New York (AP) – President Donald Trump We cancelled $400 million in funds The majority of the financial pain that has been working on Columbia University, including on the treatment of student protests against Israeli war in Gaza, from school campus, including on curing cancer and studying the impact of Covid-19 on children, fell into the financial pain of many of the researchers.
The urgency to retrieve ongoing research projects in university labs and world-renowned medical centers was one factor in Colombia’s decision to succumb to the Republican administration last week. Unprecedented demands Changes to university policies as a condition for restoring funding.
Ivy League University announced Friday that it would overhaul the student disciplinary process, ban protesters wearing masks, bar demonstrations from academic buildings, adopt new definitions of anti-Semitism, and place a Middle Eastern research program under the supervision of a side-scheming statement about curriculum and employment.
The university’s decision to join almost every Trump administration’s request has infuriated faculty members who say Columbia has sacrificed academic freedom. American University Professors and the American Federation of Teachers, representing members of Colombia faculty; He filed a lawsuit On Tuesday, he said that revoking the funding violated the Free Speech Act.
Scientific and medical researchers are keen to see their work being drawn into the debate from the start.
“There is no legitimate link to putting this type of research on the fire boundary because of the goal of mitigating anti-Semitism elsewhere,” says pediatric researcher Dr. Dani Dumitriu, Ph.D. Babies born during the Covid-19 pandemicsaid from her office in midtown Manhattan.
Dr Andrew Russman, a brain cancer expert and associate director of clinical trials at a Cancer Center in Columbia, said researchers must make difficult decisions if the cuts are on the way. These options include prioritizing which experimental cancer treatments to focus on and which patients can treat, he said.
“It’s authentic, not a theoretical study,” said Rusman, who works at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, about 2.5 miles (4 kilometres) north of the university’s main campus. “Younger, old people, black people, Republicans, Democrats – I don’t care about cancer.”
U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said the university was ” On the right track “After announcing the changes on Friday, it has not yet been shown whether funds will recover.
Colombian interim president Katrina Armstrong on Tuesday characterized the changes in school policy as “. Suitable for Colombia. ”
“Implementing these measures is fundamental to maintaining the academic mission without disruption and ensuring the safety of Columbia students and campuses,” she said in a statement, adding that she is committed to restoring the partnership between the university and the federal government.
On Columbia’s main campus, environmental scientist Benjamin Bostic, one of those who lost funding for research into rural water quality in Arizona, Oklahoma and Dakotas, was disappointed by the university’s decision to agree to the Trump administration’s demands.
He said the school was put in a position that it couldn’t fight back. “But I really hate it to divide the institution effectively and distract attention from the fact that research activities are interrupted by external forces,” Bostic said.
“From my point of view, what the government is telling me is that they don’t care about people who have these issues or how they deal with them,” he mentioned water quality research.
At Teachers College in Columbia, Katt was hit with a program that trains graduate students and becomes a teacher for hearing impaired hearing. Elaine Smolen, co-supervisor of the program, said the Department of Education grant provided students with lesson support, living expenses and professional development.
“We don’t discuss the extreme shortages and the need for the kind of work we work for,” she said. “The more deaf or listen children have difficulty waiting for service, the worse their outcomes will be.”
At Dumitriu’s office, funding cuts forced her team to stop conducting and analyzing brain scans of participants in a study that sought to track the long-term health of a child whose mother signed for Covid-19 while pregnant.
“We were learning a lot and we wanted to continue following up with these babies all the way to adults,” she said.
Cassandra Almonte, a New Jersey mom who is taking part in the research with her son, said it “has no point in withdrawing funds.”
She said additional testing and regular check-in with Dumitriu’s team gave her a sense of security that her now 2-year-old son, Oliver, is developing properly.
“It’s completely unfair to withdraw funds from science because people practice free speech,” Almonte said.
For now, Demitriu says that much of her team’s work could continue to use other funds as the National Health Grant grant, suspended by the Trump administration, represented about a quarter of the budget. She wants to appeal the decision while her office seeks other grants.
“We’re like every moment,” Demitriu said. “It’s a really tough time when you want to do good things.”
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Follow Philip Marcelo twitter.com/philmarcelo.
