Changing Higher Ed · 2026-06-23 · 40 min
When the federal government freezes research funding, leaders tend to treat it as a budget problem: a number that was cut and might later be restored. The harder truth in this conversation is that much of the damage cannot be undone. Halted studies, shuttered labs, and departed early-career researchers do not simply resume when the money comes back. Research funding cuts are a strategic risk, not a line item. In this episode of the Changing Higher Ed® podcast , Dr. Drumm McNaughton speaks with Dr. Nick Dirks , President and CEO of the New York Academy of Sciences and former chancellor of UC Berkeley. Dirks first joined the show in 2018, as the podcast's third guest , reflecting on the protests that had put Berkeley at the center of national attention over controversial speakers on campus. He returns to discuss what the current research funding cuts are doing to American science, where AI fits in higher education, and the choices facing presidents and boards.
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