Every year, Gallaudet University, a Washington, D.C.-based college founded in 1864 for the deaf and hard of hearing, graduates hundreds of students and spends millions on research into advances in areas like neuroscience related to visual learning and the genetic causes of deafness. Gallaudet is one of hundreds of colleges that stand to lose significant operating revenue if the Trump administration proceeds with its plan to freeze all federal grant and loan payments.
In 2023, federal funding, including money from the Education of the Deaf Act of 1986, made up 65% of the Gallaudet’s $213 million annual operating revenues. With a relatively meager $170 million endowment, the university which employs more than 230 professors, many of whom are deaf, would struggle to recoup the loss of federal money. Another college at risk is Williamsburg Brooklyn’s United Talmudic Seminary, which trains more than 2,000 male adherents to the ultra-orthodox Satmar Hasidic sect in Jewish law and teachings. More than 50% of United Talmudic Seminary’s $46 million in annual revenue comes from the federal government. By far the biggest at-risk group of colleges are 18 historically Black colleges and universities—including Washington D.C.’s Howard University, Saint Augustine’s University in North Carolina, Voorhees University in South Carolina, Stillman College in Alabama and Tougaloo College in Mississippi. HBCUs receive federal support via Titles III and V of the Higher Education Act, and according to the latest federal education data, these 18 HBCUs relied on federal dollars to make up at least 29% of their operating revenues in fiscal 2023 (see table).
Other colleges that primarily serve non-white students stand to lose assistance, such as the Universidad Central de Bayamón, a private, four-year university in Bayamón, Puerto Rico. The university serves 900 students who are almost entirely Hispanic and Latino. It needs federal funding to make up 59% of its $9.3 million operating revenues. Tribal colleges such as North Dakota’s United Tribes Technical College and Turtle Mountain Community College, which serves tribes such as the Lakota, Mandan and Hidatsa, use federal funding to pay for at least 74% of operations. Most of these colleges have relatively puny endowments.
The Trump administration has clarified that Pell grants and federal student loans would not be included as part of the freeze, but the Higher Education Act-sanctioned federal funding for minority-serving institutions is likely to be tied up in the pause, says Rick Hess, senior fellow and director of education policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute. After the Supreme Court ruled in 2023 to bar colleges from using race in college admissions, it’s possible the Trump administration will apply the same standards to federal funding designations. “There’s an argument that a minority-serving institution designation of those funds is unconstitutional, and that those funds should instead be distributed based on criteria like economic need, as is with Pell,” Hess says. “If that turned out to be the case, some institutions would be winners and some would be losers.” For instance, at HBCUs Voorhees and Saint Augustine’s University, more than 72% of students receive Pell grants. At Howard, only 44% of students receive Pell grants.
As of Monday afternoon, the funds are still flowing. A judge in the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island issued a temporary restraining order that halts the freeze until the court can hear arguments for and against a preliminary injunction.
See here for a look at how the biggest recipients of federal dollars are well equipped to weather the funding freeze.