The New School president, Joel Towers, has denied at least $14 million in proposals from trustees hoping to resume PhD admissions at The New School for Social Research (NSSR), according to faculty.

Various trustees at The New School have proposed a $1 million cash offer and a separate $3 million cash offer, both intended to help cover the cost of attendance for at least 20 new PhD students. Another proposal from trustees proposed a $10 million to $15 million endowment for a new cohort of PhD admittees. 

Amy Malsin, vice president of university communications, did not confirm or deny the proposals in a statement to the New School Free Press.

The New School, founded in 1919, originally only consisted of The New School for Social Research. The college’s core values included “dissenting opinions, radical ideas, and progressive solutions,” according to the university’s website. 

The proposals followed the university’s plan to revise PhD programs, including a pause in November on NSSR PhD admissions for the 2026-2027 academic year. The pause came amid a broader plan, known as restructuring, meant to stabilize the university’s growing financial deficit. 

Some faculty say Towers’ rejections prove TNS administration is uninterested in continuing PhD admissions, regardless of possible funding.

During a community forum on Nov. 20, Towers was asked about the $1 million offer from trustees. In response, he said that he is against temporary solutions to funding PhD programs at NSSR.  

“We need to be thinking about the long term perspective on this,” Towers said, explaining that funds would be better used if they were put toward a sustainable, endowed funding source for PhD programs. 

While Towers acknowledged that the initial gift offer from the trustees was generous, he further said, “We couldn’t [fund the programs] in a way that was just kicking the can down the road for yet another year and not confronting the challenge we have.” 

Tuition waivers for all PhD students at NSSR began in fall 2024, according to a comment from Merrie Snead, associate director of communications at The New School. Each PhD student is estimated to directly cost the university an average of $38,000. PhD students with “distinguished records” are eligible to receive additional support: a stipend of $25,000 each year for four years, according to the university’s website.

Faculty interviewed by The New School Free Press for this article were granted anonymity due to fear of employer retaliation, as efforts to reduce faculty, including involuntary separation letters, are still ongoing.

An associate professor at NSSR and Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts said when Towers first informed the Board of Trustees about the PhD pause during a board meeting on Nov. 14, a group of trustees offered $1 million to fund stipends for at least 20 PhD candidates for the upcoming year. Towers rejected the offer. 

At a later date, trustees came forward with an additional $3 million to help fund the cost of attendance for doctoral students, according to three faculty members. That offer was also denied. 

The total $4 million could have carried a PhD cohort forward for an additional four years, according to the associate professor at NSSR and Eugene Lang.

According to a faculty member at NSSR, after the combined $4 million offer was denied, two trustees discussed a proposal to build a $10 million to $15 million endowment for 8-10 PhD students at $1.25 million each. An endowment is a fund in which donated money is invested to earn interest, with a portion of the investment available to spend. Typically around 5% is spent a year. This endowment would support $62,500 per student annually — about the same as a tuition waiver and stipend combined. 

While Towers expressed interest in working with the trustees, the proposal did not proceed after Towers mentioned “vague reasons for needing to delay” the plan, according to the faculty member at NSSR. 

The university has historically had trouble funding its PhD programs. Sanjay Reddy, a professor of economics at NSSR, said that in order to fund stipends, the university has had to reduce the number of PhD students admitted in the past year.

“The university has never figured out a sustainable financial model for doctoral education,” Towers said at the Nov. 20 community forum.

Towers explained at a university town hall meeting led by the University Student Senate on Dec. 5 that, given NSSR’s annual deficit of $15 million a year — based on the 2025 fiscal year — NSSR would need to have a $300 million endowment to sustainably fund its PhD programs. 

NSSR currently has an endowment of about $70 million, Towers said —  part of The New School’s total endowment of $500 million.

“Building robust and sustainable doctoral education at The New School is a central goal of the current work to transform our university for the future,” Malsin’s statement said. “We are in close conversation with all the donors you mention and are directing their generosity toward this shared goal.”

Faculty and students remain outraged over the admissions pause and its potential consequences, which have been described by the NSSR economics department as a “financial death spiral.” Moreover, the community remains skeptical that a serious effort will be made to raise a sustainable, endowed source of funding to continue PhD programs.

“He told [faculty] that he was committed to working on raising that money,” the associate professor at NSSR and Eugene Lang said. “In my view, it doesn’t seem like a high priority.”