Overview
- The Defense Department ended senior service college fellowships at 13 U.S. colleges and nine other organizations starting in the 2026–27 academic year, eliminating 93 slots.
- Targets include Brown, Columbia, Princeton, MIT, Tufts and Yale, as well as Queen’s University in Canada and nonprofits such as the Brookings Institution and CSIS; the memo lists 11 cuts at Johns Hopkins SAIS’s West Space Scholars and eight at Saint Louis University.
- Service members currently in affected programs may complete them, and the Pentagon named 21 potential replacement partners including Liberty University, Hillsdale College, George Mason University, the University of Michigan and Arizona State University.
- The memo cites criteria such as intellectual freedom, minimal relationships with adversaries and minimal public opposition to the department, without detailing how institutions were evaluated.
- Secretary Pete Hegseth defended the move in a video denouncing elite campuses as ideological indoctrination and said a broader review of military education is underway, while reporting highlights unresolved implementation details and outdated eligibility listings.