👇🎯 The public isn't going to understand this, unless the presidents of R1 universities around the country <loudly> & <collectively> get out into the public square & start explaining this & calling out the existential threat to the entire 🇺🇸 university system. The silence is deafening right now. - ThreadSky

mcopelov.bsky.social • 1 day ago

👇🎯 The public isn't going to understand this, unless the presidents of R1 universities around the country & get out into the public square & start explaining this & calling out the existential threat to the entire 🇺🇸 university system. The silence is deafening right now.

Reposted from Tom Pepinsky

The public really needs to understand this. Every university system in the world rests on public funding, there has never been an alternative model at any time in history.

We have universities for literally the same reason that we have roads and armies.

Comments

finn-cak.bsky.social•22 hours ago

Presidents of R1s are run by board of Trustees who are conservative as heck and don’t want to see their corporate wealth deteriorate in the companies they hold. Presidents aren’t going to buck that.

16bracknell.bsky.social•17 hours ago

Sure, but Diaper Don and his chaotic DOGE and Project 2025 loons are going to drive not just the academies but the whole gloal economy into a ditch - and much of that corporate wealth will turn to ashes. They even want to trash the dollar itself! Global capital is getting ready to flee the US.

melscott98.bsky.social•5 hours ago

@upittpress.bsky.social Listen up! Make your voice heard! What are you waiting for? Silence won't help!

davidmouritsen.bsky.social•1 day ago

Perhaps they believe that this tyrant, like the Tyrannosaurus in Jurassic Park, won't see them if they don't move. Both assumptions are highly inaccurate.

mepafford.bsky.social•23 hours ago

What if Just-Lay-Low BLUE-Waits Too Long to Fight RED?

If BLUE holds to a, "Do Nothing and Let RED Implode", strategy-it can't Clearly Show any difference from Chaos-Ridden RED.

Voters Might Even Think, "Well, Hell. RED's Better Than Nothing."

BLUE Must Get Back In The Fight-Now!

ACT RIGHT NOW!

lieutenant-kije.bsky.social•3 minutes ago

Undermining the universities is like giving the nation a lobotomy.
The Nazis started to do this to Poland in July 1941. Killing the professors of one the leading universities.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_Lw%C3%B3w_professors

barrykiefl.bsky.social•21 hours ago

I imagine hundreds of thousands of Canadians have attended university in the U.S. I received a master’s degree from Boston University in ‘73. It was a wonderful experience.

In the Trump era will Canadians shun the great American universities in Boston? @BU_Tweets @Harvard @MIT

doubtthedefault.bsky.social•22 hours ago

This is the answer to "Why is China dropping supertons of cash into their University system?"

veracitas.bsky.social•20 hours ago

What will it take for Universities to unite, and say this is oppression of free speech, not to mention not factual for their facuity to teach how to detect Fascism?
Why are Georgetown (and Columbia next?) left to fend for themselves? Are the other institutions just operating out of cowardice?

iustitia100.bsky.social•19 hours ago

I loved the response from Georgetown.

veracitas.bsky.social•19 hours ago

A fitting double-finger salute with an FU on top.

It was great!

radicalrealism.bsky.social•1 day ago

Bullying media & universities to bring them to heel, wch is proceeding incredibly fast, is the first thing authoritarian regimes try to do bc it reduces public spaces wch otherwise accommodate art, speech & collective action that dissents, criticizes & contests the regime & its actions.

petergratton.bsky.social•1 day ago

And they still might not understand it! But you’re not saving up for a time to do the is later—if not now, later might not come.

mcopelov.bsky.social•1 day ago

Here is UW - Madison's budget. Our funder is the federal government. 25%. It used to be the state. Either way, the university in its current form ceases to exist if these federal cuts really happen. But The. Public. Doesn't. Know. This. And our leaders are absent from the public debate.

inkonelbows.bsky.social•22 hours ago

It's almost like Red states and the Heritage Foundation planned this entire scenario.

ncsudem.bsky.social•1 day ago

Columbia’s just the first. The goal, like Mao’s cultural revolution, is to destroy the “intelligentsia” and middle class.

The drain of all scientific expertise at NIH, NOAA, EPA, same goal.
No DOE and vouchers end free, public education.

