The Brief

A letter earlier this month from new U.S. Department of Education leaders sent shockwaves through K-12 and higher education institutions. In a Feb. 14 "Dear Colleague" memo, the department directed schools to stop using race to admit students or for any other consideration, including scholarships, housing, and "all other aspects of student, academic, and campus life."

The department said it would enforce compliance at the end of February and punish institutions by withholding federal funding.

In the face of uncertainty, some Southern California college educators are waiting for leaders of their campuses to give them clear direction as to whether diversity programs and efforts will be curtailed or shut down — or whether the institutions will resist the Trump administration’s directions in court.

“There are a group of us across institutions, especially in California, who are saying it's time to actually double down on doing diversity, equity and inclusion work,” said Liane Hypolite, a professor of educational leadership at Cal Poly Pomona. “This isn't the time to just comply … out of fear."

Providing data on how students feel

The letter paints diversity programs in a stark light.

“These institutions’ embrace of pervasive and repugnant race-based preferences and other forms of racial discrimination have emanated throughout every facet of academia” and led to discrimination, including of white and Asian students, the department said.

Diversity programs, supporters say, help the targeted students and the population at large.

The USC Race and Equity Center, for example, offers campus climate surveys, said executive director Jessica T. DeCuir-Gunby.

Those surveys can be taken by students or employees to “assess what's going on, see how everybody's feeling," she said. "And then based upon that, we'll, you know, write up a summary and give it to the leadership and let them know, this is what's going on in your institution.”

The goal is to improve inclusion of people of different races, ethnicities, religious, sex, and gender in schools and the workplace.

Graduating students take their seats at the Fresno State Chicano/Latino Commencement Celebration in the Save Mart Center in Fresno on May 18, 2024.

(

Photo by Larry Valenzuela

/

CalMatters/CatchLight Local

)

“Everyone in academia is taking this letter very seriously,” DeCuir-Gunby said. “We are looking to leadership to help us to better understand their interpretations of the letter.”

USC spokesperson Lauren Bartlett said the university is studying the letter.

Spaces for culturally specific activities

The Department of Education letter says “many American schools and universities even encourage segregation by race at graduation ceremonies and in dormitories and other facilities.” It’s calling for those policies to stop.

Campus employees say cultural centers fall within that claim. Many colleges and universities have taken steps to create and fund cultural centers based on student groups’ race, ethnicity, sex, or gender.

“[Cultural centers] end up being these spaces where students can find refuge that they often cannot find on the rest of their college campus,” said Hypolite of Cal Poly Pomona. “They are places where students get connected to services. They actually welcome in, for example, culturally relevant therapists that might work in the counseling center, but students don't feel comfortable going there."

That helps students' social and emotional well-being, she said, which raises the likelihood that they’ll stay enrolled in college and earn their degrees.

“I just haven't seen that kind of really solid communication saying, essentially, ‘We stand with our most marginalized students right now,’ which is what our students need to hear,” Hypolite said.

Dr. Cornel West speaks at a Juneteenth event.

(

Patrick Record

/

Cal State University

)

CSU Chancellor Mildred García did email CSU employees about a week before the U.S. Department of Education letter that the Trump administration’s executive orders would not change the school's commitment to students.

“I write to assure you that, in this moment, the CSU will do what all great institutions — and great people — do in times of uncertainty and change. We will turn to and uphold our core values. We will honor our purpose. We will fulfill our mission,” García wrote.

The California Community College chancellor’s office did not specify how it will respond to President Trump’s directives.

“We are encouraging college leaders to continue their critical work in alignment with state and federal laws, regulations, and our shared goal of expanding educational opportunities, strengthening student pathways, and supporting workforce development to meet California’s economic needs,” said Melissa Villarin, a spokesperson for the California Community Colleges chancellor's office.

A way to meet the federal government’s own requirements

Biola University in Southeast L.A. County is a religious school; its mission is to offer a “biblically centered education, scholarship and service — equipping men and women in mind and character to impact the world for the Lord Jesus Christ.”

The university's board of trustees approved a theological statement on diversity in 2019, which among other things states: "Unity without diversity ceases to be unity and becomes uniformity, and diversity without unity ultimately becomes either radical tribalism or individualism."

It’s also trying to become a Hispanic-Serving Institution, a federal designation that comes with requirements to help Hispanic students in order to tap into federal funds.

