Week 36
Sept 20-26 - curing compost
The happiest hours I’ve spent in the past week have been out in my garden. I’ve been harvesting vegetables and turning over the spent beds for the autumn garden.
After two summers, one of the things I’ve noticed is how much more familiar I am with the path of the sun over our yard, the way the water moves through the soil, and the habits of the various critters who sometimes wreck my work.
I’m just barely scratching the surface of what there is to know about growing plants in this place, but I’m already noticing how much easier that knowledge makes it for me to take chances. I’m chopping plants back and digging them up in a way I was afraid to when this garden was brand new. It’s not that I’m more callous, it’s that I have more confidence in what needs to be done.
That was a metaphor and this was Week 36. Let’s get into these weeds.
What’s happening now
Let’s start with a piece of very good news! On Monday, Judge Rita Lin ordered the administration to restore UCLA’s 500 NIH research grants. This is her second ruling against funding freezes - last month, she ordered the restoration of UCLA’s 300 NSF grants (following a preliminary injunction that was upheld on appeal). Before you ask, and yes, this is important - NSF did actually reinstate the grants and did not join other government agencies in appealing the injunction. Judge Lin has set a Monday deadline1 for compliance with her NIH reinstatement order. The key takeaway from Judge Lin’s reasoning is that mass terminations violate the federal agencies’ obligation to individually explain such decisions under the Administrative Procedure Act. And here’s where it gets very interesting! Even though the Supreme Court’s strange, split decision made the Court of Federal Claims the venue for universities that want to bring suit over research funding, Judge Lin is holding the door open for individual researchers to seek relief, even if their university won’t sue.
And this is a bit adjacent to our focus on science & higher ed, but I thought it was interesting to see the General Services Administration (GSA) trying to reinstate nearly 400 Public Building Services employees who were fired by DOGE earlier this year. These are staff who were responsible for managing office leases across the country for agencies like the IRS or FDA. Office closures and relocations are a subject of active dispute. For example, I just saw an announcement today arguing that moving the Division of Food Processing Science and Technology out of Illinois will “slow crisis response, threaten public safety, and ultimately lead to higher costs in the long run.” When it comes to collaboration, co-location matters, sometimes a lot.
Last week, I wrote about these $100,000+ H-1B visa fees as that news was breaking. We now have a clearer sense and sharper analyses about how this will affect universities. Between faculty, postdoc, and clinical or research appointments, it’s easy for major research institutions to submit more than a hundred new petitions each year. I also really appreciate this detailed, interactive map of the 13,000 H-1B visa holders who have joined universities so far this year. You can search the database to see how the schools that matter to you will be burdened with new fees.2
Okay, now the late-breaking and grim news.
Today, the Supreme Court effectively blessed the pocket rescission. To quote the Government Accountability Office, “A pocket rescission essentially bypasses Congress’s power of the purse… A pocket rescission is illegal as we explained in our most recent decision on pocket rescissions.” This time, the target was $4.9 billion dollars in Congressionally-approved foreign aid, but the fear is that the administration is seeking to set a precedent to legitimize this maneuver in future funding fights. In the context of the looming government shut-down3, it raises the threat that the executive branch will simply override Congress, no matter what legitimate compromises might be reached. The even larger concern is that this Supreme Court order, like so many others lately, was part of the shadow docket.4
Finally, there is the matter of the latest presidential memo5 focused on the need, “to identify and disrupt financial networks that fund domestic terrorism and political violence.” This is wrapped up with an executive order on Monday that seeks to declare antifa a domestic terrorist organization.6 Reading these documents is frightening because it is clear that actual data on political violence are completely ignored, and these measures are just one part of a large project to crush political opposition.7
What’s next & what to do
In addition to vegetables, my gardening this week offered up a reminder of a model of systems change that I was first introduced to a few years ago. The Two Loop model is a framework that describes key phases and roles in the decline and emergence of complex systems. I particularly appreciate the recognition that there are periods of transitions that are discomfiting, if not outright harrowing. The model makes explicit the “composting” work that is necessary to identify what is valuable, honor those parts of the past, and repurpose them to nurture the emerging system.
I see so many opportunities for such composting work in science and higher education. We have the freedom, now that we understand more about the elements controlling this season, to look at old practices with fresh eyes. What needs to be pruned? What must be cleared away to make space for something better? How do we use what we already have to enrich what we want to grow? Some ideas:
You can revisit decisions about how to proactively defend your values, as Columbia professors are by inserting a statement supporting academic freedom into their syllabi.
Maybe you’re thinking bigger and want to tackle academic hiring, promotion, or tenure processes. There’s new funding support you might pursue, called the The Modernizing Academic Appointment and Advancement (MA3) Challenge. This joint initiative of the Aspen Institute Science & Society program and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences is supported by foundations like Moore, Dana, Rita Allen, and Robert Wood Johnson. The first virtual information session is October 1 and you can also schedule a consultation session with the great organizers at ORCA.
Or maybe you really push yourself to think big. I find myself mulling over the most troubling updates in this newsletter. We know we have to update our priors as the conditions shift. So how does our thinking change when we recognize that what we must confront is actually state terrorism? I find myself thinking about how rapidly I expect bad actors to weaponize these new ‘domestic terrorism’ definitions. How will universities and research funders cope with new developments in coordinated campaigns to silence scientists, public intellectuals, and campus organizers? Think about how your institution currently monitors and assesses threats. What vulnerabilities are likely to be exploited. Consider the ways we conduct due diligence, balance the rights of accused and accusers, and mitigate risk: which good parts of existing systems must be preserved? Which assumptions or protocols must be composted instead?
It might be difficult to start these conversations. Suggesting that some things need composting may create conflict and fear. But we know that courage is contagious and what you’re really cultivating is hope. May it thrive.
Liz
As ever, thanks for reading & thinking with me. Please share it with your people. Meeting the Moment will always be free, but if you want to contribute ⤵️
If this email was forwarded to you, hi! 👋 This newsletter is my part of an ongoing conversation with friends who’ve had a rough week. Every Friday night, I share two or three pieces of news that feel most important to those of us who care about science and higher education. I try to offer a helpful way to think about the problems in front of us, and at least one useful thing to do. If you like what you see ⤵️
If you only read one story about this, I suggest making it this one - thanks CalMatters! ↩
For example, my alma mater (go Terps!) would be facing a bill of nearly $25 million per year, unless they radically change their hiring practices. And that’s the fear, isn't it? ↩
And if that shutdown happens, I am worried about so many things, but this letter from the National Parks Service is a dimension of it that I find particularly upsetting. ↩
Also called the emergency docket, these decisions are rapid, unsigned, and reliably, marked partisan. Even though the stakes are tremendous, they “do not always live up to the high standards of procedural regularity.” ↩
No, not the TikTok executive order, but we should talk about it in passing because Pew Research Center just released new numbers and 20% of US adults regularly get news from TikTok and that’s huge. It reminds me I have had this scicomm case study on TikTok sitting in my to-read pile for a couple months now. ↩
You might reasonably say, “But antifa isn’t itself an organization, there is no legal process for such a designation, and anyway, anti-anti-fascism is… pro-fascism?” I agree on all counts, but deconstructing the logic doesn’t take us very far toward defusing the potential impact. ↩
Just in case your people might think I’m overreacting, here’s where we now stand: Do you hold any anti-capitalist sentiments? Would your opponents say you have “extreme” views on immigration, race, or gender? Any objections to “traditional American views on family, religion, and morality”? Congratulations, those are grounds for your investigation, prosecution, and “disruption.” ↩