A strong feudal state requires ignorance, poverty and fear.

brookied.bsky.social•1 day ago

This makes me want to cry. Then burn shit down.

mcopelov.bsky.social•1 day ago

It's maddening to get emails & go to Faculty Senate meetings & hear about all the monitoring & lawsuits & checking in with our peers & DC sources about what's happening & what we will have to comply with. Yes, of course. But You. Also. Have. To. Be. Out. In. The. Public. Square. Making. Our. Case.

ethanprall.bsky.social•1 day ago

So why aren’t they? Surely they make enough money to be insulated from financial risk. How do they overcome a collective action problem?

mcopelov.bsky.social•1 day ago

Again, the head-down, quiet strategy is bound to fail. It always does. We know this in WI from the Scott Walker years. R1 presidents need to get over their collective action problems & get out, in DC, right now, & engage Congress & the public, before it's too late.

clarkevanswx.bsky.social•1 day ago

100%. This is the story of UW-Milwaukee in the Walker era. Faculty encouraged to not make a fuss because leaders were working behind the scenes to advocate for better outcomes. That was a crock. The university is already shuttering programs, has few faculty <45, with more pain to come.

smidbot.bsky.social•20 hours ago

There is no penalty for being loud, angry, and non-compliant when the end goal is to end higher education anyway

Do not comply with anything

laney502.bsky.social•18 hours ago

Fascists: always coming to pluck out the educated leaders first.

ncweaver.skerry-tech.com•23 hours ago

To butcher Zapata, University presidents really need to understand it is better to die on your feet than die on your knees. You can't placate face eating leopards.

laywilliams.bsky.social•1 day ago

Things could have played out very differently in Wisconsin if the flagship campus had responded to Act 10 by shutting down Bucky Badger. I really believe that. But, alas, no one had the courage for that.

phasmatic.bsky.social•10 hours ago

College football is probably the main reason our universities get the support they do. There is nothing else in American culture that would suggest we would maintain an intellectual infrastructure that is the envy of the rest of the world.

jordynnjack.bsky.social•23 hours ago

Where are our professional organizations? I’m not in science so maybe I’m missing something. But aside from the AAUP I’m hearing nothing from our national and international associations advocating for our research and freedom of speech.

lazyrabbitann.bsky.social•20 hours ago

I was wondering about this too. It’s been too quiet! People are not making voices.

jordynnjack.bsky.social•23 hours ago

Here is one statement from the NCTE https://ncte.org/blog/2025/03/congress-federal-grant-cancellations/

sokudoningyou.bsky.social•1 day ago

I was at a two year Wisconsin college when Act 10 happened. One professor outright quit, a few retired. And now they've closed it down entirely as of last summer.

2heartswellness.bsky.social•1 day ago

Yep.

This is not the time to turn to write op-eds for the Chronicle of Higher Education and think your day of protest is done.

They need to get out in public and get loud. Otherwise...

katexas.bsky.social•22 hours ago

Encouraging your staff to like and share your LinkedIn post about the importance of NIH funding is likewise not gonna cut it

tagerai.bsky.social•1 day ago

Sort of makes you wonder if we’ve been selecting university presidents on their ability to woo and compete with each other for private donors rather than collectively make their case for the value of higher ed to the broader public

jheaton416.bsky.social•22 hours ago

I put my name forward for a search in the University Staff Congress last week, hoping to play my part in encouraging the administration to do something.

kstroopwafel.bsky.social•1 day ago

“A plague on both your houses.”

golfwriterkiel.bsky.social•1 day ago

I've been trying to tell the leadership at Illinois the exact same thing. "Don't put a target on our back" is stupid advice, because there already is a target on our back. We need to stand up and speak out, and fight back!

laureanne.bsky.social•1 day ago

.Edu
@amyklobuchar.com
@wyden.senate.gov @smith.senate.gov @markwarner.bsky.social
@aoc.bsky.social
@schatz.bsky.social
@joaquincastrotx.bsky.social
@senatorheinrich.bsky.social
@tedlieu.bsky.social
@booker.senate.gov
@repbonamici.bsky.social
@repjasmine.bsky.social
@kenmartin.bsky.social

notrite132.bsky.social•1 day ago

you expected them to show up?

idoamir.bsky.social•1 day ago

Good America is calling out for help, as they are being run over by the criminal occupying the White House. And it's not clear that anyone is hearing their call. This is so sad.

henrymn44.bsky.social•1 day ago

https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/irs-tops-1-billion-in-past-due-taxes-collected-from-millionaires-compliance-efforts-continue-involving-high-wealth-groups-corporations-partnerships

henrymn44.bsky.social•1 day ago

In 2019, the Trump U.S. Treasury Department estimated that the top 1% of Americans accounted for 28% of the “tax gap” — the disparity between taxes owed and taxes collected — totaling an approximate $163 billion each year.

