Diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives are being targeted by President Donald Trump’s administration, which has led to threats of federal funding cuts and restricted programming for educational institutions across the United States. The Ithaca City School District is under investigation by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights after the Equal Protection Project filed a complaint against ICSD for allegedly intentionally excluding white students from a DEI event.

In a letter sent to Luvelle Brown, superintendent of ICSD, and Sean Eversley Bradwell, the president of the ICSD Board of Education, on May 28, 2024, the EPP claimed that the Students of Color United Summit 2024 at Ithaca High School, scheduled for May 31, was limited to staff and students of color. The letter outlined why the EPP believes all the summit events held from 2021-24 are a form of racial exclusion. The EPP wrote that the event violates Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination based on race, color and national origin in programs that receive federal financial assistance. ICSD receives federal funding, which means it is at risk for funding cuts if the district is found to be noncompliant with Title VI. On Jan. 27, 2025, the DOE opened the investigation into whether or not ICSD treated students differently on the basis of race or ethnicity and if there was an intentional exclusion of white students.

Before the 2024 summit, the EPP wrote in the letter that the official SOCU Summit website required that registering students acknowledge that the event is a student of color only event. ICSD responded by sending a mass email to the school community.

“Please know that SOCU is open to all of our secondary students,” the statement said. “We apologize for any previous communication that included exclusionary language about the event. Anyone who wishes to attend on Friday is welcome!”

On Jan. 20, Trump signed an executive order titled, “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing.” The federal DOE has been supporting the efforts of the Trump administration by removing or archiving over 200 web pages from the DOE website that contained DEI resources that were identified for removal. Also, some DOE employees that lead DEI initiatives were put on paid administrative leave.

“The U.S. Department of Education has taken action to eliminate harmful Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives,” the DOE wrote in the press release. “These actions are in line with President Trump’s ongoing commitment to end illegal discrimination and wasteful spending across the federal government.”

On Feb. 14, the DOE released a Dear Colleague letter threatening to revoke federal funding for all schools and universities that do not remove all DEI initiatives. Sara Levy, associate professor and chairperson in the Department of Education at Ithaca College, said that even though the anti-DEI sentiments in the letter are not backed up by law, it is still threatening.

“[Anti-DEI actions] are an attempt from this administration to violate the civil rights of a whole host of students and to really pull back on some of the initiatives that we know are important for student success, both at the higher education level and at the K-12 level,” Levy said. “It needs to be taken seriously.”

William Jacobson, clinical professor and director of the Securities Law Clinic at Cornell University, founded the EPP through the Legal Insurrection Foundation. Jacobson said DEI initiatives on college campuses and should not be funded by taxpayers. He said support should be given to students based on background and circumstances, not their skin color.

“DEI at its core is a group-identity ideology, which treats students not as individuals, but as proxies for racial, ethnic or other identity groups,” Jacobson said. “In this way it is dehumanizing to the individual, and frequently plays upon negative group stereotypes.”

The EPP wrote that it is requesting that the Office for Civil Rights hold ICSD accountable for its unlawful conduct. This includes imposing fines, initiating administrative action to suspend or terminate federal financial assistance and referring the case to the Department of Justice for judicial proceedings.

Levy said that she feels the complaint against ICSD is wrongfully targeting the district.

“ICSD has done a really good job of trying to have a culturally responsive district,” Levy said. “I think that the district was well within the law and I really appreciate their efforts to address issues within the school and within the community.”

Levy said that despite pressure from the federal government to erase DEI initiatives, the college’s Department of Education is helping students learn strategies to build connections in classrooms and talk to each other with respect.

“Our mission and our department is grounded in social justice and equity,” Levy said. “Our students are asking all of these [questions about DEI] … and so we’re doing our best to help them find resources to learn more. We want to support them. We want to help them think critically about the world they live in.”

Shuzhan Li, assistant professor in the college’s Department of Education, said via email that even though policies impacting education are constantly shifting, it is important to resist restrictive policies.

“The scholarly and advocacy work that we do as educators does not cease,” Li said. “We just have to figure out how to navigate current climates with strategy and solidarity with each other.”

The anti-DEI sentiments also extend to higher education. According to data from The Chronicle of Higher Education, 125 bills have been proposed across the U.S. to create legislation that would prohibit colleges from having diversity, equity and inclusion offices or staff, diversity statements in hiring processes, mandatory diversity training or race, sex, ethnicity or national origin considered in admissions or employment.

According to The New York Times, colleges that continue to offer scholarships and grants for students on the basis of their race or ethnicity are at risk of receiving funding cuts. Sophomore Marvin Juarez Espinoza, a music education and performance major at IC, said many DEI policies have made college accessible for him.

“It makes me a little nervous, especially as a person of color and coming from a low-income background, for how I’m gonna even afford school,” Juarez Espinoza said.

Juarez Espinoza said his music education classes at IC are preparing him for the DEI pushback by teaching him how to make his classroom adaptive to all kinds of learners and backgrounds. However, he said not all of his education classes go as deeply into DEI topics as they need to.

“I feel like we’re glossing over it — learning vocabulary, but not really learning about what truly goes on behind the scenes and how all those operations work,” Juarez Espinoza said. “One of the most important things that teachers can do is establish a community within their classroom where people respect each other.”

Levy said DEI initiatives work toward a society where all people are valued and make room for a wide range of knowledge.

“Either we believe that all students have value in the classroom, or we don’t,” Levy said. “Education must be paying attention to the way things have been and acting in ways that work towards equity, that work towards inclusion, that work towards belonging with an understanding that we are not there yet.”

Photo Editor Lucia Iandolo contributed reporting