Conversation

Notices

1. Embed this notice
   Matt Blaze (mattblaze@federate.social)'s status on Sunday, 23-Mar-2025 05:36:15 JST Matt Blaze

   Those outside of R1 academia might not understand how thoroughly the administration's shakedown of universities like Columbia upends STEM research.

   To a first approximation, universities perform a large fraction of basic research in the US, but fund almost none of it themselves. The funding - for labs, researchers, etc - comes from short-term "grants" (really contracts), mostly from the federal government, for specific projects.

   • Embed this notice
     Matt Blaze (mattblaze@federate.social)'s status on Sunday, 23-Mar-2025 09:29:42 JST Matt Blaze

     in reply to

     There aren't many advantages in life to being closer to the end of one's career than the beginning, but at the moment, I'm grateful that's where I am. This is going to be a rough road ahead.

   • Embed this notice
     Matt Blaze (mattblaze@federate.social)'s status on Sunday, 23-Mar-2025 09:29:43 JST Matt Blaze

     in reply to

     This is an oversimplification, but to a first approximation at R1 universities (where research happens):

     - tuition funds teaching
     - (federal) grants fund research
     - endowment income and donations fund infrastructure and emergency reserves.

     Kim Scheinberg repeated this.
   • Embed this notice
     Matt Blaze (mattblaze@federate.social)'s status on Sunday, 23-Mar-2025 09:29:45 JST Matt Blaze

     in reply to

     Without that funding, research simply stops. While some universities have substantial endowments in the bank, that's nowhere near sufficient overall to fund US STEM research. The reserves would be spent down quickly, and then we wouldn't be able to do teaching, either. We'd just close down.

     The irony is that federal grants have historically been a safer vehicle than corporate sponsorship of research, which is where the nasty strings are often attached.

   • Embed this notice
     Kim Scheinberg (kims@mas.to)'s status on Sunday, 23-Mar-2025 09:48:08 JST Kim Scheinberg

     in reply to

     @mattblaze
     I'm lucky to not only love my kids, but also to like them. And yet, it's hard to shake the occasional misgivings I have over having brought them into this world

     I felt that way very briefly after 9-11 (my youngest was only 10 weeks old at the time). The feeling is much stickier now than it was then