The Department of Earth and Climate Sciences at Tufts is facing uncertainty because of threats to their sources for research funding from federal agencies, including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Science Foundation.
In late January, in compliance with President Donald Trump’s administration’s executive order, the National Science Foundation cancelled its grant review panels. Given the fact that the goal of increasing the participation of underrepresented groups in the sciences is typically taken into consideration during the grant review process, it is possible that the new administration’s targeting of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives is responsible for the freeze.
Following this freeze in grant funding have been budget cuts and layoffs within the National Science Foundation. In February, the foundation fired approximately 10% of its workforce to comply with Trump’s executive orders which aimed at improving government efficiency.
Although no funding cuts have formally been made, Professor Jill VanTongeren, chair of the Department of Earth and Climate Sciences at Tufts, emphasized that research will still be impacted.
“It’s not that the funding has been erased, it’s just the laboratories are now in such an uncertain state that they can’t progress even on grants that have not been cut.”
“I currently have two National Science Foundation grants, neither of which are necessarily in jeopardy because they’ve been going on for a while,” VanTongeren said. “It’s just a question of getting grants in the future. It’s just uncertain.”
VanTongeren spoke about how her research in the White Mountains in New Hampshire has been paused due to fears that funding will be suddenly cut.
“One of my main laboratories and collaborators for [my research] is a United States Geological Survey office, and they can’t take on or commit to any more projects … because of the uncertainty,” she said.
Professor Dylan Vasey, an assistant professor in the Department of Earth and Climate Sciences, echoed similar concerns about the uncertain future of federal funding.
“None of us knows what’s going to happen. We don’t know what the National Science Foundation budget is going to look like,” Vasey said. “We don’t know how the National Science Foundation’s new process is going to be like.”
“It’s an enormous threat to research. I think it’s going to reduce the scale of research that we can do by [an] order of magnitude,” Vasey said. “The uncertainty is the biggest part of this.”
One aspect of uncertainty is the grant review process at the National Science Foundation. A National Science Foundation grant review panel that VanTongeren was supposed to serve on in February of this year was initially postponed to March and moved online, before ultimately being canceled.
“I have firsthand knowledge of the fact that no proposals are being evaluated right now,” she said. “We’ve been given no direction as to when they will become reviewed again.”
Vasey described the grant applications, including one of his own with the National Science Foundation, as perpetually pending because there are currently no review panels.
It is Vasey’s second year at Tufts. Under more predictable circumstances, he would be hoping to get his first grant in the next year or two.
“As somebody who’s [in their] early career as a scientist, it’s particularly hard because I’m at a stage in my career where I’m expected to demonstrate that I’m able to get these sorts of funds,” Vasey said. “So this is unnerving for people in my position.”
If he does not receive the grant, he said “I can’t do nearly as much research.”
Both VanTongeren and Vasey expressed difficulties with finding other sources of funding beyond the federal government.
“We are a little fortunate in the climate sciences that it’s an issue that I think a lot of people care deeply about and understand the urgency for … So there are foundations that are definitely interested in climate and environment issues,” VanTongeren said. “We will definitely need to pivot or diversify our funding streams, and that is something that we are working on actively.”
Vasey also pointed out that receiving funding from private foundations or sources means that researchers are restricted to topics that those funders are interested in.
“It also not only changes the scale of research we can do, it changes what we choose to research,” he said.
“One of the benefits of having something like the National Science Foundation is that it’s science for science’s sake, [for] questions that we think are important as a country,” Vasey said.
While research is continuing in the Department of Earth and Climate Sciences, many researchers are facing psychological difficulties and mental taxation.
“Right now, to me, the really big impact is the psychological damage,” VanTongeren said. “New discoveries in science take years to develop, and when you plant that seed [but then] that effort might not be funded or come to fruition … it’s really challenging.”
Despite uncertainties, the Department of Earth and Climate Sciences remains committed to conducting research at Tufts.
“Tufts and Earth and Climate Sciences are committed to continuing our research and education mission in the climate sciences and in the earth sciences because they are fundamental aspects of our understanding as a society, and they have globally relevant implications,” VanTongeren said.
