Dear Harvard Community Members,
We are writing with two timely and important developments related to Harvard’s overall finances and its federal funding. In light of these developments, we must also share our rapidly growing concerns about plans for severe budget cuts and layoffs at some Harvard schools. Our goal is not to cause alarm, but to enlist the broader Harvard community in pushing back against these harmful cuts through action steps, including the petition below.
SIGN THE PETITION:
Sign our petition today to let University leaders know that the Harvard community is united in protecting University staff and projects from drastic, unnecessary budget cuts. Everyone in the Harvard community—including staff, managers, faculty, students, and other community allies— is encouraged to sign. The final petition will be delivered to all of the University’s top decision makers. Click here to read and sign the petition!
Open Letter to the Harvard Community
There have been two consequential positive developments in recent weeks regarding Harvard’s federal grant funding and Harvard’s FY2025 finances:
- The vast majority of federal research funding has been restored and funds are flowing. More than a month after a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration illegally froze Harvard’s $750 million per year in federal funding, the vast majority of Harvard’s grants have now been officially reinstated, and those funds are flowing to the University again. Harvard has not only received retroactive reimbursement for nearly all frozen expenses dating back to when grants were first frozen, but the University is also receiving ongoing reimbursement for newly submitted grant expenses.
- Harvard just posted very strong FY2025 financial results. Harvard’s newly released annual financial report shows that the endowment grew by 11.9% in FY2025, generating $6.3 billion in endowment profits and bringing the total endowment to $56.9 billion. In addition, donations that can be spent immediately—known as current use gifts—came to $629 million for the year, the largest amount for a single year in Harvard’s history. Harvard also experienced a $210 million gain in operating revenues for FY2025. Although the report describes a $113 million budget shortfall for FY2025, that shortfall comes almost exclusively from the loss of federal grant funding—funding that has just been restored and will show up in the FY2026 report. Including the restored research funding, the University’s revenue from all sources increased by an enviable 5.3% from the previous year. In FY2025, Harvard also has over $6 billion in untapped reserves (which are liquid and not part of the endowment). In other words: Harvard is ending this fiscal year in a very strong financial position, even amid the political uncertainty.
Plans for Drastic Layoffs Despite Strong Financial Position
Given these overwhelmingly positive developments, it is alarming that some Harvard schools and departments still seem to be pressing ahead with plans for massive budget cuts and layoffs, making claims of severe financial constraint, which are not supported by the published facts about Harvard’s financial position.
The most extreme example is the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), which has just eliminated more than 20% of its HUCTW staff, and many non-union staff. This is the largest staff cut at any Harvard school in decades, and it is at least three times deeper than any other school’s staffing reductions in 2025 to date.
Under the HUCTW-Harvard Agreement, schools like SEAS must engage in a mandatory union-management consultation process when considering layoffs. As part of this process, SEAS is required to provide financial details showing why these cuts are necessary. In response to multiple requests for this information, SEAS administrators have been unable or unwilling to supply data that would substantiate their claims of financial hardship. This can only lead us to believe there is no significant financial necessity driving these destructive cuts. The School’s federal research funding has been restored and there are no other known short-term fiscal challenges—and yet SEAS administrators are still choosing to take away the livelihoods of dozens of talented and committed staff members. It is an unjustifiable and deeply harmful decision that hurts people, as well as the education and research programming they support—not out of urgent necessity, but out of choice.
More broadly, it is becoming clear that some Harvard schools have directed their departments and centers to implement deep budget reductions that would result in the elimination of important teaching and research services and major job losses for union and non-union staff, without a clear, fact-based rationale for such deep and painful cuts.
Devastating Cuts Based on Panic, Not Prudence
As we have noted before, the Trump administration’s ultimatums and attacks are moving targets designed to destabilize Harvard. They have created anxiety across the University and have prompted leaders to explore contingency plans. Drawing up plans for worst-case scenarios is prudent. But dismantling critical programs and community members’ livelihoods based on hypothetical danger is not prudence—it is panic.
We cannot allow speculation about uncertain future risks to dictate permanent decisions that will hurt our staff and our schools. As we said in our last letter, “Harvard should base critical staffing decisions on each school’s current financial reality, not on the shifting shadow of threats that may never materialize.”
