31-03-2025
Has The Brain Drain From U.S. Universities Already Begun?
As the Trump administration continues to wage its multi-front campaign against university research, signs are emerging that faculty at American colleges are ready to pack their bags and head elsewhere to continue their careers. Some already have.
Citing the political climate in the United States and the federal government's attacks on higher education, Jason Stanley, author of the highly regarded How Fascism Works, recently announced he was leaving Yale to accept a chair in American studies at Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy along with a position in the University of Toronto's philosophy department. Stanley told Daily Nous that his 'decision was entirely because of the political climate in the United States.'
Yale history professors Timothy Snyder and Marci Shore, who are married, had announced their decision to depart Yale late last year. They will also work at Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy.
Snyder, the Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale, is the author of several influential books including On Freedom and On Tyranny. Shore, who received her Masters from the University of Toronto, is the author of The Ukrainian Night: An Intimate History of Revolution.
According to Inside Higher Education, the couple offered mixed motives for their decision to leave the U.S. In an email, Snyder said, 'The opportunity came at a time when my spouse and I had to address some difficult family matters.' adding that he had 'no grievance with Yale, no desire to leave the U.S. I am very happy with the idea of a move personally but, aside from a strong appreciation of what U of T has to offer, the motivations are largely that—personal.'
But Shore wrote to Inside Higher Education that 'the personal and political were, as often is the case, intertwined. We might well have made the move in any case, but we didn't make our final decision until after the November elections.'
'I sensed that this time, this second Trump election, would be still much worse than the first—the checks and balances have been dismantled,' she added. 'I can feel that the country is going into free fall. I fear there's going to be a civil war. And I don't want to bring my kids back into that. I also don't feel confident that Yale or other American universities will manage to protect either their students or their faculty.'
How widespread fears like that are among American faculty is not clear, but a recent nonrandom poll by Nature suggests that many U.S. scientists have become apprehensive about their future career prospects if they remain in the country.
About 75% of the more than 1,600 scientists who responded to the Nature poll said they were considering leaving the United States following recent actions by Trump officials targeting research funding and specific universities. Europe and Canada were among the top choices for relocation.
That feeling was most apparent among early-career researchers. Of the 690 postgraduate respondents, 548 were considering leaving; 255 of 340 PhD students indicated the same attitude.
'Many respondents were looking to move to countries where they already had collaborators, friends, family or familiarity with the language,' according to Nature. Some scientists who had come to the United States for work said they now planned to return to their home countries.
Universities abroad are taking notice and are beginning to try to lure away American researchers. According to The Guardian, the University of Aix-Marseille in France has launched a Safe Place for Science, a three-year program aimed at recruiting 15 American scientists working in climate, health and astrophysics.
More than 60 applications have been received, 30 of them coming within the first 24 hours, reported The Guardian, and the university has contacted 'other universities and the French government about expanding 'scientific asylum' on both a national and European level, and to help coordinate welcoming and relocating different researchers.'
The CBC reports there are signs of increased interest to go to Canada by scientists working or training in the U.S. Quebec Immigration Minister Jean-François Roberge announced that the province was actively looking to recruit scientific talent from the U.S. who were concerned about what he called "the climate-skeptic directions that the White House is taking."
'The more questions and concerns emerge in the United States, the more opportunity there is for Canada to try and reassert its leadership in the world as a global research powerhouse,' Gabriel Miller, president and CEO of Universities Canada, told the CBC.
Politico reports that China is also making a pitch to scientists who've recently lost their jobs from the Trump research cutbacks. It's one more sign of how vulnerable America's long-time prominence as the global leader in higher education and scientific research has suddenly become.
