Dive Brief:
- Johns Hopkins University has created two new grant programs to help keep alive some of the research projects threatened by federal funding cuts and delays imposed by the Trump administration.
- The programs provide short-term funding for faculty while they seek new support or revamp their research direction, or while they wait for sponsored funding to kick in.
- The university is financing the grants with “flexible resources,” including endowment earnings, a university spokesperson said in an emailed statement. But Johns Hopkins repeatedly made clear that the new programs cannot fully account for the lost federal funding.
Dive Insight:
Johns Hopkins joins Northwestern University in resorting to paying out of pocket to keep what research programs they can on track amid federal cuts and threats.
In Northwestern’s case, the Trump administration has reportedly targeted $790 million in federal funding over claims the university failed to protect students from antisemitism. The private institution earlier this month committed to using its own resources to fund any research affected by federal stoppages.
Other colleges affected by agency cuts have frozen budgets and hiring, and some had to stop research activities, including clinical trials, altogether.
Johns Hopkins self-funding initiative includes a program, called Bridge Grants, that provides up to $100,000, including $50,000 from matching funds, for researchers facing significant delays with federal funding but “a high likelihood of funding being released in the near future,” according to the university.
The other program, Pivot Grants, offers up to $150,000, including $75,000 in matching funds, for faculty whose federal awards were terminated by the government.
In both cases, the money can be used to keep research staff on board and pay for other expenses. Along with those grants, the university is offering financial support for doctoral students who lost their federal grants.
“The new grants cannot come close to fully replacing recent and ongoing reductions in federal support,” the university said in a news release.
Johns Hopkins also cautioned that its endowment, which is partially supporting the grant programs, isn’t a panacea for dealing with the federal funding chaos.
“It’s a common misconception that universities can simply ‘use the endowment’ in moments like this,” but restrictions exist on vast swaths of donations and endowment funds, the university said in a statement “That said, we are using flexible resources — some of which are tied to endowment earnings — to help sustain critical research in this moment of uncertainty.”
Research at Johns Hopkins has been hit hard by multiple efforts within the Trump administration to unilaterally refashion the federal government and cut spending.
The administration has canceled over 100 grants to the institution and delayed the renewals, awards or reviews for “many others,” Johns Hopkins leaders said Monday in a community update.
The Trump administration’s move to effectively dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development resulted in $800 million in lost federal funding alone for Johns Hopkins, the institution said in March. That led the university to lay off more than 2,200 workers tied to its USAID-funding research and programs.
A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to restore some of the canceled USAID funding, though lawsuits concerning the agency are still working their way through the courts.
A “portion” of the cut USAID grants to Johns Hopkins have been restored, university leaders said without going into further detail. But other federal agencies have since axed other grants to the university.
The institution faces a steep risk overall from the Trump administration’s attacks on research funding. In fiscal 2024, more than half of Johns Hopkins’ total operating revenue came from $4.8 billion in sponsored research revenue, with 88% of that coming from the federal government.
Among other hits, the university faces a potential $200 million cut if the National Institutes of Health succeeds in its quest to cap indirect research cost reimbursement at 15%.
Multiple lawsuits — including at least one in which Johns Hopkins is a plaintiff — have sought to block NIH’s plan. A judge in April issued a permanent injunction against the cap, and NIH has appealed the ruling.