Hammer revenue to Reps!! IRS firing INSANE unless you are a Millionaire +.

faculty.bsky.social•1 day ago

Pardon my ignorance, but where does athletics revenue fit in this donut…?

faculty.bsky.social•1 day ago

An attention-grabbing thing R1 presidents could do is to announce that should NIH (etc) cuts happen, they will reappropriate all athletics allocations into research to protect the core of their academic enterprise. If presidents had the chutzpah, this could stop the administration in its tracks.

mattva.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Do TikToks. Make this go viral

datadrivenbeltway.bsky.social•23 hours ago

Well, it's our job to make sure the public knows. Don't just post to Bluesky, we are the choir. Call journalists and get the word out.

kevinfry.bsky.social•21 hours ago

Also ... where are the faculty and students? Are they asleep while fascism creeps into their classrooms? I hate to sound like an old codger, but in my day we would have taken over the quad and occupied several buildings by now.

phasmatic.bsky.social•10 hours ago

This crop has been *completely* turned off about domestic politics. They shut down because of the toxicity. Trump has been the main character since they were in grade school, and all they know about the Dems is that Biden was old and supported genocide.

anthrofeminisms.bsky.social•22 hours ago

📌

kierceldwen.bsky.social•6 hours ago

@aidanosullivan.bsky.social

daveamp.bsky.social•22 hours ago

chunkytoast.bsky.social•20 hours ago

I would like to see the Chancellor speak up. I would likely donate if there was a call to action to UW alums to help keep scholarships and research available.

mjherrera5.bsky.social•1 day ago

Pathetically, our dem congresspeople can’t even be bothered to “loudly & collectively” do this with ANYTHING going on.

doxy-cycling.bsky.social•1 day ago

If we has news media that did their jobs informing the public, that’d sure help a lot

arlecchinoswart.bsky.social•1 day ago

It's impossible to be safe in this environment. There should have been a coordinated response to the Dear colleagues letter, but instead they all decided to try to muddle through.

pordy24.bsky.social•20 hours ago

Every scientist needs to leave their lab and campus to speak in public fora about their scientific work the way Pasteur did in his life. Most of the public has no idea what work is being done in universities. Don’t expect administrators to do this, SPEAK UP, tell your story.

wakeup92.bsky.social•1 day ago

Universities are big players....call a press conference!

historyned.bsky.social•13 hours ago

The scary part is how many Uni admins seem to be happy to take a huge financial hit if it means centralizing power at the top of the admin structure in partnership with the largest private donors.

isocket.bsky.social•1 day ago

What!? It's almost as if the university system doesn't actually represent this bastion of liberalism that has been decried by the right since forever.

annab73.bsky.social•1 day ago

No one can seem to find a voice these days

ongoingslaughter.bsky.social•21 hours ago

They are WELL compensated. Ffs!

szeto.bsky.social•21 hours ago

Johns Hopkins seems to be doing that with their campaign https://hub.jhu.edu/research-saves-lives/

jeanieeous.bsky.social•1 day ago

🧬 #ScienceNotSilence #standupforscience2025
#ScienceSavesLives

tawmussohhh.bsky.social•1 day ago

Ofc you know this but they’re all afraid to make the first move and be made an example of like Columbia. As if keeping heads down will save us.

rajtham.bsky.social•1 day ago

@gregggonsalves.bsky.social

bkilus.bsky.social•1 day ago

https://youtu.be/wjOG1ohZvVA
HeritageFDN/Trump see Hungary as THE model to emulate.Oligarchs control media/newspapers sharing only propaganda; fired UniversityBrds replacing with Sympathizers;stole govt wealth; removed checks&balance; silenced investigations/critical voices.They’ll betray U.S. like Ukraine.

alexandra-gee.bsky.social•1 day ago

But the Repugnant party and MAGA don’t care about education and saving higher learning. Universities should be screaming from the rooftops.

writeon1.bsky.social•21 hours ago

If it weren't for research universities, there wouldn't be any Silicon Valley, and we'd never have heard of tech bros. And a country with 5% of the world's population wouldn't dominate much of anything.

mhairiforrest.bsky.social•1 day ago

The president of Gallaudet University has been explaining what is happening. They are especially vulnerable as they're specifically mentioned as targets in Project 2025.

You can't get rid of Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion in higher ed & allow a school like Gallaudet to thrive.

iustitia100.bsky.social•19 hours ago

: (

carlagmail.bsky.social•23 hours ago

📌

curator1967.bsky.social•6 hours ago

Yes! All University Presidents must stand up!

cskellum.bsky.social•22 hours ago

Everyone, not just universities, is acting like this. Individuals and individual institutions fear Trump’s retaliation. Unified collective action against a common enemy is what’s needed now.

duimaze.bsky.social•20 hours ago

Republicans slashed our state education budget by 25% in Michigan, so that will cut down on enrollment in colleges and universities. It will also increase the number of future uneducated Republican voters. 🤷‍♂️

https://michiganadvance.com/2025/03/06/michigan-house-republicans-pass-20-billion-spending-plan-to-democrats-ire/

chadmbriggs.bsky.social•1 day ago

So many institutions won't survive, especially small private ones. And if they deep six the Dept of Education and scale back student loans, the effect will cascade everywhere

buildcommunity.bsky.social•1 day ago

Travel to Florida CD-1 to Canvas for Gay Valimont for Congress. They are offering limited supporter housing for those who may need accommodations while volunteering. Help knock on doors any time this month. Thwart their voter suppression efforts.

