U.S. colleges are increasingly slashing their African American studies and related programs, citing low enrollment and limited funding, at a time when the federal government is exerting intense pressure to end racial diversity efforts.
Some academics blame politics, pointing out that Republicans and the Trump administration have taken aim at scholarships, admissions policies, and other efforts to boost diversity. At least a dozen schools, including private colleges and public flagship universities, have scaled back Black, African, or African American studies programs since Trump signed an executive order targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, a Washington Post review found.
“Politics is the engine, not a factor,” said Jafari Sinclaire Allen, director of the Institute for Research in African American Studies at Columbia University.
Allen, whose institute has surveyed colleagues around the country, says the cuts are so deep that they could damage the pipeline for important research and training for new scholars for years to come.
“They are not cutting at the fringe,” said Allen, who is also a professor of African American and African diaspora studies at Columbia. “They are striking the foundations.”
Universities that have closed or merged African American studies units over the past two years include the University of Iowa, the University of Texas at Austin, and the University of Kansas.
Others have eliminated or begun phasing out majors and degrees, including Kennesaw State University, the University of Toledo, and Indiana University at Bloomington. Several colleges have also trimmed classes, removed them from the core curriculum, or cut staff.
Enrollment in the programs has been falling in recent years, data shows.
For three straight years, students received fewer than 700 degrees in African American studies nationally, the lowest level in the last two decades, according to an analysis of federal data through 2025 by a researcher at the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. That’s despite the fact that the number of schools offering degree programs has gradually risen during the same span.
“It is quite puzzling,” said Robert Townsend, director of humanities, arts, and culture programs at the academy, an honorary society and policy research center.
Low enrollment has made the programs a target for cuts at some schools.
Take the University of North Texas (UNT), which projected a $45 million shortfall for the fiscal year ending this month. The university blamed falling enrollment, especially among international graduate students, and cuts in state funding for instruction and operations.
“UNT is facing a significant budget challenge,” the school said on its website.
To help balance the budget, the school said it would close or consolidate a long list of programs, including undergraduate minors in Africana studies, Asian studies, Mexican American studies, LGBTQ studies, women’s and gender studies, and degrees related to linguistics.
Some states have passed laws requiring schools to review and cull programs that yield few degrees. For instance, the University of Toledo cited such a law in Ohio when it suspended admissions to its bachelor’s program in Africana studies last year.
And the University of Iowa noted that there were only nine students in the bachelor’s program for African American studies when it decided to eliminate the major. It also closed its African American studies program.
But department chairs point out that the cuts are coming at a time when some states have also passed laws restricting courses focused on race or ethnicity.
For instance, a Florida law enacted in 2023 bars core general education classes — select courses required for graduation — from teaching “identity politics.” A North Carolina law passed this year generally bars public universities from requiring courses “related to divisive concepts” involving race or gender. And Texas A&M canceled eight courses, citing new policies governing race and gender instruction. The canceled courses included “Introduction to Race and Ethnicity” and several courses focused on diversity.
On the federal level, the Trump administration has attacked diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, arguing that they amount to race discrimination that violates civil rights laws. As part of the anti-DEI effort, the administration blocked many research grants related to race.
The Education Department did not respond to a request for comment on the cuts to African American studies programs.
Erica R. Edwards, chairperson of Black studies at Yale University, said such programs have become a target because “the field is unapologetic in its critiques of fascism, antiblackness, sexism and antitransness, and anti-immigration.”
“Given the concerted attempts of our current administration and its allies to suppress history and silence truth, it comes as no surprise that Black Studies programs are facing challenges from the inside — cuts, intense scrutiny, censorship, and consolidation — as well as attacks from the outside,” Edwards wrote in an email to the Post.
Some say the cuts are part of a broader ideological attack on the humanities.
“Although conservative attacks on the humanities have recurred periodically over the past several decades, the present moment is markedly different in scale and coordination,” said the executive committee for the American Studies Association, a scholarly organization, in a recent public statement.
Neetu Arnold, a policy analyst for the conservative Manhattan Institute, said the cuts are probably driven by low enrollment rather than politics. Still, Arnold said she believes that Black and African American studies departments have blurred the line between scholarship and advocacy.
“It’s hypocritical for department chairs to deride the cuts as political when they’re the ones who have allowed their departments to become highly politicized hotbeds of scholar-activism,” Arnold said.
To be sure, some cuts may be temporary. The University of Louisville in Kentucky paused admissions to three graduate programs, including its Pan-African studies Ph.D., because of tight funding. But a spokesperson said it is likely that admissions will reopen when more funding is available.
And some universities said they are continuing to offer classes and fund research in the field, despite consolidation and other administrative cuts.
Consider Northwestern University in Illinois. The school recently decided to move its African studies program from its research office to its provost’s office and eliminate two positions that supported the program. The move received national attention in part because the university says the program, founded in 1948, is the oldest of its kind in the United States.
Despite the changes, a Northwestern spokesperson said the program will continue to conduct research, offer a certificate for graduate students, and sponsor both a major and minor for undergraduates.
“None of that is changing — it will all continue,” said spokesperson Jon Yates. “To be clear: The program is not being downgraded.”
Still, more cuts could be coming to African or African American studies programs across the country.
For instance, the University of Georgia said it is evaluating whether to drop low-enrollment programs as part of a regular review.
That includes its African American studies major.
