I posted this article about my student's grant cancellation this morning. A few minutes ago, I learned that another very talented student in my lab had their funding cancelled too. I'm heartbroken -- not just about my students, but the future of science.
darbysaxbe.substack.com/p/my-student...
Big, growing crowd just west of the U.S. Capitol protesting Trump, Musk and DOGE on President’s Day. “Hey Congress, grow a spine,” they shout, gathering for a rally around the reflecting pool.
I have been talking to the media, Time, Fortune, NBC, etc., to explain how the onslaught on science and NIH will impact the health of all Americans. Everyone knows someone who has cancer, heart disease, or depression. Spread the word about how cutting science impacts all.
time.com/7216299/nih-...
For the 79% of heterosexual married women whose legal married name doesn’t match your birth certificate or passport, get ready to have your voting rights frozen.
Yes, read that again.
No, that is not hyperbole.
Act now.
Stand Up for Science rallies will be held in DC and state capitals on March 7th. Share with friends. Sign-up here to get email updates with details: www.eventbrite.com/e/stand-up-f...
A funny historical fact: if you look up where the top science happened around 100 years ago... it was Germany.
I wonder what happened...
Update: They were removed from our reviewer assignments completely. I'm so sorry to all those graduate students. Anonymous to protect the identity of the NIH employee I spoke to...I am on study section next month to discuss F awards. We were just instructed to put the F31-Diversity applications on the bottom of our priority list for review because there is a chance we may not be able to review them. My heart is breaking for the grad students and their mentors that put so much work into these just for them to be disqualified and thrown out.
Just in case you thought that removing DEI criteria would mean that everyone is competing equally: NIH is removing grad students from underrepresented backgrounds from the applicant pool altogether. Their applications will not be considered. Other students, not from these backgrounds, will be.
The CSR comm I'm on just pulled all Diversity F grants from the current review cycle. These apps are reviewed alongside (and by the same criteria) as all other F grants. So, instead of helping these trainees, they will actually be punished by having their grant reviews delayed at least 1 cycle !?!?
This is a good if terrifying summary of Trump’s war on science
www.science.org/content/blog...
Trump is soooo concerned about fentanyl use among Americans, yet his minions prevent the National Institute on Drug Abuse from meeting. You'd almost think it's not about Americans' use of drugs?
list of banned keywords
🚨BREAKING. From a program officer at the National Science Foundation, a list of keywords that can cause a grant to be pulled. I will be sharing screenshots of these keywords along with a decision tree. Please share widely. This is a crisis for academic freedom & science.
It’s a discombobulating experience to watch Trump simultaneously write executive orders in the name of “protecting women” while removing entire websites dedicated to women’s health.
He doesn’t care about women. I wish more journalists would call it out every single time he attacks trans people
The biggest news today isn’t Trump’s tariffs on Mexico, Canada, and China. It’s that an unelected billionaire now has access to your Social Security income.
Americans should be asking: Who really controls our future?
www.nytimes.com/2025/02/01/u...
#SocialSecurity #WealthPower
Oh you mean even if I doomscroll and read every post the coup will still be happening? 🧐
Federal funding makes up 33% of U.S. nonprofit revenue. A freeze could cripple essential services like foster care, disaster relief and homeless shelters. Two nonprofit scholars explain: https://buff.ly/416y4Ax (@dyanamason.bsky.social @uoregon.bsky.social; Mirae Kim @georgemasonu.bsky.social)
It is simply not enough for universities to say, “Our grants & research offices are looking into how research will be affected by the latest directive.”
University leaders must actively and very publicly make the case for the kind of work many of us do. The silence on this front is deafening.
A quote from the writer AR Moxon from 2017. He wrote: "Historians have a word for Germans who joined the Nazi party, not because they hated Jews, but out of a hope for restored patriotism, or a sense of economic anxiety, or a hope to preserve their religious values, or dislike of their opponents, or raw political opportunism, or convenience, or ignorance, or greed. That word is "Nazi." Nobody cares about their motives anymore. They joined what they joined. They lent their support and their moral approval. And, in so doing, they bound themselves to everything that came after. Who cares any more what particular knot they used in the binding?" A.R. Moxon
This.
This is not business as usual.
It’s not just a change in funding priorities going forward; it is the reneging on funding agreements and is profoundly disruptive for even those grants that will be found to be compliant.
Meanwhile, trainees who often live paycheck to paycheck are going unpaid.
Resurfacing in the light of day: People should archive their favorite CDC datasets today, namely ones around race/ethnic diversity, LGBTQ, flu, covid, reproductive health...
Many of you may not be familiar with #NIH grants. Here are some facts to help you understand the magnitude of this disaster.
1) NIH grants are extremely difficult to get & not "free money". Researchers must have preliminary data & write detailed proposals. Mine was >200pages & took years to put
I am begging the national media to start taking this seriously.
Stop buying the claims that the framing of "temporary" or "pause."
They are altering the review processes of federally funded scientific research from merit-based peer review processes to political screening by ideologues.
Ten simple rules for developing good reading habits during graduate school and beyond
To me, the most important are:
Read often, read broadly (incl. older papers and outside your field), and learn to read some papers in detail and others more superficially (and quickly)
Devastating for scientists and their research, and everyone who benefits from that research.
I’m not sure if everyone outside academia is aware that a delay or “pause” in grant funding often means the researchers themselves are lost from the field, along with their expertise.
Can’t wait to dive into this special issue, featuring a paper from my lab!
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
Many great points in this piece about PTSD disinformation
Misrepresenting research in a way that discourages ppl from seeking effective care is extremely harmful
Existing evidence-based options for PTSD aren’t perfect & often require flexing to meet individual needs. But they _do_ work
A starter pack of clinical psychology scientists doing interesting and diverse work:
#psychsky #starterpack
go.bsky.app/SsNPcGP
I have talked to reviewers who say this as well, it is such an odd attitude. The intro is the easiest thing to ask someone to fix, therefore the thing I care least about both when reviewing and reading papers
I don't care what significance authors think their paper has, I'll judge that for myself
