplinary scholar trained in law, history, and anthropology. Her book Policing the Mind: The Antidemocratic Attack on Scholars and Why It Matters has just been published by Johns Hopkins University Press in May, 2025. 

Links to sources mentioned in the conversation: 

• “Fighting on Three Fronts” by Hank Reichmann
• Legal and Academic Resources for Academic Freedom and On-Campus Protests - Rutgers AAUP-AFT
• Policing Higher Education by Eve Darian-Smith 
• Un/German by Fatima El-Tayeb Translated by Elisabeth Lauffer
• India: 5,000 Years of History on the Subcontinent by Audrey Truschke 

Further reading: 

• Academic Freedom in India in 6 tables— IAFN 
• Punched, choked, kicked: German police crack down on student protests | Israel-Palestine conflict News | Al Jazeera
• Peace Petition Scholars, Turkey –Scholars at Risk   
• Hungary broke EU law by forcing out university, says European Court
• Discourse on Colonialism by Aime Cesaire 

This episode of our special series “Academic Freedom on the Line” takes a look at accreditation, a seemingly complex but essential mechanism for safeguarding both the quality of education our institutions offer as well as the institutional and disciplinary autonomy that allows them to create and enforce standards of rigor without direct interference from the federal government. Robert Shireman of the Century Foundation joins us to demystify the role of accreditation agencies and help us understand why changes to accreditation threaten academic freedom in the United States. 

Links: 

• CDAF’s Executive Power Watch Fact Sheet on Accreditation 
• Robert Shireman’s June 2024 report“Academic Freedom Is Under Attack. College Accreditors May Be the Best Line of Defense” 
• Robert Shireman’s March 2025 Article in the Chronicle “How an Accreditation War Could Start” 
• “AAUP Testimony to NACIQI”
• “Accreditation and Academic Freedom: An AAUP and Council for Higher Education Accreditation Advisory Statement”

In this episode, we speak with a coalition of student leaders actively organizing against state-level DEI bans in Texas and Kentucky. This is the third episode in the special series, "Academic Freedom on the Line," being produced in conjunction with the AAUP's Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom (CDAF).  Host Vineeta Singh also speaks with Clare Carter at the Freedom to Learn team to help us understand how state legislatures have attacked the principles of academic freedom, institutional autonomy, and shared governance, and then we get to hear from the students about what this has looked like on their campus, and how they have mobilized against these attacks. 

The episode guests are:

• Clare Carter, the Program Assistant for the Freedom to Learn Program at PEN America where she and the Freedom to Learn team work to combat state legislation that would censor higher education. You can reach her at ccarter at pen dot org 
• Dionicia Berrones, a Texas Students for DEI member who supports the collective with Administrative + Operational Tasks, Onboarding, and Outreach. She is completing an Ed.M. in Education Leadership, Organizations, and Entrepreneurship with a concentration in Identity, Power, and Justice in Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.  
• Angel Yongyin Huang, a senior at the University of Texas at Austin, majoring in Sociology and minoring in Social Work. Angel is also the Economic Opportunity Fellow for Every Texan and a leader in Students Engaged in Advancing  (SEAT), where she has been at the forefront of protecting students' rights by opposing educational censorship bills. 
• Laysha Renee Gonzalez, a proud daughter of Mexican immigrants and a first-generation college student. With the support of the Terry Foundation Scholarship, she achieved her dream of studying at The University of Texas at Austin, majoring in Race, Indigeneity, and Migration and Plan II Honors, with minors in Government and Women’s and Gender Studies, set to be the first in her lineage to graduate from a U.S. university this May.
• Savannah Dowell, a third-year undergraduate student at the University of Louisville double-majoring in history and gender studies with a minor in humanities. She’s also an organizer with the Kentucky Student Coalition for DEI focusing on student outreach and collaboration between public universities across the Commonwealth.
• Bradley Price, from Lexington, Kentucky by way of Natchitoches, Louisiana, is a junior undergraduate student at the University of Louisville, double-majoring in Pan-African Studies and English Literature with a minor in creative writing. She’s an organizer with the Kentucky Student Coalition for DEI, focusing on social media and collaboration between public universities across the Commonwealth.  

