The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) on Friday rejected the Trump administration’s proposed “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education,” which would have required sweeping changes on campus in exchange for a funding advantage in federal grant awards.
The 10-point memo was provided to nine higher learning institutions last week, requiring reforms such as a rewiring of the admissions process by adjusting the consideration of race or ethnicity, student grading and demanding that transgender women be excluded from women’s locker rooms and sports teams.
The document “includes principles with which we disagree, including those that would restrict freedom of expression and our independence as an institution,” reads a Friday letter from MIT President Sally Kornbluth to Education Secretary Linda McMahon.
“And fundamentally, the premise of the document is inconsistent with our core belief that scientific funding should be based on scientific merit alone,” she added.
MIT is the first institution to publicly rebuke the offer, in spite of its ties to preferential funding.
TVNL Comment: Congratulations to MIT for making this decision!




With days left before journalists covering the Pentagon must sign on to a new set of guidelines to retain physical access to the department, major US news companies – and organizations representing their interests – remain concerned about specific policies they fear will stifle independent reporting on the Pentagon.
US troops have been sent to Israel as part of the peace deal approved on Thursday to support and help monitor the ceasefire, according to multiple news reports.
A Rutgers University professor who taught a course on anti-fascism and was blocked from leaving the US for Spain on Wednesday night, according to media reports, hours after Donald Trump hosted a White House roundtable highlighting the impact of antifa – or “anti-fascist” – far-left activists is now departing.
The last two years have brought unprecedented horrors in Israel-Palestine: first, the gruesome Oct. 7, 2023, assault on Israelis led by the Palestinian militant group Hamas, then Israel’s sweeping and U.S.-enabled devastation of the Gaza Strip. Daily reports of deaths and apparent war crimes have been so overwhelming as to sometimes obscure the reality that the continued conflict and tragedy are a result of choices by individuals — often, choices at the White House.





























