Columbia University is laying off 180 researchers whose work was funded by now-terminated federal grants.
The New York City-based university attributed the layoffs to increasing budget constraints and uncertainty regarding future research funding levels.
“We have had to make deliberate, considered decisions about the allocation of our financial resources. Those decisions also impact our greatest resource, our people. We understand this news will be hard,” said Claire Shipman, Columbia’s acting president, in a public letter May 6.
Overall, the layoffs account for about 20% of individuals whose projects lost funding after the White House pulled $400 million from the university in March, citing directives from the Trump administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism.
About $250 million in funding was tied to National Institutes of Health grants, many of which supported researchers and physicians at Columbia’s College of Physicians and Surgeons — the university’s medical school located at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York City.
Alongside the layoffs, Columbia is also strategically scaling back or pausing research across certain schools or departments.
The university said it is working with the federal government to restore lost funding and looking for alternative funding sources.
Read the full letter here.
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