Hundreds of young and highly qualified Presidential Management Fellows have either been terminated or placed on administrative leave as the Trump administration continues a nationwide slashing of the federal workforce. For decades, the Presidential Management Fellows program was seen as a building block for the civil service with the expectation that the few who earned the position would one day become leaders in the federal workforce. Now the road ahead is uncertain. One of President Donald Trump's executive orders ended the program, which was created in 1978 to entice highly qualified workers with advanced degrees to join the federal government. The Trump administration had ordered agencies to lay off nearly all probationary employees, potentially affecting hundreds of thousands of workers in one fell swoop. That included recent classes of the fellows program, which has a two-year probationary period. Fellows had persevered through a highly selective selection process that included multiple tests and evaluations as well as a blind interview. The agency website said about one in 10 applicants are accepted, although that number has been recently as low as just 3 percent. While many fellows affected by the job cuts were reluctant to speak on the record, several did. As a group, they said they loved their jobs and see federal civil service as a way to serve their country. All would welcome, if given a chance, the opportunity to get back to work and use their expertise. Juliane Alfen, 25, left her workplace at the U.S. Agency for International Development in tears, exiting to cheers from supporters who protested the abrupt way one of the world’s preeminent aid organizations had been decimated. “I feel like we made a difference,” Alfen said. A 2023 fellow, her goal was to build a life and career around federal service. "Most PMF's are in the same position and being let go from their respective agencies. There's hundreds of us that were just starting out that will no longer be able to work," Alfen added. Alfen learned of the fellowship through her graduate school program in international affairs at the University of California, San Diego. The day she learned she’d made it to finalist, she said, “I literally screamed and called my mom on the phone.” There had been over 10,000 initial applicants. Now, when she looks at her LinkedIn account, everyone is job hunting. She said would love the opportunity to return to USAID, though the prospects for that are uncertain given the Trump administration’s gutting of the agency and halting its humanitarian work.