Officials announced Tuesday they are suspending hiring and will likely lay off staff and faculty as they cut administrative and academic budgets for fiscal year 2026 to address “unsettling” financial challenges worsened by a yearslong structural deficit and federal attacks on higher education.
GW will implement a hiring freeze for positions supported by operational funds until at least Oct. 1, limit non-essential discretionary expenses, review procurement contracts and planned capital expenditures and likely lay off some faculty and staff — a step officials said they “tried to avoid but cannot any longer” as President Donald Trump’s threats to federal research, international students and financial aid programs mount. The announcement comes as officials prepare the University’s FY2026 budget, which they announced in April would reflect a three percent reduction to address expenses surpassing revenues in recent years.
The announcement — signed by University President Ellen Granberg, Interim Provost John Lach, Chief Financial Officer Bruno Fernandes and Chief of Staff Scott Mory — states that University leadership will take voluntary temporary salary reductions and review current procurement contracts to cut costs. These steps add to measures officials announced in April, which included a pause on merit-based staff salary raises to combat “difficult and immediate budget challenges” and higher education “headwinds.”
The University’s revenue growth averaged 6.1 percent while expenses grew at a rate of 6.8 percent from FY2022 to FY2024, officials said in the statement, adding that the gap’s cumulative effect is “unsustainable,” and the measures announced in April “will not be sufficient” to balance the budget.
“Since our April 30 communication regarding initial steps we were implementing to address budget challenges, we regret to report that the financial outlook for FY26 continues to deteriorate for GW and for higher education more broadly,” the statement reads.
Officials plan to review the University’s consolidated budget with school and unit leaders in early August and present a final FY2026 budget to the Board of Trustees for approval in early September, according to the statement.
The possibility of staff and faculty cuts comes after Fernandes told the Faculty Senate in April that officials’ decision to suspend merit-based salary increases and cut the University’s expense budget by 3 percent was necessary to prevent layoffs. He told the Staff Council in April that the University was not discussing or considering layoffs, and avoiding this measure remained a priority.
Fernandes said in an interview Tuesday that officials’ concerns have expanded beyond canceled federal research grants to additional budgetary pressures, including uncertain international student enrollment tied to Trump’s travel bans and visa policy changes, and cuts to federal financial aid and loan programs. He said officials are evaluating these factors and taking subsequent measures, some temporary and some “more long term,” to address the University’s financial challenges in the FY2026 budget.
“We’re still saying that we don’t want to do holistic layoffs across the University, but there is some element of this that we have to allow leaders in the academic side and the administrative side to make decisions associated with their organizations and their individual units,” Fernandes said in an interview.
Officials do not anticipate a “significant downsizing” of staff or faculty, but they cannot depend on personnel growth to sustain the University, according to the statement. Officials said they will need to rethink how the University fulfills its education, research and service responsibilities to ensure staff and faculty workloads are “manageable.”
The University is also facing “many” years of declining master’s degree enrollments and revenue, which officials no longer consider temporary, per the statement. The statement also notes that many domestic students are experiencing financial uncertainty, which has affected enrollment and the amount of financial aid they need.
Financial uncertainty is “especially acute” among students in the Washington metropolitan area, the statement asserts, due to “drastic reductions” in the federal workforce and industry sectors that rely on business with the federal government.
A University spokesperson said Tuesday that several factors could impact enrollment, including visa processing delays for international students, demographic shifts shrinking the domestic applicant pool, broader economic conditions and a nationwide decline in master’s degree enrollment.
The University last experienced budget challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic, where officials stopped most hiring, halted base and matching retirement contributions for faculty and staff, laid off 339 staff and froze all employee salaries to mitigate the $180 million pandemic-induced budget gap in FY 2020.
Top University leadership took salary cuts to combat the effects of the pandemic, including former University President Thomas LeBlanc, then-Provost Brian Blake, former Chief Financial Officer Mark Diaz, former Director of Athletics Tanya Vogel and academic school deans. Fernandes said officials notified University leadership of the voluntary salary cuts this week, and do not yet have any information on who has volunteered to take cuts or what percentage reduction they will take.
