Can college prep programs survive Trump’s war on DEI?

The Education Department has warned colleges that they will lose funding for any admissions programs that “favor one race over another.” The Trump administration has gone after several prestigious colleges for promoting diversity, equity and inclusion.

As a high school student from the Crenshaw District, a working-class Los Angeles neighborhood, Ziane Djenidi wasn’t sure about life after graduation. A child of immigrants, neither of his parents went to college, and Djenidi hadn’t decided if he would go, either.

Then, some school friends told him about the VIP Scholars Program, a University of California, Los Angeles initiative that prepares marginalized students for college. Through the program, Djenidi says, he got to visit the Westwood campus and talk with students of color, like him.

“That sort of opened my eyes to the importance of higher education,” he says.

Now a rising senior at UCLA, Djenidi is majoring in neuroscience and dreams of becoming a doctor. But the program that took him from South Central L.A. to the brink of medical school could potentially one day be in jeopardy due to President Donald Trump’s crusade against diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Programs under attack

The VIP Scholars program is among dozens of college-prep initiatives that could be under attack because they create pipelines from high school to higher education for disadvantaged students.

Centered on an executive order Trump signed banning DEI in January, Education Secretary Linda McMahon made it plain in a “Dear Colleague” sent in February that it is “impermissible for schools to have DEI programs that are intended to advantage one race over another.” Schools that don’t eliminate such programs, the letter states, could lose federal funds and grants. The White House has proposed to cut $163 billion from non-defense discretionary spending for the 2026 fiscal year.

Department of Education initiatives that support low-income, first-generation, and disabled students, such as TRIO and GEAR UP, are at risk, despite having bipartisan support. If they are cut in the upcoming 2026 budget, fewer marginalized students would get the support and resources for college success.

As one of the several colleges that have support programs for first-generation, low-income, and historically underrepresented students, UCLA could lose more than $1 billion in federal funding.

UCLA’s VIP Scholars program collaborates with 11 partner schools in the metro Los Angeles area. Jonli Tunstall, a 2005 UCLA graduate and the program’s director, worries about the future.

“Same Thing 20 Years Ago”

Tunstall, who has been a part of VIP Scholars since its inception, said that the program was UCLA’s response to Proposition 209, a ballot initiative that ended affirmative action in California public college admissions. She said attacks on programs that help underrepresented students prepare for college are nothing new: “It was that same thing 20 years ago when this program started,” she says.

VIP Scholars Program staff learned the program would pause starting on June 30 because of university-wide budget cuts, but Tunstall says student and faculty fundraising will keep the doors open for two more months.

Across town, the University of Southern California, a private college, works with the Leslie and William McMorrow Neighborhood Academic Initiative, or NAI, a program that prepares sixth- through 12th-grade students from low-income households for college in California. Many participants have gone on to become first-generation college students.

Saianna Smith, an NAI student program advisor, says that they had to let go of two administrative positions, cut down summer programming, and limit generous financial aid packages, but their program has an endowment and is funded through grants, which gives them a bit more security.

Still, ”As a graduate of the program, it is kind of sad to see the opportunities that I had [disappear],” Smith says. “I went to undergrad, [got] my master’s, and now finishing my doctorate degree pretty much loan-free because of this program.”

What’s happening today “is going to have [an impact] on our programming long afterwards,” Smith says.

Sounding the alarm

What’s happening at other schools serves as a warning. Despite removing DEI statements on its website, Columbia University lost $400 million in grant funding, and the Trump administration is now going after its accreditation. Accusations from the Trump administration that DEI efforts violate civil rights laws have led to the cancellation of $1 billion in grants at Cornell, and $790 million at Northwestern.

Meanwhile, Tunstall, the VIP Scholars Program administrator at UCLA, says students and their family members are organizing to preserve the program.

“Our students and family members started mobilizing without being asked,” she says. When official notice went out across the campus, Tunstall says, “they just started going to work. It’s been mind-blowing to see.”

Djenidi, the UCLA student and VIP Scholar, says he has joined several students and alumni in taking action. He’s been sharing the word about donating to the VIP Scholars Program on social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram.

Tunstall said she and the other staff and community are at a crossroads.

“Should we not be able to raise money?” Tunstall says. “Or should we? Do we keep knocking on doors to hope for funding? What if we don’t? How do you pause a program? What does that mean for the students and the family members that are in the middle of it? What is the staff going to do? I don’t know that we’ve fully figured that part out yet.”

This article first appeared in Word in Black.