Skip to content

Trump administration cuts off tuition assistance for Army officers at 22 schools, but Penn isn’t among them

Princeton and Carnegie Mellon are among the 22 schools being cut off from tuition assistance by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. In initial list that included Penn had 34 schools.

[Read more]

Military officers will see their tuition assistance cut off at 22 schools and institutions, but the University of Pennsylvania is not among them.

The Ivy League institution, which counts President Donald Trump among its alumni, was on an initial list of 34 schools “at risk” of losing Pentagon-funded tuition assistance. But Penn was not part of the 22-university list released by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Friday.

Penn did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

Hegseth previously said he intended** **to cut off schools where faculty members have “leftist political leanings” and “openly loathe our military,” but he cited no specific examples of bias or misconduct at the 22 schools that will lose tuition assistance beginning with the 2026-27 academic year.

“We will no longer invest in institutions that fail to sharpen our leaders’ warfighting capabilities or that undermine the very values they are sworn to defend,” Hegseth wrote in a letter released Friday with the final list.

It was not immediately clear why Penn and other schools were removed from the initial draft list.

Among the schools still set to lose access to the tuition-assistance program is Princeton University, where Hegseth obtained a bachelor’s degree in 2003. Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh is also on the list, as is Yale University, where Vice President JD Vance obtained a law degree.

The move means members of the military will be banned from using Department of Defense tuition assistance to pay for Senior Service College Fellowship programs at those schools.

The impact will not be large — the Department of Defense said fewer than 100 military students are enrolled in programs at schools that will lose funding. Military personnel currently enrolled may complete their courses of study, Hegseth said, though it is unclear if they will have to change schools to continue receiving financial assistance.

Hegseth’s announcement did not mention several other financial assistance programs for undergraduates, including the GI Bill, which is administered by the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Here is the full list of schools losing tuition assistance from the Pentagon:

Educational institutions

Harvard University

St. Louis University

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Tufts University

Georgetown University

Carnegie Mellon University

Brown University

Columbia University

Yale University

Middlebury College

Princeton University

George Washington University

College of William and Mary

International institution

Queen’s University (Canada)

*Nonprofit institutions *

Center for Strategic and International Studies

New America Foundation

Brookings Institution

Atlantic Council

Center for a New American Security

Council on Foreign Relations

Henry L. Stimson Center

Senior Service College

Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies West Space Scholars Program