The University is weighing its stance on institutional neutrality, Provost Chris Bracey said at a Faculty Senate meeting Friday.
Bracey said he will host a community-wide virtual seminar with two legal scholars on campus free speech and institutional neutrality — a policy that mandates a university refrain in issuing statements on any political issues — April 21 at 3 p.m. The conversation will mark the beginning of “more extensive engagement” around the policy, which will “likely” involve a presentation to the Board of Trustees and the formation of a task force to “study the issue” and make recommendations over the summer, he said.
The process of discussing institutional neutrality will “perhaps” include additional engagement with the community next fall, he said.
A University spokesperson said in November that GW is not considering institutional neutrality “at this time” but that if officials were to consider adopting a stance, they would consult with community members. More than 15 American universities adopted the policy following the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
Later on in the meeting, faculty senator Guillermo Orti, the co-chair of the senate’s Professional Ethics and Academic Freedom Committee, introduced a resolution that proposed the senate endorse the American Association of University Professors’ statement on institutional neutrality.
The statement recommends that universities focus on the “practical results” of releasing individual statements related to social or political issues instead of adhering to a blanket policy of institutional neutrality.
The senate resolution states that adopting institutional neutrality is not the solution or “panacea” to the problems at GW and suggested that the University “look inward” at its principles to prioritize values like academic freedom.
Multiple faculty senators proposed amendments to clarify the resolution’s wording because of confusion over its definition of institutional neutrality and the statements that the University would or would protect under the policy. The senate unanimously voted to send the resolution back to committee for review.
Patricia Hernandez, a faculty senator and biology professor, said she received a “disturbing” email on Friday morning stating that researchers must submit their National Science Foundation grant proposals earlier than normal for reviewers to identify “naughty words” — like “woman” and “minority” — that federal agencies may flag as part of President Donald Trump’s anti-diversity, equity and inclusion orders.
“Have we now completely just given up and decided we are going to follow all of these executive orders so we can’t have women, minority, underrepresented minority, whatever these terms are?” Hernandez said.
Hernandez did not specify in her comments who sent the email. She did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
University President Ellen Granberg and Bracey said they were unaware of the email. Granberg said “some of that” is wanting to avoid the NSF’s rejection of “important science” due to the inclusion of certain words in grant proposals.
Trump’s administration has ordered agencies like the NSF to flag grants that include words like “antiracist,” “disability” and “marginalized” to determine if the grants comply with his executive orders aimed at eliminating DEI programs.
On the University’s federal research updates webpage, officials list federal actions “most likely” to impact research grant funding, including Trump’s rollback of DEI programs and the administration’s policy declaring there are only two genders.
The webpage also states investigators should forward all federal communications to the Office of Sponsored Projects, which will provide “specific guidance” for researchers on how to proceed.
Senior Associate Vice Provost for Research Gina Lohr said GW is “not saying” the proposals shouldn’t include those words, but instead is trying to “guide” researchers to word their grants in a way that will not immediately flag them as violating executive orders.
“We’re not saying you can’t use those words, but we’re trying to guide to say if you use those words, there’s a higher likelihood that your proposal will be just kicked out without review,” Lohr said.
Philip Wirtz, a faculty senator and professor of decision sciences and psychological and brain sciences, said he received calls from School of Business faculty on Thursday raising concerns about “cutbacks” in the school’s operations.
Faculty attributed the alleged cuts to increased money requirements they must give GW from the school’s revenue, also called a school’s margin, Wirtz said. Wirtz said GWSB faculty told him that officials attributed the “cutbacks” to a “dramatically” increased margin of school revenue that professors must give back to GW’s “central administration.”
“All of the deans have now been imposed in an almost after-the-fact way with additional margin requirements that they had not expected,” Wirtz said. “And they are therefore expected to cut back from their funds in order to account for the additional margin requirements for the central university.”
In response, CFO Bruno Fernandes said he’s “caught off guard” by GWSB’s alleged cuts and said officials did not impose them. He will “look into” any funding discrepancies happening in individual schools, Fernandes said.
He said the University has not ordered an increase on margin requirements to individual schools and that this year’s margin requirement was 1 percent, which he said is the minimum percentage that allows the University to “break even.”
“The margin requests that we put in place at the beginning of the year, the start of the budget process, has been consistent,” Fernandes said. “There’s not been a notification to increase that margin request, so I can look into that.”
Interim GWSB Dean Vanessa Perry said academic schools are in a “conservatorship” because officials do not report to academic deans regarding GW’s financial decisions. She said “leaks” are “usually” how deans learn about financial changes at the University.
