Week 12
Figuring out what to focus on now & next in science and higher ed
This newsletter is my part of an ongoing conversation among colleagues who’ve had a rough week. I share two or three pieces of the puzzle that feel are most important, hazard a guess about what to expect next, and offer at least one useful thing to do.
MEETING THE MOMENT: 2025-04-11
Hi friends, surprise!
I’m publishing the debrief early this week because I’m taking my own advice, and will be spending this weekend deep in conversation with the Liminal Collective. I’m sure nothing notable will happen while we’re offline, right?1
One of the things I’m most looking forward to the most is having large blocks of less-structured time together. For the past few weeks, I’ve been coping with long hours and horrifying uncertainties by making sure I always know exactly what needs to happen next in the sequence. I find a certain kind of comfort in a brutal regimen of fifteen-minute sprints: it makes the rapid-response work more manageable and makes exhausting days more satisfying. But my relentless to-do list is its own kind of distraction. It’s essential that I put it aside and spend these precious hours with these precious people, not knowing precisely what each quarter of the hour will hold.
It makes me think of Jenny Odell’s work.
“One thing I have learned about attention is that certain forms of it are contagious.2 I’ve also learned that patterns of attention—what we choose to notice and what we do not—are how we render reality for ourselves, and thus have a direct bearing on what we feel is possible at any given time. These aspects, taken together, suggest to me the revolutionary potential of taking back our attention.”
I am so ready to render a better reality together, so let’s get to it.
This was week 12.
What’s happening now
As the weeks have worn on, I feel like the bullets in this section are much more predictable. The patterns that emerge from the chaos show how power is being wielded against science. Think about the different capacities of the government, for example, as an employer, or a funder, or an enforcer of laws. There are more, but these are the ones I’m going to cover today:
As an employer: The jobs of federal employees have been in litigation and limbo for weeks. This week, decisions from the Supreme Court and U.S. Court of Appeals undid previous rulings that protected or restored jobs to thousands of workers. In just over a month, some folks at NOAA were fired, rehired, put on administrative leave, and re-fired again.3 Sometimes it’s more straightforward, but no less dire. Some entire teams have been cut, like the NIH Office of Pain Policy and Planning4 and the CDC Vessel Sanitation Program5: in other places, whole categories of expertise were cut, as when the FDA fired essentially all communication staff. And to be clear, the issue is not simply official employment status either - it’s the ability of civil servants to actually do their jobs. They are coping with whiplash around permitted conference attendance, frozen credit cards, and return-to-office conditions that include a lack of critical resources like wifi, desk space, and toilet paper.
As a funder: The House passed a new budget resolution yesterday. We can go through and analyze its potential impact on agencies like NASA, because the specifics of program cuts matter. It’s important to understand how stop-work orders affect the National Climate Assessment, for example, versus halving the number of NSF Graduate Research Fellowships, as well as distinctions between FEMA’s cancellation of $750 million allocated for future BRIC grants6 versus attempting to claw back more than $880 million dollars of SSP7 grants that have already been disbursed. To get a handle on the scope of this issue, I find it helpful to move back and forth between concrete details and visualizations of cumulative impacts. The newly-launched and still-in-progress Impact Map brings both together powerfully.
As an enforcer: This week, hundreds of students and recent graduates have had their visas revoked and now must leave the country. Neither the affected students nor their universities seem to be receiving reliable notification or communication about what is happening. Some universities have emergency mechanisms in place to support their students, like UMass Amherst’s Angel Fund. Other campus communities are self-organizing. Examples you may find useful include this informational email from UIUC Department of Physics, this Immigrants Rights Resource from Princeton, and the We Are LA student resource compilation from the Center for Diverse Leadership in Science.New fronts and tactics keep emerging, such as the news that migrants’ Social Security numbers are being moved into the so-called “death master file.”
What’s next & what to do
I saw a blog post today that had a lovely reminder “of our power to respond to chaos with calm, deliberative action. To diffuse confusion with clarity of purpose and values, with facts and evidence. To curtail fear by feeding and nourishing our collective courage. To bridge isolation by curating our connection to each other. It’s a reminder of the power in taking small actions that add up.”
It feels fitting because for the first time, I’m going to directly invite you to come take a small action with me. This Monday, we are hosting our first Scientists in Solidarity action hour. These will be a chance to connect with other researchers, make sense of what’s happening, and move into collective action.8 We’ll share updates, strategize together, and offer specific ways to plug into Meeting the Moment and other projects. Registration is here. Please join us.
As Jenny writes, “Realities are, after all, inhabitable. If we can render a new reality together—with attention—perhaps we can meet each other there.”
I dearly hope so,
Liz
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I shouldn’t even joke about it - the news cycles have been unrelenting this week. If you’ve been feeling overwhelmed by the malevolence of it all, you’re not alone. I’m sorry. ↩
This is from her book How To Do Nothing, and the sentence I am omitting here is, “When you spend enough time with someone who pays close attention to something (if you were hanging out with me, it would be birds), you inevitably start to pay attention to some of the same things.” I can personally attest to Jenny’s infectious attention to birds. Our lives have never been the same, and I’m grateful for it, even if I still prefer running to birding. Sorry buds… ↩
If that sounds familiar, it’s because Gwynne Wilcox, a board member of the independent federal agency that enforces U.S. labor law, was fired without cause on January 28, reinstated on March 6, re-fired on March 28, re-reinstated on Monday, and now re-re-fired as of Wednesday. While this is all happening, the National Labor Relations Board lacks a quorum for issuing decisions on appeals and requests for review. The same thing is happening to Cathy Harris, a member of the Merit Systems Protection Board, which protects federal employees from partisan political practices by adjudicating their appeals. I’m not an expert, but this all seems bad. ↩
Per the linked STAT article, chronic pain is our most common disabling condition. Between medical expenses and the cost of lost work, it also ranks as our most expensive chronic health condition. ↩
This is the group that conducts health inspections on cruise ships - a gut-wrenching situation (sorry) for a year already marked by large outbreaks potentially driven by the emergence of a novel strain of norovirus. ↩
The Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program proactively funds local projects to reduce damage from flooding, tornadoes, and other types of severe weather. You can contrast the current website with what was live last Friday. ↩
Last week, I had a long chat with a friend and leading science communication researcher. He is leery of my language about movements and collective actions, and prefers to talk about collaboration and strategic communication. If that describes you too, I hope it is validating to know you’re not alone. We don’t have to be in lockstep to work toward shared goals. You are very welcome and should come participate in the Action Hour. I think observing the facilitation practices of seasoned community organizers will be incredibly valuable, and I am excited to help you find the right set of actions for you. ↩