Cornell has not yet taken an official position on whether or not it would comply with demands from the Trump administration presented in its higher education compact in exchange for preferential funding treatment.
But at a press dinner with the leaders of 10 universities in New York City on Tuesday, Oct. 14, all — including President Michael Kotlikoff — did not raise their hands when asked if they would sign an agreement to these demands if asked by the administration, according to The New York Times.
“The compact itself requires institutions to make merit-based decisions on admissions and hiring, et cetera, which is perfectly reasonable, but it also creates a situation in which universities that sign the contract escape merit-based consideration for grants, et cetera,” Kotlikoff said, according to Inside Higher Ed. “They get special deals, and that is fundamentally inappropriate.”
The Trump administration’s “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education,” which was first offered to nine universities on Oct. 1, would require schools to freeze tuition for five years, cap international student enrollment at 15 percent and commit to strict definitions of gender in order to receive priority access to federal funding and looser restraints on overhead costs. This initial compact was later extended to all universities that want to “return to the pursuit of Truth and Achievement,” according to an Oct. 12 Truth Social post from President Trump.
None of the leaders present at the Oct. 14 meeting publicly confirmed that they had been sent invitations to sign the compact, according to Inside Higher Ed.
Last spring, the Trump administration froze hundreds of millions of dollars in research funding for Cornell, amid several ongoing federal civil rights investigations on campus.
Cornell also filed four lawsuits against the Department of Defense, National Institutes of Health, the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation in relation to cuts on indirect costs, which are expenses that are not directly related to specific projects, but support general infrastructure and administrative costs that support University research. Since then, settlement talks between the University and the federal government have reportedly stalled.
In The Sun’s interview with Kotlikoff and Provost Kavita Bala on Oct. 3, Kotlikoff declined to comment on whether the University would consider signing onto Trump’s higher education compact to obtain preferences and funding in the future, saying “I'm really not going to talk about that in public.”
“One of the things that Cornell's done has been very disciplined about not negotiating in public and not leaking to the press,” Kotlikoff told The Sun in response to a previous question.
When again asked by The Sun if Cornell would sign the compact after reporting on the press dinner was released, a University spokesperson declined to comment but deferred to existing reporting on the University’s stance on the proposal.
In response to questions about university settlements, however, Kotlikoff told The Sun: “I don't want to speak about other university settlements, but let me just say that the notion that the federal government would control the University's policies, would tell us how to enforce our policies, how we hire people, who we hire, how we admit students, who we admit — that is all beyond the appropriate relationship between the federal government and the University.”
Kotlikoff told The Sun that the University continues its conversations with the federal government “around what Cornell is, what Cornell supports, how it doesn't engage in discrimination” but they have not yet been successful in terms of an agreement with the federal government.
At the NYC press dinner, which was hosted by Arizona State University President Michael Crow, Kotlikoff also argued that universities have not effectively communicated their research and educational value.
When asked why universities have not mounted a more robust defense against the federal government, Kotlikoff said, “What we haven't done ... [is] play offense more generally, on the things that universities contribute to the country.”
Of the nine universities that initially received the compact, four — the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Brown University, the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Southern California — have officially rejected the deal by time of publication. However, the University of Texas at Austin, another of the initially contacted schools, has indicated that they are “honored” to receive the compact and are “[looking] forward to engaging with university officials and reviewing the compact immediately.”
Brown University President Christina Paxson rejected the compact’s provisions on the basis that “the compact by its nature and by various provisions would restrict academic freedom and undermine the autonomy of Brown’s governance.”
According to a Cornell website, the University seeks to “value diversity and inclusion.” The compact appears to target these principles with provisions to regulate the enrollment of international students and commit to a strict definition of gender. Additionally, the compact would require universities to change their governance structures to prevent anything that would “punish, belittle and even spark violence against conservative ideas.”
The Cornell Office of Global Learning reports that international students from 131 countries make up 26 percent of Cornell’s student body. The University’s “Working at Cornell” website also states its commitment to “continued inclusion of sex, gender, sexual orientation, gender expression and gender identity in our non-discrimination policies.”
Additionally, Cornell’s Center for Teaching Innovation affirms that “Cornell is a community that brings together people with many different beliefs, perspectives and worldviews.”
“We would not agree to terms that place the federal government in an intrusive position relative to a private university,” Kotlikoff told The Sun during its Oct. 3 interview.
Joshua Cohen is a member of the Class of 2029 in the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. He is a contributor for the News department and can be reached at jmc746@cornell.edu.