Links: 

• Get involved with Texas Students for DEI 
• Students for DEI at the University of Louisville 
• Follow these orgs on social media through the handles: 
  • @txstudentsfordei
  • @kystudents4dei
  • @students4deiuofl
• PEN America’s work on Education Censorship
• America’s Censored Classrooms 2024 is an excellent introduction to the work of PEN America’s Freedom to Learn Team 

This  is the second episode  of the limited series AAUP Presents: Academic Freedom on the Line. Our guest Dr. Stephanie Hall is a leading expert on college accountability and the for-profit higher education industry. Her research and advocacy in these areas have been instrumental for federal and state legislation, congressional oversight, and federal agency action. We ask her what the Department of Education is for, why the right perceives it as a threat, and how the right uses “polarizing” language to obfuscate its attacks on civil rights. 

CDAF host Vineeta Singh is joined for this episode by  Hall and Barrett Taylor. Dr Hall began her more than 20-year career in education as a middle and high school teacher in Atlanta and then Brazil. She has spent the past decade focused on policy issues including the governance of education policy and institutions, teacher education policy, undergraduate pathways, and workforce development, most recently as the senior director for higher education policy at the Center for American Progress (CAP). Prior to CAP, Dr. Hall worked with the Century Foundation and the University System of Maryland office of Academic and Student Affairs. Barrett Taylor is professor and coordinator of the higher education program at the University of North Texas. His research focuses on the relationship between universities and their environments, with particular attention to state politics and policy, the organization of academic work, and institutional inequality. 

Links:

• Stephanie Hall: What Will Happen to Your Student Loans if Trump Closes the Department of Education? | Teen Vogue
• Dear Colleague Letter
• Legal threat to Section 504 sets precedent for civil rights attacks, advocates say 
• CDAF Fact Sheet on Antisemitism Executive Order 
• Stephanie Hall: Invasion of the College Snatchers 
• Stephanie will be on stage at ASU GSV next month discussing and debating the oversight of higher ed. 

UPDATE from May 23, 2025: Educators and Unions Unite to Challenge Trump Attempt to Dismantle Department of Ed

This episode kicks off a new limited series hosted by the AAUP’s Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom (CDAF), AAUP Presents: Academic Freedom on the Line. CDAF serves as a resource and knowledge hub for all people—including faculty, students, campus workers, alumni, administrators, trustees, parents, journalists, policymakers, and business leaders—seeking to build a flourishing higher education system, rooted in institutional autonomy, workplace democracy, and freedom from coercion and external interference. Its current projects include an Academic Freedom field guide that curates resources for individuals, institutions, and organizations facing attacks on academic freedom and Executive Power Watch, tracking executive orders that impact higher education with fact sheets that break down what these new policies are intended for and how campus leaders can resist them. 

The guests are center Director Isaac Kamola and CDAF fellows Tim Cain, Don Moynihan, and Vineeta Singh. Isaac Kamola is an associate professor of political science at Trinity College. He is also the founder of Faculty First Responders, a program that monitors right-wing attacks on academics and provides resources to help faculty members and administrators respond to manufactured outrage. Tim Cain is a professor in the University of Georgia’s Louise McBee Institute of Higher Education and associate editor for the Review of Higher Education. Don Moynihan is the J. Ira and Nicki Harris Family Professor of Public Policy at the Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan and co-director of the Better Government Lab. Vineeta Singh is associate director of the Interdisciplinary Studies Program at Virginia Commonwealth University and will be the host for this limited series. 