How Biola's plans align with the new federal directive remains to be seen.

“Biola is reviewing how this letter's requirements will affect the institution…” said university spokesperson Sarah Dougher. “Biola is still determining what exactly on campus will be affected.”

"There's a fine line between removing programs that are considered to be discriminatory by race and removing programs that speak to a cultural or ethnicity support for students," Cynthia Jackson Hammond, president of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation, told NPR in an interview last week.

How will top university leaders respond?

The California Department of Education and the State Board of Education issued a joint statement Friday saying that the law hasn't yet actually changed: "Executive orders and memos cannot modify or override statutory requirements or regulations or unilaterally impose new terms on existing agreements."

But they did suggest that colleges and universities "consult legal counsel regarding the impact of any potential federal actions."

Leaders of the University of California and California State University systems have not announced whether they will comply with or challenge the Trump administration directives. Together, those universities enroll more than 750,000 students.

“As this type of action is unprecedented, we are consulting with the California Attorney General and higher education partners across the country to better understand the statewide impact of this letter,” said CSU spokesperson Amy Bentley-Smith in an email.

In some instances, California State University’s top administrators have followed policy changes carried out by University of California leaders.

Though UC President Michael Drake said in a video message Thursday that the university's mission and values have not changed, UC leaders have not specified how they will respond to the Trump administration's directives.

“The Dear Colleague letter issued by the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) provides guidance on the Department's interpretation of existing anti-discrimination laws and does not name any specific institution,” said UC spokesperson Omar Rodriguez.

“It indicates how OCR intends to enforce these legal requirements,” he said via email. He also noted that state law already restricts the use of race in college settings. “Given the UC’s compliance with Prop 209, we do not use race-based preferences in our practices.”

The stakes are high. How colleges and universities react to this order could shape generations to come.

“There's no other entity that is more influential in shaping American society and arguably the global society than the [U.S.] college and university,” said Eddie R. Cole, who researches the history of higher education at UCLA. “Nobody knows what to do and no one wants to do something preemptive."

Here's the full letter from the U.S. Department of Education

Alysa Liu’s comeback at this year’s Olympics — and her stunning gold medal win — has rocked the world of figure skating, making headlines due to her joy while performing and her commitment to mental health on and off the ice.

Though she primarily trained in Oakland, Liu, who’s also a psychology student at UCLA, has used a facility in Lakewood as one of her home bases away from home. The 20-year-old started training there as she came back from retirement and prepared to take the gold medal (not that that was necessarily her goal, to hear her tell it).

It’s part of a long history for the Rinks-Lakewood ICE, which has also hosted many champions and Olympians over the years, including Mariah Bell, Nathan Chen, Ashley Wagner and Adam Rippon, and counts prominent figure skaters among their staff.

“ We're not unfamiliar with Olympic ties,” said Braden Overett, the skating manager at Lakewood ICE, though he also clarified, “that does not in any way diminish the fun and the coolness [of Liu’s win].”

Lakewood ICE’s place in this year’s Olympics

Working with her coaches remotely, Liu started to drill down on perfecting her skating while also attending classes at UCLA. And though she moved on to her home base at Oakland Ice Center as the Olympic training started to ramp up, the staff who worked with her at Lakewood ICE kept cheering her on.

Overett said that he loves highlighting the Olympic connections at the rink, which may not be obvious to everyone who skates there.

“It's always fun just to connect the dots, right?” Overett said. “It's like going to a restaurant and then you find out later it's your favorite actor's restaurant.”

Ashleigh Ellis runs the nonprofit Unity Ice Academy, which focuses on increasing access to figure skating for kids of all backgrounds at Lakewood ICE.

“ That's just very much how the skating world is. It's very small, you never know who you're going to run into at any time,” Ellis said. “ Could you imagine just being on the ice with a national champion and Olympic skater of any sort? It's just so inspiring for the kids to see that and be within the vicinity of that.”

And Liu wasn’t the only 2026 Olympic figure skater who's used the facility. Li Yu-Hsiang, the Taiwanese national champion who represented Chinese Taipei in Milan this year, also trains in Lakewood.

