UC San Diego’s most recent response to the Trump administration’s federal funding cuts will impact prospective graduate students. On March 19, the San Diego Union-Tribune broke that UCSD can no longer guarantee funding for incoming graduate students. UCSD’s student admission letters for graduate programs now include a new clause: “The funding commitment stated in this letter may be modified, reduced, or rescinded and is not guaranteed.”
The University provided this statement to The UCSD Guardian on its inability to guarantee funding for incoming graduate students:
“UC San Diego is taking proactive steps to protect the university while facing exceptional uncertainty around future funding — a challenge facing universities nationwide,” the statement read.
“We remain committed to graduate education and stand by the funding commitments that have been made to current Ph.D., Masters of Fine Arts and Doctor of Musical Arts students. However, it is too early to determine the full extent of any potential funding shifts and their impact on future graduate cohorts. We will continue to assess changes and remain committed to championing the critical work of our university and ensuring our students have the necessary resources to thrive.”
This follows a campus notice issued by the Office of the Chancellor on April 1 that warned of potential University budget reductions in the face of cuts to the National Institutes of Health. The notice states that, though the total number of losses is unknown, the University is facing reductions that could range from $75 million to more than $500 million annually, which is 2.5% to 12.5% of the current budget.
Anthony Struthers-Young, a fifth-year Ph.D. candidate in the linguistics department, expressed concern about the uncertain University budget and its impacts on prospective graduate students.
“I feel for the graduate students,” Struthers-Young said. “[It’s] going to be very disastrous; it’s going to make … prospective graduate students really reconsider whether they would want to come to [UCSD]. That’s going to really impact UCSD’s research output. … The worse the quality of research is at the UCs, the fewer students are going to want to apply. And that means less, you know, funding. That means fewer grants. It’ll have really potentially grave long-term effects.”
Struthers-Young explained that graduate students need funding not just for their research but also to live.
“Without a stipend from the University, you’re not going to be able to live; you’re not going to be able to eat, right?” Struthers-Young said. “You’re dependent on the stipend. So, from that aspect, it’s very important to have a reliable funding source for your stipend just to be able to live and continue to do your research.”