In addition to these unrealized fears, some administrators are now pointing to the endowment tax as the primary justification for budget cuts and layoffs, but this is highly questionable for two reasons: (1) any effects from endowment tax will not be felt by the University until mid-2027 and (2) the new tax is applied to realized capital gains—which means it only applies to endowment assets that the University chooses to sell. As a result, there are multiple well-established ways for Harvard to sustain strong investment returns while substantially minimizing exposure to the endowment tax (as described in this article about how the endowment tax is being addressed at Yale).
The increased endowment tax poses a financial challenge that needs to be managed, but it is not a justification for the deep budget cuts and extreme job losses being urgently proposed.
Preemptive Cuts Will Hurt Faculty and Students
Sweeping, reckless staffing reductions like the ones being proposed by some schools will tear apart the essential infrastructure that enables faculty, researchers, and students to thrive—degrading the quality of education, research, and student life throughout the University. They will also inflict needless and lasting harm on the staff whose dedication, expertise, and—in many cases—entire careers have sustained Harvard’s mission. If Harvard slashes staff positions based on fear and speculation, it will not safeguard the University’s future, it will weaken and destabilize the institution—exactly as the Trump administration intends.
In our conversations with school and University leaders, we continue to insist on concrete details about Harvard’s financial realities and operational plans. We are urging decision makers to rely on demonstrable financial evidence and a measured, fact-based approach—not reactionary, extreme cutting driven by speculation or panic. And we remain steadfast in our fight to protect the jobs, programs, and research that are essential to Harvard’s mission.
We need help from you and the wider Harvard community as well.
ACTION STEPS
Today, we are asking you to take two simple but powerful action steps:
- Sign our petition, urging Harvard leaders to halt plans for extreme staffing reductions based on severe fiscal constraint when Harvard is experiencing a period of financial strength. We encourage everyone in the Harvard community to sign. The petition will be delivered to key decision makers in the University leadership and to the deans of all Harvard schools, including any that are considering budget cuts and layoffs. Read and sign the petition here.
- Ask the urgent questions: if budget cuts or job eliminations are being discussed in your department, everyone—staff, managers, faculty, and allies—can help by asking the relevant pressing questions. If you are told that your school or department must absorb budget cuts of 5%, 10%, or 20%, what are the specific financial losses behind such a huge cut? If no major losses have occurred, why are such severe measures—which will lead to the loss of important jobs and services—being taken now? If your school receives federal funding that has been restored, what is the plan for laid-off staff who previously worked on those grants? Will their positions be recalled? If not, why not? If drastic budget reductions with real human consequences are being discussed, are they based on concrete financial losses, or on projections of fiscal challenges that remain highly speculative.
Layoffs Are a Choice, Not a Necessity
We recognize that some potential financial risks may lie ahead—but weakening the institution from within by eliminating staff before any major loss has occurred is not protection; it is self-inflicted harm.
In the FY2025 financial report, Harvard President Alan Garber acknowledged that during this trying time, faculty, managers, and staff “pursued their work with renewed determination—a powerful testament to the commitment and strength of our community.” Harvard CFO Ritu Kalra’s comments in the report affirmed that “Harvard’s future will be secured not by resources alone, but by the collective commitment of its community to expand knowledge and serve society.”
If Harvard leaders believe in the value of staff—whose resilience and dedication have helped to sustain the institution in its most challenging moments—then it must demonstrate the same principled commitment in return. Protecting the people who provide the critical infrastructure, skills, and institutional knowledge necessary to facilitate teaching, research, and discovery is not at odds with safeguarding Harvard’s future—it is one of the most essential ways to protect it.
Thank you,
From the HUCTW Executive Board & Staff
Carrie Barbash
Tasha Williams
Ben Janey
Danielle Boudrow
Carrie Ayers
Beth Beighlie
Nyasha Bovell
Deborah Chaisson
Katie Genovese
Jason Gerdom
Katherine Westermann Gray
Victoria Groves-Cardillo
Sarah Hillman
Bridget Hinz
Cassidy Spiess
Donna Sweeney
Anna Taylor
Alex Chisholm
Jill Comer
Lynn Wang DeLacey
Laura Ebenstein
Randi Ellingboe
Joie Gelband
Simone Gonzalez
Emily Spicer Hankle
Bill Jaeger
Mack Mckenzie
Jaime Pepper
Rachael School
Tracey Smith
Ann Sjostedt
Emily Vides
Harvey Willson
