This winter, a quiet tristesse has settled across the Institute as austerity narrows conversation. Yet renewal often begins in moments like these – when faculty take up the harder questions of governance, responsibility, and imagination. The Faculty Newsletter, a platform from faculty for faculty, is devoting this issue to urging faculty to shape the financial, environmental, and cultural choices that will define MIT’s future. Across the issue three themes converge: independence, inclusion, and transformation.

• Independence through a renewed resource model.
  The current budget crisis stems from the conjunction of three pressures: the 8% tax on investment returns, tighter F&A (indirect-cost) caps, and a federal posture increasingly willing to condition support – and campus conduct – on shifting priorities. Against this backdrop, President Kornbluth’s firm rejection of the federal Compact – a decision that preserved academic freedom at real financial cost – reminds us that autonomy and academic freedom are not guaranteed; they are choices[1]. With this choice comes responsibility. The risk now is erosion by austerity. So the question is: how do we design a financial model that secures independence and inclusion? One that expands access, renews our civic partnership, and treats faculty as the stewards, not the subjects, of institutional change. Such a model must sustain a mission-driven Institute that serves the state, nation, and the world, encompassing the full breadth of MIT – science, engineering, business, the humanities, arts, architecture, urban planning, and the social sciences. It must also renew our commitment to educating new generations in civics, social justice, and ethics (not only digital ethics), linking knowledge with responsibility and public purpose. This is the focus of the essay, “Finance, Freedom, and the Faculty Post-Compact: The Case for Independence and Inclusion,” which offers a faculty conversation starter.
  
• The carbon-neutral campus: urgency reclaimed.
  Once the liveliest topic on campus, decarbonization has slid toward the back burner amid fiscal pressure and community stress. Yet the climate clock does not pause for budget cycles. Achieving a carbon-neutral MIT is more than environmental stewardship; it is a test of whether we can act collectively in the public interest even when resources are tight. Our campus – labs, studios, classrooms, meeting spaces, and housing – should be the living experiment that shows what a low-carbon future looks like and how we can reach that goal and thrive in it. Crucially, that future must model equitable resilience: upgrades and investments that protect everyone on campus and in our neighboring communities. Christoph Reinhart and colleagues’ “A Primer on Decarbonizing MIT’s Campus: What Every MIT Faculty Member Should Know” outlines what we could be doing now.
  
• Transformation through initiative and inclusion.
  Since her inauguration, President Kornbluth has launched cross-Institute initiatives designed to lower barriers between fields and broaden participation in discovery – “to empower faculty to pursue their most innovative ideas, collaborate with others outside their field, and explore fresh approaches to teaching.” These include The Climate Project, The Generative AI Impact Consortium, The Health and Life Sciences Collaborative, and The MIT Quantum Initiative[2]. In these dim months, they appear not as isolated sparks – singular and alone – but as signs of a cultural shift toward greater collaboration, transparency, common responsibility and shared purpose. Each embodies the same commitments that guided the Compact decision – merit, independence, and inclusion – and asks how a university can renew itself from within. Yet inclusion cannot end at the stairs of 77 Massachusetts Avenue. It must continue to expand outward – supporting scholars, students, and communities worldwide so that our knowledge, teaching, and resources flow in both directions and strengthen our capacity to meet shared, planetary challenges. As we await the Quantum Initiative – whose very logic invites us to move beyond the binaries that so often frame our conception of the world – spend or cut, right or wrong, us or them – toward a more entangled and generous understanding of ourselves and of knowledge itself, our colleagues Martha L. Gray and collaborators remind us that the foundations of this renewal already exist. Programs such as the School of Engineering’s Technical Leadership and Communication (TLC) initiatives offer precisely the kind of structures upon which MIT can build – extending its leadership not only in technical innovation but in cultivating the civic and ethical capacities of those who will shape a better future.

These are some of the lights we need this winter: clear principles, deliberate action, collaboration, and the courage to renew and think anew. The FNL is proud to host this conversation. Write. Propose. Consider. Experiment. Vote. Teach. Submit a letter to the FNL, or a Faculty Travelogue, or an article – and share your own small lights; together they may yet change the season.

[1] The Compact and the Future of MIT – MIT Faculty Newsletter

[2] Special Initiatives | MIT Office of the President | MIT – Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Back to top