EDITORIAL | Don’t Settle for the Settlement

Cornell played the game.

The University lobbied historic amounts. Administrators talked to the federal government. They worked to make a case to alumni and the American people about Cornell’s value and values.

After nine months of crucial research projects and the livelihood of faculty members being held in limbo, Cornell has reclaimed over $250 million in federal research funding and settled its civil rights lawsuits — for the price tag of $60 million, split between the federal government and an investment in agricultural research, as well as a laundry list of policy agreements.

It is natural to view the settlement agreement as the decisive ending to a chapter. But while the funding freeze and active litigation may be settled, the impact of this agreement is not. The legacy of the settlement will not be evident within the written text of the agreement, but rather in its subsequent use cases and implications.

Keep your eyes on the impacts. Do not be resigned. We must carefully observe, question and criticize the influence of the federal government and administrative choices on our academics, admissions and research.

1. Agricultural Research Investment

The partial diversion of financial concessions away from the federal government in the settlement process constitutes a partial win for academic independence. Further, Cornell’s commitment to a $30 million investment in agricultural research deeply aligns with the University’s mission and legacy. 

However, it is essential to pinpoint who will actually benefit from such research.

The New York Times reported that “The agricultural research planned by Cornell will involve the use of artificial intelligence and robotics in farming.”

Novel AI technology can be utilized to more effectively monitor and predict climate patterns and crop health. Data-driven decisions can be leveraged to obtain higher crop yields and minimize waste.   

But efficiency comes at a cost. AI models degrade the environment through requiring staggering amounts of electricity and water, with climate impacts that hurt agriculture itself. Data centers disproportionately affect minority and low-income areas, which pay health costs for private gain in the name of technological innovations.

These costs are hitting our own community. In the neighboring town of Lansing, a proposed data center has raised environmental concerns, including the potential use of lake water intake to dissipate exhaust heat.

Agricultural investment must not be an act of greenwashing. It must center sustainability, especially through the inclusion of Indigenous voices, which have been historically silenced, including by Cornell.

The Morrill Act of 1862 provided grants in the form of federal land to states to fund colleges “to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts.”

But there were cruel implications of this act — land-grant institutions built their endowments off the disenfranchisement of indigenous people and the selling and exploitation of the land.

Cornell, the largest and sole New York State beneficiary of this act, received nearly 1 million acres of dispossessed American Indian land across 15 states, obtained through treaties or confiscation from inhabitants.

The University’s agricultural research and education legacy has a dark past. But its current $30 million agriculture investment can affect positive change. Bolstering the output of agriculture is just as important as empowering the people from whose hands it is grown and protecting the sovereignty of the land from which it is grown.

Agricultural research must center small farms, whose livelihoods are threatened by corporate consolidation. The investment must recognize the unique concerns of immigrant farmers, hurt by raids amid a nationwide mass deportation effort, fostering a repressive culture likely stifling self-advocacy efforts surrounding medical care and worker conditions. The funds must be used to empower Indigenous perspectives on regenerative agriculture and land stewardship.

2. The Use of Admissions Data

Cornell’s settlement includes a provision to provide anonymized undergraduate admissions data by race, grade point average and standardized test scores broken down by specific colleges to the federal government each quarter.

“Admissions data will also be subjected to a comprehensive audit by the United States,” the agreement reads. 

Keeping the door wide open for investigations into the admissions process based on a statistical analysis of its results is concerning in how it compromises the independence of Cornell’s admissions process and reduces students to statistics.

The federal government will likely look for demographic patterns to allege bias in the admissions process, so as to repeat a cycle of political leverage — notably, Cornell’s settlement indicates submission to the weaponization of lawsuits. The University must exercise restraint in response to potential future political aggression over the admissions process. Settlements must not become a pattern.

Likewise, while abiding by post-affirmative action regulations, Cornell must not preemptively shift its recruitment and admissions efforts out of fear of the audit process. It must maintain a holistic and contextualized admissions process, with the recognition that underrepresented students systemically face lower access to application resources.

The Class of 2029 saw a modest increase in the proportion of Hispanic, Black and Indigenous students represented in the student body compared to the Class of 2028, while remaining significantly lower compared to previous years when affirmative action was used in admissions.

This shift followed the enactment of a new partnership with QuestBridge’s National College Match program, intentions to grow agreements with community colleges and plans to expand resources for prospective students earlier in high school.

Administrators also spoke at a town hall about increased outreach through the National Education Equity Lab and other community-based organizations and the use of the relatively new identity-focused application essay in the admissions process.

These initiatives reflect Cornell’s motto of “any person, any study” and must be expanded, along with increased efforts to contextualize applications by financial status and eliminate legacy admissions. The University must stand against the federal government’s use of admissions data as an agent of control.

3. The Influence of the Bondi Resource

In addition to restating Cornell’s commitment to “complying with federal civil rights laws,” the University has agreed to use U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s July memo titled "Guidance for Recipients of Federal Funding Regarding Unlawful Discrimination" as a training resource for all faculty and staff. 

The letter forbids “unlawful preferential treatment,” which Bondi attributes to race-based programs, “diversity statements” in applications, “safe spaces” and so on. The University has already flirted with appeasement on the “diversity, equity and inclusion” front — any further concession to Bondi’s agenda will pose a serious risk of amplifying discrimination on campus.

Bondi’s letter further invalidates transgender existence, presupposing that a person assigned male at birth cannot be a woman: “permitting males to compete in women's athletic events almost invariably denies women equal opportunity.” The letter asserts that federal law demands the University enforce the prohibition of trans women from women’s sports — a policy Cornell already follows — and “single-sex spaces … such as bathrooms, showers, locker rooms, or dormitories.” 

At one point, Weill Cornell pledged to provide gender-affirming care for trans youth. But following President Donald Trump’s return to office, President Michael Kotlikoff’s administration heeded anti-trans executive orders, and with that, abandoned the University’s core values. Trans lives are at stake in the battle for recognition, especially on college campuses.

An authentic Cornell would protect them; this one has not. The community should anticipate and resist compliance with Bondi’s interpretation. 

With no settlement clause establishing an independent monitor of the University, as opposed to Columbia, the agreement to a training resource may have very well been intended as a performative move. 

Kotlikoff said at a town hall that the U.S. Department of Justice guidance only represents guidelines and that “the University did not agree to abide by [the guidance] as law.” He noted: “We have lots of resources to train our faculty and it’s important to understand and address the government's view of eliminating discrimination on campus.”

But if Kotlikoff considers DEI, pronouns and “identity politics,” to be “woke,” then his interpretation of federal law may very well align with Bondi’s. 

And even a symbolic alignment with anti-trans and anti-DEI guidance raises serious concerns about shifts in campus culture. Official guidance is more than enough to stifle academic freedom and inclusion efforts on campus, especially as faculty face staff cuts amid what administrators have labeled “profound financial challenges.”

Tread cautiously. The Cornell community must not settle for the settlement.

The Sun is interested in publishing a broad and diverse set of content from the Cornell and greater Ithaca community. We want to hear what you have to say about this topic or any of our pieces. Here are some guidelines on how to submit. And here’s our email: opinion-editor@cornellsun.com.

---