February 2025

Hello alumni, colleagues, and friends across the U-M community:

Looking to the future, we are facing a time of significant challenge from the proposed policy changes and executive orders emanating from Washington, D.C.

The implications of many of these measures are unclear and will likely depend on how they are interpreted and applied, both by agencies and, ultimately, the courts.

This is a critical moment for higher education.

Through my role as a board member and chair of the Council of Presidents at the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU), my role on the board of the American Council on Education, and my position as a member of the Association of American Universities, University of Michigan is guiding our sector through this remarkable period of change.

I have been in near-constant communication with presidents from other universities to craft a sector-wide strategy to engage constructively with the federal government.

When the National Institutes of Health (NIH) issued a directive that all future and current research grants will be subject to a 15% cap on indirect costs, I worked with partners from APLU to mobilize a coalition of 22 attorneys general – including Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel who co-led the lawsuit. We succeeded in winning a critical, but temporary, restraining order.

The NIH directive and other federal guidance carry significant financial implications. The chief financial officer of the University and his larger team are carefully tracking changes and modeling a variety of potential outcomes. We are fortunate to maintain a strong financial position, and we are taking steps to be as prepared as possible to respond wisely and quickly to any financial impacts that may lie ahead.

Maximum return on investment

As a public university, we have a responsibility to ensure we are efficient in our use of dollars from American taxpayers. Given the recent challenge to indirect costs, I’ve taken the step of asking my team to conduct a careful analysis of these indirect cost reimbursements to ensure we are providing the maximum return on investment for the state of Michigan and the nation.

Our faculty must be able to exchange ideas, question assumptions, challenge views, and engage with the broadest range of scholarly subjects and materials. These freedoms remain the lifeblood of any great academic institution. There should be no limitation on that academic freedom. Scholarship, research, and curriculum must remain in the purview of our faculty.

I’d like to thank our regents for their counsel and support — as well as our leadership team and deans for their diligence and expertise — in reviewing those federal actions and working to understand their implications for our community. As we move forward, we will stay true to our values and our ethos.

Meanwhile, we have much to be proud of — and much to be thankful for — in our achievements as a university.

This week, Times Higher Education ranked the University of Michigan as the 18th best university in the world. The rankings are determined using data collected from more than 55,000 scholars globally and assess prestige in the areas of research and teaching. U-M is one of ​three public institutions in the U.S. to have cracked the top 20. It is an extraordinary achievement and one that should instill us all with tremendous pride.

Prioritizing the arts

While the University is a powerhouse research institution, we also play a formidable role in the arts.

In order to continue to advance the arts on campus and support the goals of our Vision 2034, we announced in early February that we have committed $5M over the next five years to develop our public art collection.

This will include commissioning an internationally celebrated artist to create a special piece of public art for the Ann Arbor campus, one that will enrich our sense of community and belonging, and heighten our awareness of wonder and possibility.

Impact areas

In concert with our commitment to sustainability and climate action, I’m pleased to announce that we are significantly accelerating those efforts through the establishment of the Sustainability and Climate Executive Leadership Council.

The Council will be composed of Shalanda Baker, our inaugural Vice Provost for Sustainability and Climate Action, Shana Weber, our inaugural Associate Vice President for Campus Sustainability, and Tony Denton, our Senior Vice President and Chief Environmental, Social, and Governance Officer for Michigan Medicine.

Together, they will act as a leadership team for these critical areas for our University, as well as across the impact areas of our Vision 2034 and Campus Plan 2050.

Speaking of impact areas, you may know the University is taking a year to celebrate each of the four impact areas that are part of Vision 2034. While this academic year is the Year of Democracy, Civic Empowerment, and Global Engagement, I’m very pleased to announce today that next year will be dedicated to “life-changing education” and will feature lectures and events to explore this important pillar of the University’s vision.

Important strides in the sciences

Recently, our researchers engineered a new chip connection system that uses light, rather than electrical wires, to speed data transfer, a technology that could boost the training speed and size of AI models.

U-M researchers also joined with scientists at Stanford to develop a new brain-computer interface, which empowers people with paralysis to move a virtual quadcopter simply by thinking about moving their fingers. Thanks to this unprecedented level of control, they can socialize with others, participate in remote work, and even enjoy recreational activities.

And in collaboration with researchers at Rice University, U-M engineers have developed a new water purification technology, one that could replace the tons of expensive chemicals conventionally used with simple carbon cloth electrodes, saving billions of dollars, and making seawater a more affordable and accessible source of drinking water.

This is why research is so important — it’s our ability to make new discoveries, to develop new innovations and technologies, and to lift and transform lives.

I’m looking forward to our continuing year of achievement together.

Sincerely,

Santa J. Ono, PhD
President

A more complete version of these remarks, presented to the U-M Board of Regents on Feb. 20, can be found at the Office of the President website.