Fernandes said the University has been working to address the structural deficit dating back to at least FY 2022, but recent “macro-headwinds” have caused officials to “accelerate” the process.
“The difference is that we probably would have taken three years to start to address this,” Fernandes said in an interview. “Unfortunately, we just don’t have that time, and so that’s why we’re accelerating some of these measures.”
Fernandes said when officials issued the April announcement, they were primarily informed by federal research grants and indirect costs. He said they have since learned of additional “headwinds” that have caused budgetary constraints, including uncertain international student enrollment due to travel bans and visa processing policies.
Officials last month urged international students to prepare for heightened social media screening and frequently check appointment availability at their local embassy or consulate for visa applications, after applications resumed following a nearly 20-day pause. Trump enacted a travel ban last month that could delay visas or deny entry to at least 50 international students at GW, according to enrollment data.
The National Institutes of Health canceled at least five GW research grants in March, and officials in May said 47 GW-affiliated research projects faced termination over the past year. Officials said in an email to faculty in March that the University could not supplement funds for externally funded research grants that NIH terminated or delayed.
The cost of officials’ efforts to resolve the growing debt of the Medical Faculty Associates is also impacting the University’s finances, according to the statement. Fernandes said the MFA is contributing to the University’s financial struggles, but is “not solely” the cause of the institution’s financial problems.
The MFA lost $48 million in the first half of FY 2025, adding to its more than $400 million debt to GW, officials told the Faculty Senate in March.
“We’re going to continue to address that issue, and we’ll have more to say about that in the near future. But that certainly is having an impact, obviously in our fiscal 25 and fiscal 26 results,” Fernandes said in an interview.
At least a dozen universities in recent months, including GW’s peer institutions Boston University, Georgetown University, New York University and the University of Southern California, have announced budget cuts, which may include layoffs and hiring freezes down the line to address frozen or eliminated federal funding and declining international student enrollment.
Officials said in the statement that potential threats to the University include continued reductions in indirect costs to federal research grants, significant changes to the federal research landscape, constraints on enrolling international students and limitations on federal financial aid and loan programs.
Fernandes said international enrollment is a large piece of the University’s tuition revenue, and officials won’t know the impact of restricted international student visas on enrollment until the start of the semester. Officials are engaged with colleagues at other universities and higher education associations to ask that the federal government reconsider these measures, including potential threats to federal research grants, constraints on the University’s ability to enroll international students and limitations on federal financial aid and loan programs, the statement asserts.
GW enrolled more than 3,600 international students in 2024, making up over 14 percent of the total number of students enrolled at the University, according to enrollment data. The majority of international students at GW are graduate students, with over 2,500 students enrolled in graduate programs.
“For FY26, we do not see a path forward to closing the gap between revenue and expenses other than to reduce expenses,” the statement states.
Several staff members told The Hatchet in June that they have had to adjust their budgets and financial plans to make ends meet following officials’ April announcement to halt merit-based salary increases to address financial challenges. Those concerns followed a year of staff frustration over low salaries and “overwhelming” burnout driven by mounting workloads and deficient support resources.
The Staff Council held a “listening session” on Tuesday, hours after officials sent the announcement, to answer questions and offer support. During the session, Staff Council President Kim Fulmer said representatives from the council met with Vice President and Chief People Officer Sabrina Minor ahead of the meeting to better understand the impact the new budget measures will have on staff.
On the call, Fulmer asked staff to type in the chat how they were feeling about the cuts, and they responded with words like “anxious,” “uncertain,” “anger,” “betrayed” and “furious.”
Fulmer said officials told her that there will not be “mass” layoffs like the University faced in 2020, which saw layoffs of 339 staff employees to mitigate financial challenges spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic. Courtney Frost, the council’s staff experience chair, said officials did not give a specific date for when layoffs would begin and noted the decision would be “localized” based on each unit’s budget needs.
“Please remain committed to us and we will continue to support you and offer what we can, which is a community and a voice and opportunities to get to know the rest of your staff at this University,” Fulmer asked of staff during the meeting.
