How the Ph.D. Project, and 45 colleges, became a target of the Trump administration

By Elissa Nadworny, NPR

When Leyland Lucas was a Ph.D. student at Rutgers University, there weren’t a lot of professors in the business department who looked like him. He’s Black and originally from Guyana, in South America.

He says a small nonprofit, called the Ph.D. Project, helped him successfully navigate and complete his Ph.D.

“I am incredibly grateful to the program, which was fulfilling a very critical role,” says Lucas, who is now a dean at the University of Guyana.

For about 30 years, the Ph.D. Project has provided support, mentorship and guidance to students from underrepresented groups who are earning doctoral degrees in business.

Before returning to Guyana, Lucas was a professor at Morgan State University in Baltimore, where he helped mentor other students through the Ph.D. Project.

“If you see people like you who understand some of the challenges you are facing, and you can see them and see how they have overcome those challenges, that serves as an incentive for you,” Lucas says.

But with its goal of diversifying academia, this small nonprofit has now drawn the attention of the Trump administration.

The U.S. Education Department announced it was investigating 45 universities with graduate schools that partner with the program, including the University of Kansas, the University of Utah and Ivy League schools like Cornell and Yale Universities. The department alleges these schools are violating the 1964 Civil Rights Act because the Ph.D. Project limits eligibility based on race, and therefore engages in “race-exclusionary practices.”

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