Flip the House!

https://www.mobilize.us/gayforcongress/event/758552/

verum-loqui.bsky.social•20 hours ago

Conservatives have had a plan to control and privitze education since the 70's (see the Powell Memo) and the 80's (Reagan defunding education)

interrodanger.bsky.social•21 hours ago

They’ll understand when there are no doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc

snowmein.bsky.social•1 day ago

So much for the B1G commitment to research. Well I guess it is not as if they were delaying a football season.

lilmsmisanthrope.bsky.social•20 hours ago

We pretend education should function without public investment. Nothing reveals national decline quite like abandoning knowledge itself. Even ancient Athens understood that civilization requires common investment in learning. Universities, like roads, are foundations, not luxuries.

sandraeb.bsky.social•1 day ago

Trump wants to dumb down America so people won’t understand what he is doing.

corynwolk.bsky.social•1 day ago

My R1, like other unis, is also hugely dependent on international students for revenue (mostly but not only tuition). IDK what their plan is if intl students avoid the US, can't even get visas, or are forced out, especially with less federal revenue. Cutting staff and grad stipends only goes so far.

semiquaver.bsky.social•21 hours ago

"to promote the general welfare"

cgame3.bsky.social•23 hours ago

They, like everybody, thing, legislator, seem scared to say
ANYTHING!!

biknmusicmama.bsky.social•21 hours ago

I have been looking at colleges with my kid all month and the deafening silence about all this at the chipper admissions events has been something.

mattva.bsky.social•12 hours ago

So, do it. Call your local media. Got on TV

mattva.bsky.social•12 hours ago

*get.

mattva.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Call @chrislhayes.bsky.social

mcdecency.bsky.social•5 hours ago

All the science based career layoffs alone will cause a 10-15 year brain drain.

Cutting off University funding of the sciences, will cause us to quickly spiral into a 3rd world country.

adriheguy.bsky.social•1 day ago

Agreed but it won’t happen. You’d think they would have learned from history that keeping your head down and laying low does not help.

markr51.bsky.social•1 day ago

The tech-fascists imagine their llamas endlessly regurgitating regurgitated regurgitation will replace the knowledge creation and preservation function of the university system.

wookietv.bsky.social•10 hours ago

Adding this definition of R1 because I wasn't aware of the term, in case others may not.

R1: Very High Spending and Doctorate Production is reserved for institutions that spend at least $50 million annually for research and award 70 or more research doctorates each year.

jksilver.bsky.social•21 hours ago

The only people to benefit from the insanity of the MAGAts destroying American research institutions are our adversaries. Nonetheless, this in and of itself in no way confirms that tR*mp is a Ruzzian asset. 🙄

carovina.bsky.social•22 hours ago

This wouldn't make them understand it. We are in end-stage Reaganism: trickle down made everybody so much poorer that they resent every tax dollar spent, no matter on what, and every individual, including university presidents, who has more. There's no social compact left to underpin anything.

susanlowry1.bsky.social•18 hours ago

I agree. In fact, universities and students have common cause here. Which makes the silence worse.

tanyajoosten.bsky.social•21 hours ago

I agree but can't see it happening around here any time soon.

rocbrady.bsky.social•21 hours ago

Perhaps law firms should do the same, as they are not shielded from this corruption: 2 law firms were banned from entering fed buildings.
One firm represented Hillary Clinton in 2016, the other worked w/ special prosecutor Jack Smith on 2 Trump criminal cases.

paulaptb.bsky.social•1 day ago

And some of those universities (Columbia for example) are as much worried about appeasing their donors and trustees as they are the government. There’s no given that Columbia’s chief stakeholders oppose Trump’s actions.

td12212.bsky.social•20 hours ago

To become a fascist country one of the things you do after controlling the prosecutorial and military machinery is control the universities, their faculty and the politically active students. Watch for "preferred" universities to emerge. Presumably one's in the south.

phasmatic.bsky.social•10 hours ago

The tried to do that with Florida when Sasse was prez, but he only lasted a few months. And it was a right wing Board of Trustees that forced his resignation due to financial improprieties.

phasmatic.bsky.social•10 hours ago

There was a barely noticeable Gaza protest and he used the cops to bust it up under a thin pretext, expel the participants, and criminally charge some, got some laudatory Fox News coverage.

abegoldberg.bsky.social•1 day ago

Unfortunately, they each have an individual incentive NOT to do it. Or, in some cases, boards hire cautious (and complicit) presidents they know won’t do it.

It begs the question of who on our campuses defends against politically-driven overreach and attacks on academic freedom.

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