NSF slashes graduate fellowship program

From ScienceMag:

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has cut in half the number of graduate students receiving its prestigious research fellowship program for the upcoming academic year. NSF is not saying why, but the agency is facing a constrained budget.

The 1000 fellows announced today—a number available by searching NSF’s database of awards and widely reported on social media, although not confirmed by NSF despite a request by Science—compare with 2037 awards made last year and 2555 in 2023. At the same time, the annual stipend, which is good for 3 years, remains $37,000, and universities will continue to receive $16,000 per student in tuition subsidies.

“Good news and bad news,” research psychologist David Miller said in a posting on Bluesky. “I’m *thrilled* for the grad students for whom getting this award will be life-changing. … [But] the # of fellowships went down by 51%.”

The plunge in fellowships could reflect NSF’s expectation of a darkening budget picture. Last month, Congress passed a 2025 spending bill that holds the agency’s budget flat at just over $9 billion. But President Donald Trump wants to remove $234 million for construction projects from that total because he disagrees with a decision by Congress to designate them as emergency spending.

NSF has not said how much money in total will go this year to its education directorate, which supports the fellowships. The directorate received $1.172 billion in 2024 and $1.371 billion in 2023.

“A subsequent announcement of additional awardees is possible subject to future resourcing considerations,” according to an NSF spokesperson, opening the door to a possible second round of winners from among the 3018 students receiving an honorable mention. But the chances of that happening appear slim.

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