Duke University moved to reduce spending after federal funding changes that university leaders said would cut key revenue streams tied to research grants and reimbursements. The administration’s higher-education agenda, as described by The Chronicle at Duke and distributed by The Associated Press, included demands on universities to change policies involving diversity, equity and inclusion, limit international student enrollment, and reduce reliance on federally funded research.
Duke leaders linked the federal changes to budget pressures for the university, including its health system, and began planning for what they described as potentially larger losses from federal funding. In response, Duke launched a cost-reduction effort and, according to the report, became one of the first universities to trim its personnel amid the federal funding changes.
University executives said Duke’s cost-cutting program would generate savings for the fiscal year 2026 budget. Daniel Ennis, Duke’s executive vice president, and Rachel Satterfield, the university’s vice president for finance and treasurer, presented figures to the Academic Council in September that showed Duke had produced $229 million in savings across Duke’s departments and schools for the fiscal year 2026 budget, with a longer-term goal of reducing the university’s expense base by $350 million by 2030.
In its planning documents, Duke set targets for additional savings in subsequent years, including an additional $47 million in each of the next two years, a further $30 million in fiscal year 2029 and $11 million the following year. The figures cited in the report put Duke’s total savings at $364 million, or $14 million above the initial target.
The report traces the cost-cutting timeline to early 2025 policy proposals affecting universities’ federal research reimbursements. In February, the Trump administration sought to cap facilities and administrative reimbursement rates for grants funded through institutions such as the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation at 15%, down from rates described in the report as around 60%. The directive faced legal challenges and, as Duke prepared for uncertainty, the reimbursement changes were described as still blocked in the courts.
The Chronicle report said that in response to the uncertainty, Duke anticipated significant financial losses if the proposed reimbursement changes were implemented. Duke officials also described additional federal requests and changes that could affect funding related to diversity, equity and inclusion and broader research award decisions, as well as a reduction in certain grant opportunities.
Duke’s cost-reduction program began in March, shortly after President Vincent Price announced it. Price said at the time that the university would pursue cost reductions across the campus and re-imagine its work and how it aligned with priorities, and The Chronicle report quoted Price telling faculty in an annual address that the university “no longer enjoy(s) at this moment” many of the federal resources it had relied on previously, including support from the American public and the government.
As the federal funding picture remained uncertain, Duke moved from planning toward workforce actions in the middle of the year. In mid-April, university administrators said in a webinar that “employment action” would be “inescapable,” according to the report. Two weeks later, Duke announced a voluntary separation incentive program, described as buyouts for eligible staff, and the university later extended offers to 939 staff members, with 599 accepting—about 5% of Duke’s full-time staff.
The Chronicle report said that during the separation process, staff were given 45 days to accept or decline, and that much of the severance package included non-disclosure agreements. The report also described concerns raised by some staff and faculty about the scope and timing of cuts, including reports of broad reductions across libraries, student affairs and information technology and communications.
Duke also warned that if enough staff did not accept voluntary severance, it would proceed with non-voluntary layoffs. In June, Price warned that layoffs would “likely” follow, and the layoffs described in the report largely occurred in mid-August, as students returned to campus, with 45 employees laid off by September.
The budget cuts extended beyond administrative and staff roles. In the same period, Price announced a retirement incentive program for eligible faculty, and the report said 82 of 273 faculty members took it. The report also described changes affecting the Duke School of Medicine, including decommissioning the Jones Research Building as the school pursued a goal of cutting $125 million in annual expenditures.
When students and faculty returned in mid-August, the report said Duke’s operations looked different. Trinity first-years were greeted by a new team of 11 full-time advisers rather than the larger group of volunteer advisers described in the report as typically deployed, and subject librarians were left with fewer colleagues than in prior years, according to the account.
As Duke’s cost-cutting plans continued into the fall, faculty discussions centered on how Duke communicated finances and decision-making under “shared governance.” The report said Trinity dean Gary Bennett acknowledged the need for Duke to be “much more clear (and) straightforward” about how the university talked about its finances and administrative operations.
Throughout 2025, the report said some campus groups urged Duke to pause buyouts and layoffs and called for administrators to take pay cuts. In May, the American Association of University Professors called for Duke to halt buyouts and layoffs until faculty and staff could be “fully involved” in decision making, and Duke community members also signed a petition calling for Price and other administrators to take pay cuts.
As Duke headed into 2026, executives said the pace of cost cutting had slowed as it expected to operate on a $74 million budget surplus for fiscal year 2026. The report said Duke’s Academic Council in September identified the next phase as strategic realignment—shifting resources toward priority areas—and quoted Ennis as saying, “In the aggregate, we’re so much better positioned than had we not taken the action we did.”