BUZZ
One grant funded faculty training in ‘antiracist orientations’ via virtual reality
President Donald Trump’s administration recently pulled over $7.6 million in National Science Foundation grants from Arizona State University due to their ties to “diversity, equity and inclusion.”
The cuts targeted projects that included terms such as “equitable,” “underrepresented,” and “racial,” according to AZ Free News.
One of the five DEI grants that were pulled allocated nearly $2.5 million to a project called “Black Girls as Creators: an intersectional learning ecosystem toward gendered racial equity in Artificial Intelligence education.”
The program, which ran from October 2023 to April 2025, ended three years early. It offered after-school and summer camps for black girls aged 9-14 to work with AI creators, “focusing on intersectionality and racial equity,” the AZ Free News reported.
Another canceled grant allotted over $700,000 to an initiative called “Positioning Engineering Faculty to Support Black Engineering Graduate Students through Awareness, Knowledge, Capacity Building, and Community.”
The program, which was also terminated in April, was supposed to run through August 2029. It trained ASU faculty “in antiracist orientations using virtual reality simulations to address systemic barriers for black graduate students, prioritizing competency over technical skills,” according to AZ Free News.
Another nearly $3 million grant funded a project that sought to reform faculty policies to promote “gender equity and intersectionality, potentially undermining merit-based standards,” the outlet reported.
The last two grants allocated about $1.5 million to train elementary school teachers in “Culturally Relevant Teaching” and advance “Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion.”
In total, ASU has lost about $28.5 million in NSF grants this year, according to AZ Free News.
The Department of Government Efficiency has recently yanked more than 1,600 grants issued by the NSF, The College Fix previously reported.
The majority of the 701 cuts announced on April 25 pertains to DEI-related projects.
In addition, DOGE has been cutting more than just NSF grants.
In April, the government agency ordered the cancelation of $175 million in National Endowment for the Humanities grants over their DEI ties, The Fix reported.
However, a federal judge blocked this effort on Friday, ruling that the Trump administration engaged in discrimination and violated the First Amendment by cutting the grants “based on the recipients’ perceived viewpoint.”
The judge ordered that the funds tied to the grants remain unallocated until a trial is held on the “merits” of the case.
MORE: Kansas State U. closes LGBT ‘Spectrum Center’ following anti-DEI law
IMAGE CAPTION AND CREDIT: ASU sign on campus; melissamn/Shutterstock