“I think what Phil is saying, he’s using the term margin because mathematically, if you are reducing expenses more so than were originally projected, then in theory, that is an increase in the margin,” Perry said. “And so I think it’s the reduction in expenses that Phil is referring to.”
Officials need to be financially transparent by directly telling deans their decision-making process and how schools will be impacted by their choices instead of deans having to hear speculation through the “rumor mill,” she said.
Wirtz asked why officials didn’t mention at the senate meeting the “albatross” of the Medical Faculty Associates’ continued financial losses when discussing the alleged increase in margins.
“I just want to put you all on notice that the faculty is pretty doggone angry at this point and really doesn’t understand why we are supporting something like the MFA and its continued losses at what appears to be the expense of important academic initiatives,” Wirtz said.
Faculty senators have previously pressed University officials to address if the MFA’s losses are impacting the services GW is able to provide students, like financial aid and academic programs. The MFA lost more than $107 million in fiscal year 2024 and more than $48 million in the first half of FY25.
Granberg said in response there have been updates on the financial status of the MFA she cannot “announce publicly” but that officials are “working extremely hard” on the issue.
Faculty senator Jeffrey Akman, the former dean of the School of Medicine & Health Sciences, said he’s concerned the MFA has become the “boogeyman” for financial issues the University faces.
“I do think there’s a responsibility on trying to reduce the energy of these conspiracy theories that MFA is responsible for all the challenges facing this university,” Akman said.
Maria Cseh, a faculty senator and an associate professor of human and organizational learning, said Wirtz’s remarks on the alleged increased margins decreasing schools’ budgets is a “valid assumption” because “communication is not clear” from officials on financial decisions.
The Graduate School of Education and Human Development does not have a “single dime” to travel to conferences and conduct other operations, “putting such a stress” on faculty, she said.
“We know we are looking at the new budget system, but this budgeting and the threats surrounding us are putting such a stress on our colleagues and on us that I cannot describe,” Cseh said.
During her presidential report, Granberg said she plans to attend a conference call among university presidents over the weekend to start conversations about mobilizing universities against Trump’s executive actions, adding that she’s currently “not seeing a wave of organizing.”
Granberg said the federal government has revoked a “small number” of past and current GW students’ visas, and the International Services Office is available to provide guidance and support to students during this “extremely difficult situation.”
Laura Engel, a faculty senator and international education and affairs professor, said she’s “deeply troubled” by the visa revocations and asked Granberg to provide “more information” about how many students were affected.
Granberg said in response that she doesn’t know the “details” about the number of students or “the disciplines.” Bracey said it’s “a split” between current and graduated students but did not state how many visas federal agencies revoked from students.
Faculty senators also unanimously passed a resolution calling on the University to maintain its commitment to ensuring that the proportion of tenured and tenure-track faculty is “accurately and transparently monitored.”
Heather Bamford, a faculty senator and a professor of Spanish literature, proposed the resolution, which aims to “maintain” the requirement in the Faculty Code that faculty in nontenure-track positions should not exceed 25 percent in any school and that officials should tenure 50 percent of regular faculty in a given department.
The resolution suggests amending the code so GW’s calculations for total proportions of tenured and tenure-track faculty in each school include specialized faculty, or professors on a renewable contract that do not hold a regular or tenured appointment at another university.
Specialized faculty are making up an “increasing proportion” of full-time faculty and their exclusion in the proportion calculations is “obscuring the intentions” of the thresholds, the resolution states. In March, Bracey presented data that showed a steady reduction in tenure status for all regular faculty.
“This resolution calls on the administration to uphold the University’s long standing commitment to tenure and the integrity of the tenure-track system,” Bamford said.
Granberg said she anticipates the search for the new vice president for University advancement — which Aspen Leadership Group Managing Director Ron Schiller will lead along with the Search Advisory Committee — will finish after graduation. The new hire will begin in the fall, she said.
Bracey said the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, a nonprofit that provides university peer evaluations and accreditations, has begun appointing a steering committee and is inviting GW community members to discuss accreditation standards for GW.
A Middle States liaison will meet with community members April 18 to discuss accreditation standards and the launch of GW’s “self-study,” Bracey said.
Faculty senators also unanimously approved a resolution recognizing Feldman’s service at the conclusion of her tenure as Faculty Senate Executive Committee chair.
Arjun Srinivas, Hannah Marr and Jenna Lee contributed reporting.
