The Graduate School of Education and Human Development recently delivered imminent termination notices to three out of four GWTeach program leaders as the school undergoes “right-sizing” amid declining enrollment and years of financial turmoil. Faculty and students in the program said the notification, which came after Interim GSEHD Dean Lionel Howard sent possible termination notices to 25 percent of the school’s contract faculty in June, could spell the end of the GWTeach program. The GWTeach downsizing comes after almost a year of vague communication from officials, leaving faculty and students unsure of the school’s direction as it undergoes restructuring. GSEHD faculty and students deserve to be at the forefront of conversations regarding which positions get terminated and which programs will shutter, as officials have said the decisions remain largely unfinalized. The GSEHD community deserves an explanation on officials’ rationale for these decisions and a substantive update on how the school’s programs will look in the future. 

The communication thus far from officials reflects a lack of commitment to clearly informing the community about the University’s decision making process and the future of programs at GSEHD. Former Provost Chris Bracey’s June message first announcing the “right-sizing” initiatives states that non-tenure faculty and staff could see “potential changes” to their job statuses, and officials will “evaluate the number of staff” at the school as they combine classes, reorganize administrative duties and cut programs. The message did not include details about how the school and its programs would look moving forward, leaving faculty to fear that layoffs will target personnel essential to the school’s functioning, while larger class sizes and fewer courses could diminish its prestige. As of February, the status of 15 faculty members who received notices in June from GSEHD leadership that they might be laid off remains unclear, with about half told in December they might be able to stay at GW after 2026 and the other half were informed that the 2025-2026 academic year would be their last. The GWTeach program leaders likewise have little clarity about the fate of their program, with faculty reporting the contract nonrenewals will force the program to offer fewer classes, potentially pausing minor declarations and new student enrollment.

GSEHD currently hosts town halls and forums where community members can directly ask officials questions about their plans, decisions or offer feedback. But students and faculty have said officials are often vague in these meetings, providing little additional information than what they already communicated in community messages. In a town hall hosted on March 31, officials just said that they were going to have “talks” about the GWTeach program but did not explain any further, with community members saying officials have given “non-existent” information on what the future of GWTeach will look like. Instead, the meeting left them with more questions than answers. While the town halls are a crucial step toward expanding transparency, GW should be utilizing this platform more purposefully, coming prepared to answer specific questions and assuage faculty and student worries about the future of their programs. As officials work to consolidate classes, students are in the best position to inform them of which classes can be more lecture-based and have a larger roster of students, or which classes require small sizes to retain one-on-one faculty-student interactions. Officials are currently looking at cuts from a top-down approach, but that is not what the community needs. Decisions have to start with the recommendations of students. 

The lapses in transparency have not gone unnoticed by the community. In February, over 300 people signed an open letter drafted by Students and Alumni for a Viable Education GSEHD Coalition to University President Ellen Granberg and the Board of Trustees, urging them to boost transparency as officials work to consolidate classes, cut programs and lay off faculty and staff. The SAVE GSEHD coalition as well as the graduate student union has been outspoken in protests and in petitions about their desire for more communication on the fate of the school. We are asking GW to listen.

We as an editorial board recognize that myriad financial issues outside the University’s control are driving these cuts. GSEHD has faced declining enrollment of about 39 percent since 2014 as careers in education become less lucrative to incoming students, and as the educational landscape continues to evolve under President Donald Trump’s policies. Last year, Trump signed into law the One Big Beautiful Bill, which eliminated the Graduate PLUS Loan program that allowed students to borrow money to cover the cost of their graduate school program. The bill now limits students to borrowing no more than $20,500 in a year and caps the amount they can borrow in their lifetime to $100,000. Vice President and Dean of Enrollment Management and Student Success Jay Goff wrote in a memorandum last month that 84 percent of graduate students would be ineligible for higher loan caps under a new Department of Education proposal to restrict certain graduate programs’ access to higher borrowing limits. These federal actions have overhauled graduate education nationwide, as the University of Chicago, Harvard University and Michigan State have slashed down their graduate or doctoral programs, and officials at GW cut doctoral programs in the Columbian College of Arts & Sciences by 7 percent for the next academic year.

We recognize that cuts need to happen, but we ask that the University be transparent about their decisions and proactively engage faculty and students in the process. GSEHD faculty have reported feeling undervalued by officials, as they are consistently the lowest paid professors out of any school, and officials owe it to them to show through their actions and engagements that they care. Updates on GSEHD have been short-winded and do not actually detail what the “path forward” will look like or how officials are informing themselves on their decisions. It is not that our editorial board doesn’t believe officials are doing the best they can — but rather that their plans and thought process aren’t explained to the affected community members, which creates a lapse in transparency that they have to address. As officials navigate these cuts, they should be relying on the knowledge of faculty and students to inform their cuts and better serve the GSEHD community in a comprehensive manner. 

Budget cuts and cuts to programs in GW’s schools will never be easy, which is why GW must ensure that they are informing and cutting programs in the right way — communicating in a thorough, extensive and transparent manner. This is particularly imperative during a time when Trump continues to scrutinize academia and higher education. GW aims to create future leaders, which includes the development of professors and teachers as well as politicians and medical researchers. During a time when higher education faces a combination of unforeseen pressures, we need more people willing to take the helm of higher education institutions and combat this scrutiny. As a higher education institution, GW needs to be thinking of the students they are training who will someday lead these institutions. And in order for GSEHD to continue delivering a quality education to its students, GW needs to loop in community feedback more actively and directly as it reshapes the school’s future. 

This fall, GW launched and started to implement its strategic framework, which includes supporting graduate programs. Realistically, officials will have to make cuts, but the GSEHD community can still be somewhat part of the decision making by including their input and feedback and gauging what it is that students are saying about the program. The strategic framework commits to fostering a “strong and inclusive student experience,” which officials can achieve by consulting students on what they want that experience to look like.

The editorial board consists of Hatchet staff members and operates separately from the newsroom. This week’s staff editorial was written by Opinions Editor Andrea Mendoza-Melchor, based on discussions with incoming Contributing Opinions Editor Ethan Vargas, Research Assistant Ethan Tsai, Research Assistant Kya Hoffman and incoming Contributing Sports Editor Sophia Caputo.