The rink’s coaches

The small world of skating means that even novice skaters can take classes from world-class skaters: 1976 Olympic silver medalist Dianne de Leeuw teaches there, as do national medalists (and future Olympic contenders) Starr Andrews and Josephine Lee.

 "To get to see them and to get to share ice with them just has a layer of magic that you can't replace and you can't get anywhere else,” Overett said. “ You see the turnover of generations, and it brings in a huge element of history.”

What Liu’s win means for the skating world

Ellis is already using Liu’s example to stress the importance of mental health to the kids and families she works with, like one parent who was worrying about her child taking two weeks off skating due to pneumonia.

“I was like, ‘Alysa Liu took two plus years off and she just won the Olympic gold. Do not worry about it this two weeks,’” she said.

A bipartisan bill aimed at protecting pets during disasters has been introduced in Congress, with a Southern California representative citing the rescue efforts of local organizations during last year’s L.A.-area fires.

The PETSAFE Act of 2026 — which stands for Providing Essential Temporary Shelter Assistance For Emergencies — would expand the use of emergency management funds so local governments can plan for evacuations that move animals to safety, as well as provide veterinary care and rescue equipment during disasters.

Rep. Judy Chu (D-CA) helped introduce the bill earlier this month with several House of Representatives colleagues, including Republican Rep. Brian Mast of Florida and Democrat Rep. Dina Titus of Nevada.

Chu, who represents Pasadena and Altadena in the 28th Congressional District, said when the Eaton Fire tore through her district, many families delayed evacuations because they couldn’t bear to leave their pets behind.

She told LAist she’ll never forget seeing the cats, dogs and other animals with burned feet and singed fur who were being cared for by Pasadena Humane in the aftermath.

“But to think, if there is even one more thing we could do to keep our precious pets safe, wouldn't we want to do that?” Chu said. “So this PETSAFE Act could go a long way towards making sure that our loved pets can indeed survive a disaster.”

About the bill

Pasadena Humane teams looked for pets and wildlife in Eaton burn zones, dropping off food and water along the way.

(

Courtesy Pasadena Humane

)

The PETSAFE Act now has been referred to the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. The bill would amend the Emergency Management Performance Grant program to increase the federal cost share for certain animal-related preparedness activities from 50% to 90%.

Supporters say this would lower barriers and make it more affordable for communities to roll out emergency protection plans for people and pets.

Specifically, the PETSAFE Act would allow state, local and tribal governments to use grant money awarded by FEMA toward pet supplies, crates, veterinary equipment, emergency generators and training, among others.

Pet owners whose homes are under disaster-related evacuation orders can be faced with an “impossible choice” — leaving their pets behind or staying home with them, which risks the owner’s own safety and complicates rescue efforts for first responders, according to Chu’s office.

The bill aims to address the challenges pet owners and first responders face without authorizing new federal spending, according to Mast’s office.

How we got here 

Chu said local shelters, including Pasadena Humane, and communities across California stepped up to care for all kinds of animals during the Eaton Fire, which ignited in January 2025.

Pasadena Humane helped more than 1,500 pets and wildlife during the fire and in the aftermath by providing shelter, medical care and emergency resources.

A horse was housed in the organization’s garage when Chris Ramon, Pasadena Humane’s president and CEO, ran into its owner walking down Raymond Avenue for miles.

“Part of me likes to think that this won’t happen again,” Ramon told LAist last month. “But the realist in me realizes … disaster preparedness is something that just is an ongoing conversation for us at Pasadena Humane.”

Chu also cited the work of the ASPCA, which helped more than 530 animals during the Eaton Fire, including goats, parakeets, pigs and a gecko, according to the organization.

She said local organizations did “tremendous” work and “lovingly cared for” the rush of animals affected by the fire.

“But what we would want to do is to make sure that there is an even better system for animal evacuation and ways to ensure that pets could be safe,” Chu said, adding that would relieve the burden on places like Pasadena Humane.

Other laws aiming to protect pets

This is not the first time last year’s fires have led to new legislation focused on protecting pets during emergencies.

A new state law known as the FOUND Act, which went into effect Jan. 1, was inspired by Oreo the Pomeranian, who reunited with its Pacific Palisades owner in an emotional, viral video during the Palisades Fire.

The law requires cities and counties to include procedures for rescuing pets during mandatory evacuations in their next emergency plans, which need to be updated every five years to qualify for FEMA assistance.