Northeastern University scrubs DEI references online following Trump executive order
The school took down the DEI office page, and removed references to the ideology from several other pages.
Trump’s anti-DEI executive order targets DEI at ‘institutions of higher education with endowments over 1 billion dollars.’
Northeastern University in Massachusetts has removed references to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs and policies from its website, following President Donald Trump’s Jan. 21 anti-DEI executive order.
The university has removed the webpage for its DEI office, replacing it with a new “Belonging at Northeastern” page, the school paper The Huntington News reported.
Other DEI related pages, including for the College of Social Science and Humanities, the School of Law, and the D’Amore-McKim School of Business were also either removed completely or revised in some fashion, WGBH reported.
President Donald Trump’s executive order targeting DEI mandates investigations into “institutions of higher education with endowments over 1 billion dollars,” among other DEI-promoting entities, and Northeastern University would fall into that category.
Northeastern University’s vice president for federal relations, Jack Cline, said in an interview with Northeastern Global News regarding the executive order: “Our values aren’t going to change. We’re an institution that embraces a culture of belonging, because we know that having a diversity of backgrounds and experiences make us better at teaching, at research, at solving the world’s problems.”
He added: “The methods we use to achieve those goals may need to be adjusted, though — partly because we’re always looking for the best way to meet our goals, and partly because we need to continue to comply with the law.”
Renata Nyul, the school’s Vice President for Communications, echoed these sentiments, stating: “While internal structures and approaches may need to be adjusted, the university’s core values don’t change. We believe that embracing our differences—and building a community of belonging—makes Northeastern stronger.”
Northeastern is not the only entity to move away from DEI policies in the wake of Trump’s executive order.
[RELATED: West Virginia universities reconsider DEI policies after new governor’s executive order]
Recently, the Department of Education began curbing its DEI efforts, including by canceling its “ongoing DEI training and service contracts which total over $2.6 million.”
The department announced that it had “removed or archived hundreds of guidance documents, reports, and training materials that include mentions of DEI.”
Campus Reform has contacted Northeastern University for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
