Purdue outlines staffing, research strategies as federal cuts loom

Letter to faculty and staff Friday has the university maneuvering to keep up with ‘daily zigzags’ of federal and state directives and potential research cuts.

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PURDUE OUTLINES STAFFING, RESEARCH STRATEGIES AS FEDERAL CUTS LOOM

Purdue isn’t pulling back on recruiting Ph.D. students amid pending federal cuts to research and university programs, but the campus is moderating outside hiring to keep positions open for current staff who might get hit with cuts, a letter sent to faculty and staff said Friday.

“We and your entire Purdue team continue to work diligently to track, digest and respond to changes in the federal funding landscape and their impacts on faculty, staff and students,” a team of Provost Patrick Wolfe, Executive Vice President for Research Karen Plaut and Purdue CFO Chris Ruhl wrote in a letter sent Friday morning.

(Photo: Dave Bangert)

The letter was the first general note to faculty and staff on the West Lafayette and Indianapolis campuses since one sent Feb. 13. The university has been purposely quiet in public – even when President Donald Trump singled out a $70 million Purdue-led program funded through USAID – while tracking White House directives, proposed funding cuts and court actions that follow in daily updates online.

“Since our last email communication to the university community, each of the tracks has continued to evolve rapidly, sometimes in daily zigzags,” they wrote. “Recognizing also that we, like all of you, do not know what we do not know at any given moment, we have tried to minimize accidental amplification of these zigzags while remaining steadfast in our institutional value of academic and research excellence.”