Antisemitism and Free Speech on Campus

Ryan Quinn
Inside Higher Ed

Excerpt: Last month something happened that has little, if any, public precedent: A university fired a faculty member almost immediately not for out-of-classroom speech but for an optional course assignment. DePaul University dismissed adjunct Anne d’Aquino midway through her first quarter teaching Health 194: Human Pathogens and Defense.

DePaul spokespeople said students and others had expressed concern about the assignment and an accompanying email from d’Aquino that focused on Palestine and included the terms “genocide” and “ethnic cleansing.” The assignment asked students to, among other things, explain “the impact of genocide/ethnic cleansing on the health/biology of the people it impacts.”

Adam Kredo
Free Beacon

Excerpt: Harvard University failed to implement a sweeping set of recommendations from its in-house Antisemitism Advisory Group (AAG) and turned a blind eye to numerous instances of campus harassment even after they were raised with the school's leadership, according to a congressional report.

Emma H. Haidar and Cam E. Kettles
Harvard Crimson

Excerpt: The Harvard Corporation rejected an effort by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences to confer degrees on 13 seniors facing disciplinary charges for participating in the pro-Palestine encampment, an unprecedented veto that opens a new front in the internal battles that have convulsed Harvard for the past year.

The Corporation, the University’s highest governing body, deliberated late into the night on Tuesday as it stared down an impossible decision: render Harvard College’s disciplinary processes toothless by approving the FAS-amended list or undercut the authority of the University’s largest faculty by declining to uphold their amendment.

Zach Kessel
National Review

Excerpt: Harvard University leaders failed to implement an action plan from the school’s own task force aimed at combatting antisemitism on campus, according to a new report by a House education committee whose chairwoman said the task force was apparently “all for show.”

Abigail Anthony
National Review

Excerpt: Nearly 2,000 people who claim to be Columbia University alumni have signed a letter pledging to “withhold all financial, programmatic, and academic support” from the institution until it meets the demands of anti-Israel protesters, claiming that $77 million in donations is at risk.

The letter, addressed to Columbia president Minouche Shafik and the school’s trustees, expresses support for the protesters who oppose the university’s “continued collaboration with the Israeli government’s ongoing genocidal violence against Palestinians.”

Michelle N. Amponsah and Joyce E. Kim
Harvard Crimson

Excerpt: Members of the pro-Palestine encampment rejected a proposal from interim University President Alan M. Garber ’76 to end their two-week occupation of Harvard Yard and avoid receiving involuntary leave of absence notices, according to an Instagram post published shortly after midnight on Friday by the group leading the encampment.