Links:

• AAUP Presents episode Political Interference in Higher Ed: Escalations, Attacks, and the Billionaires Behind It 
• Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom | AAUP 
  • Academic Freedom on the Line Newsletter
  • Publications: Executive Power Watch, Action Reports, etc.
  • Academic Freedom Syllabus
  • Academic Freedom Field Guide
• Joan Scott on Academic Freedom as Ethical Practice
• Ellen Schrecker: Worse than McCarthy

In this episode we discuss the AAUP's statement "Against Anticipatory Obedience" which offers guidelines about how to respond to attacks on higher ed like those being launched by the Trump administration and its right wing allies. The statement says in times like these, "it is the higher education community’s responsibility not to surrender to such attacks—and not to surrender in anticipation of them. Instead, we must vigorously and loudly oppose them." Henry Reichman, a professor emeritus of history at California State University–East Bay and one of the statement's writers, walks us through the history and the recommended actions in the face of attack.

In part two of the episode, we discuss what specific steps faculty can take to strengthen their CBAs and handbooks to safeguard academic rights and governance.  The guests in part two are Mark Criley, a senior program officer in the Department of Academic Freedom, Tenure, and Governance at the AAUP, and Monica Owens is a senior program officer and field services representative in the Department of Organizing. The episode is hosted by Mariah Quinn.

Links:

• Against Anticipatory Obedience, AAUP
• 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure, AAUP
• Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities, AAUP
• Recommended Institutional Regulations on Academic Freedom and Tenure, AAUP
• Statement on Procedural Standards in the Renewal or Nonrenewal of Faculty Appointments, AAUP
• Understanding Academic Freedom, Henry Reichman, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2025
  
  
  

In this episode we discuss the AAUP's new statement On Institutional Neutrality. As college and university communities begin to suffer the consequences of unchecked power, the statement reaffirms that institutional neutrality is neither a necessary condition for academic freedom nor categorically incompatible with it—and that respect for faculty voices and shared governance procedures is essential to sound decision-making and the protection of those who dissent.

Our guests are the report's coauthors, Joan Wallach Scott and Brian Soucek. Scott is a historian and an  emerita professor at the Institute for Advanced Study and a member of AAUP’s Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure.  Soucek is professor of law and chancellor’s fellow at the University of California, Davis, School of Law. He is also a member of AAUP’s Committee A.  The episode is hosted by Anita Levy, a senior program officer in the Department of Academic Freedom, Tenure, and Governance.

Links: 

• The statement, On Institutional Neutrality 
• FAQs on Institutional Neutrality

In this episode we discuss the Nonpartisan College Voter Registration and Education Project, a student voter registration project that aims to increase student voter registration and turnout by asking faculty to devote five minutes of class time to voter education and on-the-spot voter registration.

The guests are Sam Novey,  Chief Strategist at the University of Maryland Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement, and Michael Rosenblum, professor of biostatistics at Johns Hopkins University and affiliate of the Johns Hopkins SNF Agora Institute for strengthening global democracy. He is an AAUP member in the Johns Hopkins chapter of the AAUP.

Episode links:

• Nonpartisan College Voter Registration and Education Project registration form 

In this episode we discuss  academic boycotts and the AAUP's revised policy on boycotts, released this August. We’ll hear more about the statement, how it came about, and where it fits in the current debates about academic freedom in higher education. The guests are Rana Jaleel, an associate professor at the University of California at Davis and chair of the AAUP's Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure, and Risa L. Lieberwitz, a professor at the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations and the general counsel of the AAUP. She is also a member of Committee A.

Episode links:

• 2024 Statement on Academic Boycotts
• “The AAUP Has Always Defended Academic Freedom. We Still Do,” Rana Jaleel and Todd Wolfson, The Chronicle of HIgher Education, August 21, 2024 
• “The AAUP Is Right, Supporting Boycotts is Academic Freedom.”  Joan Wallach Scott, The Chronicle of Higher Education, August 20, 2024
• “Changing My Mind About Boycotts, Joan W. Scott,” Journal of Academic Freedom, Volume 4, 2013
•  2006 Statement on Academic Boycotts