Professors and student leaders shared concerns that the Trump administration’s “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education” could threaten the College’s academic freedom.
On Oct. 1, the Trump administration approached the College and eight other universities to sign the agreement, which would require a number of changes to school policies in exchange for expanded access to federal research funding. The administration expects the College to respond “with feedback” on or before Oct. 20.
Faculty and students told The Dartmouth they had concerns about many aspects of the deal, including changes to research funding and threats to academic freedom.
Government professor Russell Muirhead wrote in an email statement to The Dartmouth that the Trump administration’s compact is “boneheaded and authoritarian” but said higher education must “explain and show how what we do serves the country.”
He cited the response of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which became the first university to respond to the administration and reject the deal.
“The MIT president’s letter rejecting the compact explicitly underlines MIT’s ‘service to the nation,’” he wrote. “That is instructive, and we should follow her lead. Unless we succeed at explaining how what we do serves the country, large numbers of our fellow citizens may question why their tax dollars underwrite institutions like Dartmouth.”
More than 575 Dartmouth faculty members signed a petition urging Beilock to reject the compact, citing similar concerns.
College president Sian Leah Beilock provided her first, and thus far only, reaction to the compact, on Oct. 3, writing in an email to campus that she will “always defend our fierce independence.”
College spokesperson Jana Barnello wrote in a statement to The Dartmouth that the College is “actively engaging with faculty across the university through Dartmouth’s shared governance framework and working closely with the Board of Trustees.”
Last week, senior vice president for student life Jennifer Rosales weighed in at a Dartmouth Student Government meeting. She said that “some parts” of the compact may “go against some” of the College’s current “policies and missions,” such as those around academic freedom.
Some important voices in higher education have been more amenable to suppositions in the contract. On Oct. 6, Harvard professor Danielle Allen wrote on Substack that she is “excited” about the “excellent idea to have a coalition of strong universities work together to negotiate a package of reforms for higher education,” although she “does not think” colleges should sign the compact in general.
At Dartmouth, professors largely expressed trepidation. On Oct 6., government professor Brendan Nyhan co-wrote an opinion article for MSNBC arguing that the College should reject “the devil’s bargain.”
“We share concerns that debates on college campuses are often too narrow and can be influenced by administrative position-taking, but the solution to these problems is not government coercion, especially when undertaken in obvious bad faith,” Nyhan and Vanderbilt professor Lisa Fazio wrote.
Professor of government emerita Linda Fowler urged against making deals with the Trump administration, which she called an “untrustworthy party.”
“Think[ing] you could make a deal with the Trump administration about anything would be a demonstration of naivete,” she said. “They just don’t follow through. Trump is one thing one day, something else another day.”
Fowler said it was “ludicrous” that the compact promises “substantial and meaningful federal grants” to colleges who sign.
“Grants that Dartmouth faculty receive are carefully screened by committees of experts and there are lots of procedural hurdles that have to be gone through,” she said. “The idea that they can turn money on and off for research is ludicrous.”
Professor of government emeritus Nelson Kasfir, who is one of more than 575 signatories of the faculty petition to reject the compact, raised concerns about academic freedom.
“I think it’s a great intrusion on Dartmouth’s independence,” he said. “It is a classic move by a government moving towards authoritarianism to try to take control over universities, and they say very nakedly they want the university to adopt goals that the administration wants to promote.”
Dartmouth College Democrats political director Beatrice Reichman ’27 agreed in an interview, adding that allocating federal research funding to universities which “ideologically agree” with the Trump administration “defeats the purpose of higher education.”
“The fact that the Trump administration even considered that Dartmouth would be a college to accept these kinds of conditions proves that the Beilock administration has not had a strong enough stance in their rejection of unconstitutional interference into our education,” she said.
Student body vice president Favion Harvard ’26 signed a joint statement against the compact along with other student government representatives from the other eight universities asked to sign.
On the other hand, president of Dartmouth Conservatives Jack Coleman ’26 said he “wholeheartedly supports” many of the “common sense” principles of the compact, including its points on “meritocracy” and “promoting intellectual diversity” on campus.
“The federal government has the ability to put conditions on tax-payer dollars,” he said. “I don’t think this is an incursion on private institutions the way some people have portrayed it to be.”
Coleman added that Beilock should consider the potential “response from the campus community” and the amount of grant money being offered. Still, Coleman said he “would support voluntarily adopting a lot of the principles expressed in the compact.”
Roan Wade ’25, a student activist, described the number of signatories as “record-breaking.”
“It’s a really clear indicator of the community really opposing Trump’s compact and its infringement on academic freedom and the lives of marginalized students on this campus,” they said.
The compact would require Dartmouth to adopt an institutional definition of gender based on “reproductive function and biological processes.” Wade said the compact would “gut” the women’s, gender and sexuality studies department.
“It is deeply concerning that there is even any discussion of a negotiation over this very clearly fascist document that will infringe on our ability to to be students and even engage in any academic inquiry on this campus,” Wade said.
Jack Coleman ’26 is a member of The Dartmouth’s podcast team. He was not involved in the writing or editing of this story.
Correction Appended (Oct. 14, 10:13 a.m.): This article erroneously stated that Roan Wade ’25 contributed to organizing the faculty petition. The article has been corrected.
