Eva Cherniavsky and Amit R. Baishya
Technology Review
Excerpt: We write as former members of the Modern Language Association (MLA) and its Committee on Academic Freedom and Professional Rights and Responsibilities (CAFPRR). Both of us resigned from CAFPRR after the refusal of the MLA Executive Council to advance Resolution 2025-1 to the organization’s delegate assembly.
Responding to the genocide in Gaza and citing the revised position of the AAUP on the legitimacy of academic boycotts, the resolution called on MLA members to embrace boycott, divestment, and sanction (BDS) actions against Israel. We recount some of the events that led to our decision and present three major concerns that arise from disallowing the debate.
Ariel Kaminer, Sian Beilock, Jennifer L. Mnookin and Michael S. Roth
New York Times
Excerpt: It’s an eventful moment in American higher education: The Trump administration is cracking down, artificial intelligence is ramping up, varsity athletes are getting paid and a college education is losing its status as the presumptive choice of ambitious high school seniors.
To tell us what’s happening now and what might be coming around the corner, three university leaders — Sian Beilock, the president of Dartmouth; Michael Roth, the president of Wesleyan; and Jennifer Mnookin, the chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Madison — spoke with Ariel Kaminer, an editor at Times Opinion.
Jessica Blake
Inside Higher Ed
Excerpt: The Education Department is planning to move TRIO and numerous other higher education programs to the Labor Department as part of a broader effort to dismantle the agency and “streamline its bureaucracy.”
Instead of moving whole offices, the department detailed a plan Tuesday to transfer certain programs and responsibilities to other agencies. All in all, the department signed six agreements with four agencies, relocating a wide swath of programs.
Associated Press/NPR
Excerpt: The Trump administration cannot fine the University of California or summarily cut the school system's federal funding over claims it allows antisemitism or other forms of discrimination, a federal judge ruled late Friday in a sharply worded decision.