Tufts University has been involved in a series of lawsuits this year, ranging from a dispute over cuts to National Institutes of Health funding to allegations from the U.S. Department of Education of “election influence,” to a lawsuit brought on by tenured faculty of the Tufts University School of Medicine.
On Jan. 5, the U.S. Appeals Court made permanent a previous ruling by the lower court prohibiting the NIH from imposing a 15% indirect cost reimbursement rate. Originally filed February 2025, the case opposed the decision to limit reimbursement for NIH-related research.
“The university joined this lawsuit as a plaintiff, along with leading national higher education organizations, 22 states and other research universities, because we believed that the reduction in NIH facilities and administrative costs was not made in accordance with the Administrative Procedure Act and was in violation of the law,” Patrick Collins, executive director of media relations at Tufts, wrote in a statement to the Daily.
He explained that, had the changes to funding been accepted, the university would have experienced serious cuts that would have adversely impacted research.
Research has been increasingly under attack in the last year, as seen in a second lawsuit the university was involved in regarding the illegal sharing of private student data.
On Feb. 5, the University received a letter from the DOE sharing that the National Study of Learning, Voting and Engagement, or NSLVE, which is housed in the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life, was suspected of having violated the Family and Education Rights Privacy Act by sharing data with third parties.
That same day, the DOE sent letters to more than 1,000 university presidents warning them to not use the most recent data collected by NSLVE until the investigation was completed.
The University sent out a response on Feb. 20, defending NSLVE’s compliance with FERPA regulations and their continued commitment to civic engagement. A March 10 statement by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement about the investigation stated it was still ongoing.
“As Tufts explained in its response to the department, NSLVE is a longitudinal nonpartisan study, that seeks to understand whether students vote, not who they vote for,” the statement said.
The statement goes on to say that NSLVE, by design, is in compliance with FERPA as it works with the National Student Clearinghouse, a Virginia-based nonprofit organization, to de-identify student data. Participation in the study is voluntary and all data that is used is already held by the NSC.
“All data received by Tufts from the Clearinghouse are anonymized, and NSLVE’s reports include only de-identified, aggregated data about overall student voting trends,” the statement reads. “Tufts does not solicit, receive or review any identifying student information and never has access to information about party affiliation or candidate selection.”
On Feb. 25, the NSC notified all participating institutions that it was “terminating its Participation Authorization Form,” which institutions had to sign to opt-in to the study, for NSLVE effective thirty days from the date of notification.
“Tufts has requested a swift review and conclusion to the investigation and looks forward to resolving this matter with the department,” the statement reads.
Most recently, in a lawsuit closer to home, a state court ruled in favor of eight Tufts School of Medicine basic science faculty, finding the university in violation of tenure agreements.
After a trial in late January, Justice Hélène Kazanjian found that Tufts’ 2017 and 2019 compensation plans, which required a portion of salary funding through external grants, led to cuts in the salaries and full-time status of tenured basic science faculty. These conditions were not agreed upon when the faculty initially received tenure.
Kazanjian, in an April 2 ruling, determined that the compensation plans had violated tenure’s promises of “economic security,” ruling in favor of the eight faculty members and ordering the university to pay nearly $4 million in damages.
The ruling also cited motivations by the university to push older faculty to retirement. Kazanjian referenced emails from Provost Caroline Genco saying that many of the older faculty in her department, including several of the plaintiffs, were “lingering on” and “dead weight.”
“We are considering our options and have no further comment at this time,” Collins said.
