“Mattering is More Important Than Belonging”: Pitt-Greensburg President Discusses Challenges With DEI Policy Changes on Campus

On Feb. 14, 2025, all colleges and universities received a “Dear Colleague Letter” from the Department of Education informing institutions that they must end diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) practices and programs. 

This letter was overturned by a New Hampshire judge on Jan. 21, 2026. The Department of Education can no longer say that campuses must eliminate DEI, but the Department of Justice still has the ability to target specific campuses, such as Harvard. Universities are working hard to ensure their students and programs will be safe if targeted.

“Unfortunately, in the last year or so we have been in reactive mode. There’s priority over here and over there. It can be hard to figure out where we should put our energy,” Dr. Bob Gregerson, Pitt Greensburg president, said. 

Gregerson explained that Pitt Greensburg changed the President’s Committee on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion to the Committee on Student Initiatives in reaction to the Dear Colleague Letter. Gregerson explained that though the name changed, the work did not. The committee still focuses on creating a campus where every student feels as if they belong and matter.

“We’ve been talking about belonging for a long time now, but it’s shifting into the idea of mattering. Mattering is more than belonging. Mattering is: My contributions are recognized, and my contributions make a difference no matter what my role is,” Gregerson said. “I think that’s deeper, and I’m glad we’re starting to talk about that.”

Gregerson explained that it is helpful to be a part of the University of Pittsburgh because we can utilize their resources to ensure our campus allows success for all students. The University of Pittsburgh is currently doing an inventory of all scholarships, including branch campus scholarships, to determine if there are any scholarships that are targeted for a specific race, religion, or gender. 

Mike Husentis, director of admissions at Pitt Greensburg, is on the Pitt committee completing the scholarship inventory. Their goal is to ensure that scholarships are fair and unable to be targeted by the current administration. 

Pitt-Greensburg does not have any targeted scholarships, but instead has general scholarships such as merit-based, Dean scholarships, and transfer scholarships. The only scholarship that could fall into DEI guidelines would be the Vera Heinz Foundation scholarship. This scholarship supports women in global studies with minimal travel experience. 

Most scholarships come from money that has been given to the university, but the Vera Heinz scholarship is given directly from the foundation to the student. Since the money is given from a private foundation, it must be honored and can’t be prohibited by lawmakers.

Clubs that are centered around inclusivity are another topic of concern. At Pitt-Greensburg, clubs are open to anyone regardless of race, religion, or gender. Since organizations on campus do not exclude students, Gregerson does not believe that they will be targeted. 

“So the idea is we want to make a campus that allows everybody to be successful and to feel a sense of belonging. We never favored one group over another, so it’s not about giving one group an edge. It’s about making sure nobody has an unfair disadvantage,” Gregerson said.