I teach gifted students. Trump is stealing their future.

His deep cuts are hitting America’s best and brightest.

By Bob from Home of the Brave

For nearly 40 years, I’ve had the privilege of teaching some of the nation’s most advanced science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) students in the country at several high schools for gifted and talented kids. My particular area of focus is computational science—the use of computers and mathematics to solve novel scientific problems, sometimes known as scientific computing or modeling and simulation.

My students build and analyze computer models to explore challenging scientific problems, some of which are not able to be studied in traditional experimental labs. That puts them on the cutting edge of research and scholarship being done in this country, and their talents are a boon to the nation at large. These are kids who work hard, study long hours, care deeply about their work, and want to contribute to the public body of understanding around complex problems.

Our students come to schools like ours because they understand this, even as teenagers: Becoming a research scientist is a long, hard road. The journey has a lot in common with what it takes to become a professional musician. For musicians, it takes years of music lessons, moving to increasingly competent (and expensive) music teachers. The best get accepted to music programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels, such as Juilliard or the Eastman School of Music. The best of those get invited to audition for very limited spots in a symphony orchestra or other professional musical organization. And the best of those get to play for a living.

Scientists develop in very much the same manner. For most, the path begins with an experience in an undergraduate research lab, perhaps a summer internship or academic year position in a lab. The better students then get accepted to graduate school, typically on the strength of having published one or more “first author” papers in a peer-reviewed journal as an undergraduate. Grad students emerge with a PhD, and the majority go on to a post-doctoral position. From there, an invitation to apply for a tenure-track position at a university might follow, or an offer to work for a private research organization. For university types, the university will support the faculty member for some amount of time, providing lab space, and funding for grad students—but the expectation is that the faculty member will obtain their own funding after some period of time to be functionally self-supporting.

Writing about NASA’s Project Mercury, Tom Wolfe quipped: “No bucks, no Buck Rogers.” This of course meant that without adequate funding, there would be no man on the moon. Science works the same way: no funding, no science. In 1945, Vannevar Bush was asked to write a report for President Truman on American science. His report, “Science, the Endless Frontier,” laid the groundwork for the creation of the National Science Foundation (NSF) by calling for a robust partnership between the federal government and the scientific community, primarily in the research universities.

The system worked this way: The government would, structured on a highly efficient and competitive peer-review process, fund researchers to conduct the nation’s scientific research. This funding consisted of two parts: direct costs, which pay for scientists’ salaries, equipment, and other materials that are directly identified for the research to occur. The second are indirect costs, which pay for infrastructure such as buildings and building maintenance, electricity, janitors, grants managers, and other expenses that research requires but are not directly attributed to the specific research. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) uses the same funding process, as do other federal institutions such as the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Education, NASA, Department of Agriculture, and others.

The Trump administration has taken a sledge hammer to these funding organizations. It has cut $3.9 billion from the NSF, or 56 percent of the organization’s budget, and reduced the NIH’s budget by 40 percent. Meanwhile, existing grants are being scrutinized for any hint of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). The fallout from various cuts is already being felt by major research institutions that have seen large reductions in federal funding, some of which is used for research such as cancer therapies for children. There have been threats of significant cuts to indirect costs, which at some universities can be as high as 50 percent. The Trump administration has argued that indirect costs need to be capped at 10 or 15 percent, wholly inadequate for the real costs of doing research. This is a war on research funding the likes of which we have never seen before.

But, back to my students. In essence, the pathway from early scientist to professional scientist is in significant jeopardy. At the undergraduate level, programs such as NSF’s “Research Experience for Undergraduates” (REU) were cut right before they were supposed to begin this summer. As a result, my students have fewer opportunities to work in university research labs. And those labs will not be able to support graduate students and post-docs, who serve as the primary mentors for undergrads, helping them design experiments, write papers, and do all of the things that a researcher has to know how to do. Now, without warning and without reason, that all might be gone forever.

One notable quote from former NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins, regarding the impact of shutting down or reducing federal funding for research projects: “My deepest concern is that America is going to lose a whole generation of scientists. It will be very hard to recover from that.” These are wise words, and sadly true. The students coming from my high school research program don’t yet know that many doors to their continued journey toward a research career have been closed. They will, unfortunately, find out all too soon.

Bob is a lifelong teacher and a participant in Home of the Brave, a new initiative highlighting the harms of Donald Trump’s second term.