Red states and blue states alike Equal opportunity damage to biomedical research and the US economy

Tennessee Lookout@tennesseelookout.com · last yr.

Vanderbilt University Medical Center, one of the largest academic research and hospital care systems in the southeast, expects to lay off 650 employees as a result of grant and other funding cuts made by the Trump Administration, it said in a statement. From @anitawadhwani.bsky.social.

This proposed budget, which zeroes out many key programs that protect the US, would be catastrophic for American health. www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...

Internal budget document reveals extent of Trump’s proposed health cuts

HHS would be asked to absorb a $40 billion cut, about one-third of its discretionary budget.

washingtonpost.com

For those who don't know a K01 is a training grant for early career researchers. Typically 4-5years to help them launch their research careers. It protects up to 75% time for research. Rescinding awarded K level grants is throwing a grenade into an already tenuous research pipeline.

Jace D. Flatt, PhD, MPH (They/He)@jaceflatt.bsky.social · 2y ago

Another NIH grant rescinded - The Epidemiology of Alzheimers Disease and Related Dementias in Sexual and Gender Minority Older Adults: Identifying Risk and Protective Factors - 1K01AG056669

It's entirely reasonable to both think university indirect rates are too high and a 15% ceiling is too low We want universities to be transparent and efficient But if they have to subsidize the research enterprise, it won't happen at most institutions www.statnews.com/2025/02/07/n...

NIH plans to slash support for indirect research costs, sending shockwaves through science

The NIH said Friday night that it would slash support for indirect costs on all existing and future grants to 15%

statnews.com

Academic Skyers: I am compiling a list of policies and statements from various universities about how they are handling the "pause" in terms of stopping expenditures (or not). Please respond to this post with your institution and materials. THANK YOU!

What is worst advice you have ever received from an academic?

#Thread Why Autistic-led autism research matters. I get Google Scholar alerts about newly published research. It’s striking how little of this has any tangible benefits for Autistic people. On the contrary, much of it is potentially harmful. There’s an alarming sub-text. We’re subjects, not people.

Does anyone have an assignment they enjoy grading for developmental psych that has students engage with a (or multiple) scientific article(s)? I have tried many iterations of different assignments and want one I look forward to grading. Right now... not enjoying grading AI-written policy letters.

"even when controlling for specific components of the same evaluation surveys, students tend to give lower overall ratings to female instructors...RateMyProfessors’s overall quality ratings have a greater influence on course enrollment than official evaluations" www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Gender Gap in Teaching Evaluations and its Effect on Course Enrollments

The disparity in teaching evaluations between male and female instructors is well documented. This paper demonstrates that, even when controlling for …

sciencedirect.com

Overworked faculty: there's just too much on my plate, and no time left for the really important stuff AI techbros: so hear me out--what if we automated your entire teaching process and then you can go to more meetings

One of my barometers for men colleagues is if they know and push back against the course evaluation comments their women colleagues receive. Every woman I know gets horrendous comments and they are all deeply misogynistic and unrelated to the course content.

This is presuming the "result" is a good grade in the assessment, whereas the result should be the learning and understanding itself. How we re-centre that is the big question.

Jim Dickinson@jimdickinson.bsky.social · 2y ago

“Students using AI is like hiring robots to lift weights for you in a gym”. No it isn’t. Some people like working out. Some people hate it and want the result. If you can get the result without the sweat, so be it.

saying "you only live once" - cliche - thanks for the existential dread - offensive to cats saying "leroy jenkins" - has some flare - here for a good time not a long time - leeeeeeeeeeeeroy jeeeenkkiinns - inoffensive to cats

My student just unlocked a researcher core memory: she was trying to replicate an analysis for a class project but the values she were getting didn’t make any realistic sense. Turns out the PUBLISHED paper reported incorrect variable coding. After some troubleshooting, we figured out what they did.

Today is International Day of Persons with Disabilities. Time for a reminder that "disability" can mean a wide variety of visible and invisible disabilities, and it doesn't mean lower productivity. 🧵1/9 #disability

Every time I read about banning books, I think of this: Reading a book with a gay character will not make you gay any more than reading a book about Einstein will make you a genius. If you're afraid that books might change someone's thinking, you're not afraid of books — you're afraid of thinking.

Mid-career academics - do you have a formal 'mentor' outside of your line management? Have you sought them out? Are they at a more senior career stage, or at roughly your career stage?

It's always interesting to hear educational entrepreneurs sell their programs to teachers. The formula seems to be a vague definition of a well-known problem + multiple buzzwords of the moment integrated into a narrative + a healthy dose of neurobabble.

Fascinating and depressing. Virtually identical trend as we are seeing in the US.

Tom Calver@tomcalver.bsky.social · 2y ago

NEW: Why do we always think crime is rising, even when it isn’t? This week I looked at one of the big data mysteries. Britain is 2/3 less violent than the 1990s; thefts were higher pre-lockdown Why, then, doesn’t it feel like it? 1/8 @thetimes.com 🔗 www.thetimes.com/article/b63d...

I had zero luck with grants. People really didn’t get why what I did was important and never figured out how to explain it to them.

I think you'll find the shark only killed and ate a very small number of the people who were present in the water, and as you can see everyone else is having a wonderful time

This Thanksgiving weekend, I'm thankful for marta running regular service! That said, it's now December, and according to information reviewed by @thexylom.com, marta still hasn't run full service over two consecutive weekends. docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

For the first time, you can track MARTA Rail's weekend service statistics.

docs.google.com

Darin Givens@atlurbanist.bsky.social · 2y ago

The quality of Atlanta's transit service will suffer until we do 2 things: 1.) Talk plainly about the need for a sustained increase in MARTA's operations spending. 2.) Admit that huge increases in walkable density near all train/bus lines is essential. nextcity.org/urbanist-new...

My students and I spoke about this the other day. The largest impacts on society I will have are through my interactions with them and our community engagement. But that’s also fine with me!

RiderToast, lovable scamp@ridertoast.bsky.social · 2y ago

I’ve been in research and regularly publishing since 2011 and it’s so funny that the biggest impact my life will have on medicine in my lifetime probably already happened when i was one of many who helped unionize our residency.

"After coming into contact with pepper spray" Expert deployment of the exonerative tense by the Athletic. www.nytimes.com/athletic/595...

NEW: Why do we always think crime is rising, even when it isn’t? This week I looked at one of the big data mysteries. Britain is 2/3 less violent than the 1990s; thefts were higher pre-lockdown Why, then, doesn’t it feel like it? 1/8 @thetimes.com 🔗 www.thetimes.com/article/b63d...

Hi, Kamalla! Can you help me diversify and reach more autistic folks . Im also autistic and advocating to amplify our voices! Check out the below skeet! :) @kamalladreams.bsky.social More info: bit.ly/Aut2ask

Autism Supports (v.2)

An autistic led community. The community of Aut2Ask members are aut’ers (otters) 🦦 We need each otter. Us: Autistic folk, caregivers, educators, specialists, community helpers, allies, etc. It's about...

bit.ly

Aut2Ask 🦦@aut2ask.bsky.social · 2y ago

Aut2Ask is for an autism community for you. 〰️Autistic folk 〰️Caretakers/Parents 〰️Educators 〰️Siblings 〰️Community Helpers 〰️Allies JOIN US! Help us! bit.ly/Aut2ask bit.ly/Aut2ask bit.ly/Aut2ask #autism #autistic #neurodiversity

Every academic right now