Harvard’s president announced a temporary hiring freeze on all staff and faculty positions across the university in the wake of actions imposed by the Trump administration that could impact the institution’s financial future.
“We need to prepare for a wide range of financial circumstances, and strategic adjustments will take time to identify and implement,” Alan Garber wrote in a letter to the campus community on Monday. He added it was “imperative to limit significant new long-term commitments” to prevent the need for future actions.
In his letter, Garber referenced the uncertain financial climate all universities are in right now as they face “rapidly shifting federal policies.”
Garber said hiring is paused, effective immediately, for at least the duration of the academic semester. The president said he will “revisit that decision as circumstances warrant.”
Higher education leaders have been on edge since President Trump took office in January and announced a slew of executive actions impacting research and academic institutions.
First came the cuts to NIH research funding — though that remains in limbo as a federal judge ordered a preliminary injunction — then came threats to hike the tax on endowments of some of the country’s richest higher ed institutions. Harvard has an endowment valued at roughly $53 billion, the largest endowment of any academic institution in the U.S.
Then on Friday, the Trump administration said it was immediately canceling $400 million in federal grants and contracts to Columbia University in New York — and signaled more cuts to come. In a joint statement issued by multiple federal departments including justice and education, Trump officials said the funding was revoked because of Columbia’s “continued inaction” regarding anti-Jewish student harassment.
“These cancelations represent the first round of action and additional cancelations are expected to follow,” the joint statement read.
Harvard is also identified by the Justice Department as one of 10 universities to be investigated due to reports of antisemitic incidents since October 2023, per a press release.
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights also said on Monday afternoon it has sent letters to 60 higher education institutions to inform them they are under investigation for alleged antisemitic discrimination. That list includes Harvard, Tufts, Boston University, UMass Amherst and others in the region.
Harvard spokesman Jason Newton did not respond to a request for comment about the Justice release or other details surrounding a potential visit to Harvard by federal officials. He declined to comment on Garber’s announcement of the hiring freeze.
Ryan Enos, a political scientist and government professor at Harvard, said he first learned of the hiring pause Monday morning through Garber’s email.
“This is going to hurt not just Harvard, but what places like Harvard are trying to do which is conduct scientific research and to educate our students to provide a service to society,” Enos said in an interview.
As for the immediate impacts to the university, Enos added the hiring freeze will impact the filling of classroom instructional positions, and ability to continue research.
“It reverberates across the system,” he said. “It means there’s going to be people who have been counting on … starting jobs next year that are left hanging for the foreseeable future.”
MIT last month also announced a hiring freeze, but only for non-essential staff positions, due to the uncertainty around federal funding. Kim Allen, a spokeswoman, said the freeze does not impact faculty positions.
Still, in a message last week to the campus, MIT President Sally Kornbluth announced that “many departments” would be reducing the number of graduate student admissions this fall — a step also taken by UPenn and other institutions.
“For an institution grounded in research and education having to turn away superb young talent is a striking loss. And it’s clearly a loss for the nation too,” Kornbluth wrote in her March 4 update. She added it was “critical” for MIT to take these austerity measures now “to contend with changes yet to come.”
Last month, Boston University announced it would be slowing spending to account for the uncertain federal climate to preserve its long-term financial health. That includes applying a “hold status” to full-and part-time staff positions not in the final offer stage and limiting discretionary spending, President Melissa Gilliam wrote.
Garber’s letter on Monday also directed all Harvard department heads to “scrutinize discretionary and non-salary spending” and to be vigilant about conducting new multi-year financial commitments.
He added that the current hiring freeze is taking place in conjunction to “broader efforts already under way across our campus to identify structural savings and capacity.”
This article was originally published on WBUR.org.
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