NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — President Trump recently issued an executive order cutting federal funding for many Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs nationwide.
The order is broad, impacting important work you may not associate with DEI, including programs here in Nashville.
One Vanderbilt program that supports education for students with autism, the Frist Center for Autism and Innovation, is set to lose funding because of the new policy.
"We were told as recently as the first week of January that grant proposals that we had submitted to the National Science Foundation 12 to 18 months ago were going to be awarded, totaling about 7, 7 and a half million dollars," explained the Center's director Keivan Stassun.
But, in recent weeks, after Trump's announcement, he learned they wouldn't be getting any of that funding.
Professor Stassun says while the grants were applied for through the National Science Foundation, the wording they used for those specific grants, like "accessibility" and "inclusion," fell under DEI categorization.
"That program has now awarded more PhDs to autistic scientists and engineers than any other program before," he explained. "There are amazing contributions that these folks can make and are prepared to make, but we need to support them. We need to finish their training. We need to provide the coaching and the mentoring that they uniquely need."
Stassun says the loss of funding is a loss for society, given it's been a pivotal program since 2017. With a PhD training program and national college autism network, the Center is meant to set autistic STEM students up for success. It largely focuses on, and encourages, the strengths of people with autism and supports them throughout college and into the workforce.
"[The program] completely changed my life," added Amber Crabtree, a science and engineering fellow in the program who is about to earn her PhD. "If you can know your strengths and be able to use those, you can probably have a very successful and fulfilling career versus feeling essentially like a failure and something you're not designed for."
"As the parent of an autistic teenager who is just about getting ready to start college, I know very directly and I feel it in my heart, my parent's heart, what a loss it is," concluded Stassun.
In addition to the loss of program funding, Stassun says the Center also has to let go of several staff members, including autistic PhD scientists.
Do you have more information about this story? You can email me at nikki.hauser@newschannel5.com.
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