A person walks across the mall on the University of Maine campus in Orono in 2023. After a recent pause, the university has announced it reinstated some graduate student funding. Derek Davis/Portland Press Herald

ORONO — After temporarily pausing new graduate student financial offers, the University of Maine announced it will honor all offers already made to incoming graduate students, in addition to making new offers.

The university announced in March it was pausing funding for incoming graduate students after the Maine Legislature passed a baseline budget with flat funding for the public university system and amid uncertainties around federal public university funding. 

The paused funding included financial offers for teaching and research assistantships for incoming graduate students only at Orono.

University of Maine graduate students who received a financial offer for the upcoming academic year were asked to act on their offers by April 18, or the offers would be withdrawn, according to Samantha Warren, the university’s chief external and governmental affairs officer, in a news release issued Monday.

“Based on the response and the identification of available funding, the university is making additional financial offers on a rolling basis and prioritizing positions that align with institutional operational needs, including supporting undergraduate student learning,” Warren said.   

As the system paused graduate student financial offers, other colleges and universities across the country also paused accepting graduate students for several reasons, including the National Institute of Health’s proposed cuts to reimbursements for costs related to research.

The University of Maine System, as a whole, faced its own financial threats as President Donald Trump’s administration threatened to cut $56 million in funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture as well as cutting — and then reinstating — Maine’s Sea Grant of $4.5 million that goes to coastal workforce and business development as well as marine-related education and outreach.

“Since then, multiple federal research grants and contracts that support graduate student teaching and research positions have been terminated or paused and the federal government has indicated it intends to have a different relationship with research institutions. For example, multiple federal agencies, including the U.S. Department of Energy, have announced a reduction in the rate they reimburse universities to support essential research expenses, though courts have paused implementation,” Warren said in the release. 

The University of Maine System is experiencing its highest-ever graduate enrollment this year, with 6,999 students pursuing graduate and masters degrees across the system. The flagship university in Orono enrolled 3,261 graduate students this year and 806 of them were appointed to paid assistantships, according to the news release.