At Risk U will examine challenges to democracy and academic freedom in U.S. universities
February 23, 2026
Susan Koshy, Jason Mazzone, David Sepkoski, and Rosalyn LaPier
Susan Koshy, Jason Mazzone, David Sepkoski, and Rosalyn LaPier
The project's principal investigators are, left to right, Susan Koshy, Jason Mazzone, David Sepkoski, and Rosalyn LaPier

A multi-disciplinary team of faculty researchers from the University of Illinois has been awarded a Sawyer Seminar grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to study the challenges to democracy and academic freedom confronting US universities now. This is the first time in the 30-year history of the Sawyer Seminar Program that Illinois faculty have won this prestigious humanities award. The Illinois Sawyer Seminar initiative, “At Risk U: The Past, Present, and Future of Academic Freedom,” examines the emergence of risk management as a deeply ingrained organizing feature and priority of modern universities and considers its implications for academic freedom and democratic governance. 

The initiative is led by Susan Koshy (Asian American Studies and English), Rosalyn LaPier (History and American Indian Studies), Jason Mazzone (Law), and David Sepkoski (History). The Illinois faculty team was drawn to Mellon’s unique call to turn their own universities into the object of their investigations in studying current challenges confronting higher education. 

“This was a rare chance to show how the humanities can tackle urgent questions about higher education’s future—reflexively, through the study of our own institution,” said Koshy. 

The project leaders will explore questions of risk and academic freedom through a series of case studies alongside a larger team of 11 core contributors comprising faculty researchers, administrators, and archivists from 13 departments and three colleges.

The Sawyer Seminar activities span a two-year period from spring 2026 to spring 2027. These activities are designed to draw the larger campus community into the dialogues and explorations at the center of this project through speaker visits, seminars, case studies on the history of the university, exhibits, mini-grants for team-teaching and curriculum redesign, and a concluding symposium. At Risk U seeks to deploy the university’s richest resources—its faculty, its student researchers, and its archives—in entirely new ways to understand current threats and reshape governance.

For more information, visit the At Risk U website  or contact sawyerseminar@illinois.edu.

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