MIT President Sally Kornbluth
April 1, 2025

Dear Members of the MIT Community,

I would like to update you on the completion of a study the trustees of the MIT Corporation asked my office to conduct on the relationship between the MIT Strategic Action Plan for Belonging, Achievement, & Composition enacted by my predecessor, the $40M per year MIT has been spending supporting this plan, and recent actions of the Federal Government that jeopardize MIT’s financial sustainability.

We have concluded that the Composition portion of the plan, which illegally advances the interests of favored identities at the expense of disfavored identities, has not only failed to achieve its stated goals, but has become a threat to Belonging, Achievement, and the continued receipt of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funds that are the lifeblood of our research activities.

We have, therefore, decided to replace the plan’s Composition policies with a series of identity-blind Merit policies. These explicitly forbid the consideration of any individual’s race, sex, gender, sexual preferences, color, ancestry, economic class, religion, ethnicity, or national origin in admissions, hiring, promotion, or access to any program or service provided by MIT or any of its Schools, Departments, or Centers.

We believe that these changes will not only reduce the toxic divisiveness fostered by identitarian policies that artificially divided both our faculty and student body into “oppressed” and “oppressor” classes, but will open the door to rapprochement with MIT’s key funding sources, including not just the federal government but disenchanted alumni.

I thank you for your understanding and cooperation as we set about restoring MIT’s unique culture and reputation as the leading STEM university in the world.