On Friday, October 17, 2025, a coalition of students from Tulane University gathered on Freret Street in New Orleans, rallying for an affordable and inclusive campus. The demonstration, organized by Together United Louisiana Students for a Democratic Society (TUL SDS), was a direct response to the Trump administration’s controversial Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education—a proposal that has ignited fierce debate across the nation’s higher education landscape.
Students at Tulane voiced a series of demands: lowering attendance costs, increasing Black and local enrollment, and protecting Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives. The rally also drew attention to the stark racial disparities between Tulane’s predominantly white student body and the majority-Black city it calls home. As Sania Islam, a senior at Tulane and lifelong New Orleans resident, passionately declared, “When Tulane raises our tuition, they make it harder for working-class students to join us. When Tulane complies with ICE, they push immigrant students into hiding. When Tulane eliminates DEI programs and refuses to address the stark whiteness at this school compared to New Orleans, they threaten Black and brown students in our own damn city!” (Fight Back! News)
The protest was sparked by the Trump administration’s ten-point compact, sent to select universities on October 1, 2025. The compact offered preferential access to federal funding in exchange for sweeping policy changes. Among the most contentious demands: banning DEI programs, limiting international and immigrant student admissions, removing race, class, and gender from hiring and admissions considerations, and defining sex strictly on conservative biological criteria—effectively rejecting transgender and non-conforming identities. According to CNN, the compact also required a five-year tuition freeze, a cap of 15% on international student enrollment, and annual anonymous polls to monitor compliance.
While Tulane has not yet received the compact directly, its students are already feeling the pressure of rising costs and shrinking support for marginalized groups. “It’s odd to live in a Black city and see so few Black or brown students in my classroom. The tuition at this school is almost double the average income in New Orleans,” Islam noted, highlighting the economic and social disconnect between the university and its surrounding community (Fight Back! News).
Across the country, the Trump administration’s proposal has met with growing resistance. The initial letters were sent to nine universities: Vanderbilt University, University of Pennsylvania, Dartmouth College, University of Southern California, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), University of Texas at Austin, University of Arizona, Brown University, and University of Virginia (CNN). Since then, three more—Arizona State University, University of Kansas, and Washington University in St. Louis—were invited to participate, bringing the total to twelve institutions engaged in this debate.
So far, six leading universities have publicly rejected the compact: MIT, Brown, University of Pennsylvania, University of Southern California, Dartmouth College, and University of Virginia (CNN, Bloomberg). University of Virginia’s interim President Paul Mahoney explained the school’s position after attending a White House meeting: “While there are many areas of agreement in the proposed compact, we believe that the best path toward real and durable progress lies in an open and collaborative conversation.” Dartmouth College President Sian Leah Beilock echoed these sentiments, declaring, “I do not believe that a compact—with any administration—is the right approach to achieve academic excellence, as it would compromise our academic freedom, our ability to govern ourselves, and the principle that federal research funds should be awarded to the best, most promising ideas.” (CNN)
Other institutions, such as Vanderbilt University and the University of Arizona, have stated they are reviewing the compact, while the University of Texas at Austin expressed openness to discussions without committing to the agreement. Meanwhile, the University of Virginia’s rejection came just hours after a White House meeting, underscoring the urgency and intensity of the ongoing debate.
White House officials, including May Mailman (senior adviser on higher education policy), Vincent Haley (head of the Domestic Policy Council), and Education Secretary Linda McMahon, described recent meetings with university leaders as “productive.” Spokesperson Liz Huston remarked, “They now have the baton to consider, discuss, and propose meaningful reforms. These leaders are working steadfastly to improve higher education and have been invited to the table to share ideas with the Administration, and we look forward to discussing transparent ways that, together, we will produce future generations of American excellence.” (Bloomberg)
The administration’s push for the compact is part of a broader campaign to reshape U.S. higher education. This effort has included freezing billions in research grants, opening civil rights investigations into allegations of campus discrimination and antisemitism, and pressuring universities to align with conservative policy priorities (Bloomberg, CNN). While some universities, such as Columbia, Penn, and Brown, have reached settlements to restore federal funding, Harvard University continues to resist and is pursuing legal action against the administration.
At Tulane, the impact of these national trends is already being felt. Students report that tuition and on-campus meal plan prices have soared, and the cost of living has grown increasingly burdensome. Moreover, the university has rolled back programs supporting low-income and minority students, renamed the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion to the Office of Academic Excellence and Opportunity, and eliminated the Office of Gender and Sexual Diversity. Programs like the African Studies Book Club and Black and Lavender (LGBTQ+) graduation events have been canceled, leaving many students feeling marginalized and unsupported (Fight Back! News).
In response, Tulane students are demanding that their administration freeze rising costs, reinstate programs celebrating cultural, economic, gender, and sexual diversity, and declare the campus a sanctuary for vulnerable students. They are also calling on Tulane to take a public stand against the Trump compact if it is ever presented to the university.
As the November 21 deadline for initial signatories approaches, the Trump administration has indicated it will revise the compact based on university feedback and circulate an updated version. Still, the fundamental question remains: Can universities protect their academic freedom, institutional autonomy, and commitment to diversity in the face of mounting federal pressure?
The battle lines are drawn, not just at Tulane, but across the country. Students, faculty, and administrators are wrestling with what it means to foster true academic excellence—and who gets to define it. As one Tulane student put it, “We’re fighting for a campus that reflects the city we live in, where everyone has a chance to succeed, no matter who they are or where they come from.”
For now, the debate over the Trump compact continues to reverberate through the halls of academia, with both sides holding firm to their vision of the future of American higher education.
