Graduate chairs from the School of Arts and Sciences sent an open letter on Feb. 24 to senior administrators voicing concern over the school’s decision to cut graduate admissions.
The 22 graduate chairs who signed the letter expressed concerns about the negative effects of reducing graduate program admissions, and argued that the cuts could compromise the University’s education and research missions and inflict “reputational harms” on Penn. The letter included demands for the SAS administration to reverse the decision and restore admission rates to previous levels.
The letter was addressed to administrators, including Interim Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences Jeffrey Kallberg, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Peter Struck, and Associate Dean for Graduate Studies Beth Wenger. The message came days after Kallberg told graduate chairs to reduce graduate program admission rates by one-third as a “necessary cost-saving measure to help mitigate the impact of these new funding realities.”
In a statement to The Daily Pennsylvanian, Wenger wrote that she met with SAS graduate chairs alongside Kallberg, and “listened carefully to the concerns that were raised, and the faculty heard our responses.”
“We are pained by this decision, but believe in this uncertain climate, this is the way to ensure support for our existing students and the talented cohort to come next year,” Wenger wrote.
A University spokesperson and a spokesperson for the Provost’s Office did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
“We understand that the recent federal executive orders targeting higher education have introduced profound uncertainties into what was already a challenging set of conditions for University administrators,” the letter said.
“It harms applicants who may someday be our colleagues and most certainly are the future of our institutions,” the letter read. “And especially in the absence of any official announcement of the cuts, it will do significant harm to the trust others place in our programs and in us as individuals.”
The graduate chairs also objected to “the fact that the cuts were decided without faculty consultation,” and called “for a re-commitment to shared governance as a source of strong decision-making.” They wrote that the decision to cut programs “in ways that directly affect teaching and research” should have involved faculty in “a deliberative process.”
In an interview with the DP, a SAS professor who signed the letter, but requested anonymity due to fear of retribution, echoed those sentiments.
“There are a lot of smaller departments where they feel on the edge of not being able to maintain a [graduate] program. If you cut us from having two students a year to one student, your one student a year is just not a grad program,” the faculty member said.
The letter additionally outlined several demands, including a request to restore SAS graduate admissions to the levels communicated to faculty prior to Feb. 1, 2025. The faculty members also petitioned for a meeting to “formulate less harmful responses” to the National Institutes of Health funding cuts.
If the admissions reductions stand, graduate chairs asked for the option to rescind offers themselves, and for Penn to make an official announcement detailing “how the decision was made and by whom.”
“We will not continue to be a world-leading research institution if we visibly disinvest from graduate education and step back from our role in training the next generation of researchers and intellectual leaders,” the letter concluded. “The University’s needs and values rest on reputation, and that reputation is put at risk by the proposed cuts.”
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