Academic Freedom at Princeton

Siyeon Lee and Genevieve Shutt
Daily Princetonian

Excerpt: A coalition of Princeton’s liberal and progressive organizations hosted a ‘Walkout For Our Futures’ last Friday, in response to Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election. Like many others, we were fearful, dejected, and most of all, angry — and understandably, sought to make this sentiment known. This anger, however, was expressed by some protestors in a manner that was not only unproductive but also incendiary.

What democratic, egalitarian, or progressive purpose is served by ascribing idiocy to all of Trump’s administration — or by fantasizing about its failure? When progressives reduce Trump and his administration to incendiary insults, often attacking their intelligence and capability, his largely working-class, non-college-educated followers likely translate those insults as their own.

Guest Contributors
Daily Princetonian

Excerpt: This Thursday, Nov. 21, Tigers for Israel (TFI), B’Artzeinu, and Chabad of Princeton are hosting an event headlined by Islamophobic activist Mosab Hassan Yousef, an individual who uses his platform to spread incendiary rhetoric about Muslim people. As members of the Alliance of Jewish Progressives and allies, we wholeheartedly reject Yousef’s Islamophobia and condemn the decision to bring him to campus.

Abigail Rabieh
Daily Princetonian

Excerpt: Just from reading the ‘Prince,’ especially last spring, it would seem that the Israel-Hamas war was the foremost issue on college students’ minds.  This was far from the case — when the ‘Prince’ polled students on their top concerns prior to the 2024 presidential election, few voters — for Trump or for Harris — identified the war as a priority. Why then, did the ‘Prince’ act as if last spring’s encampment deserved a huge amount of time, resources, and words to cover?

Wynne Conger
Daily Princetonian

Excerpt: “They may have the sense of entitlement,” Larry Leighton ’56 writes of young Princeton alumni who donate at rates far lower than their predecessors. “[T]here seems to be very little knowledge of the importance of philanthropy generally.” In recent years, many alumni have penned “giving pleas” of a similar vein, bemoaning the dying culture of annual giving. But is the reality truly as terrible as these alumni assume it to be?

Yet in recent years, younger alumni have demonstrated a marked decrease in charitable donations, and especially when compared to that of previous classes. Although there may be a manifold of reasons as to why, more and more students have reduced their giving out of concerns about whether the endowment’s investments continue to line up with their values, along with the underlying recognition that the University is no longer sustained on the backs of alumni contributions.

Zach Gardner
Daily Princetonian

Excerpt: As a former student and interviewee of Dr. Wright’s, I feel her conclusions deserve a defense. As a conservative, I believe Clemans-Cope’s article demands a response. As an advocate for free speech on campus, I believe the principles of free and open debate warrant a proper definition, not a poor caricature.

If personal experience is the currency of modern campus politics, my time at Princeton has proven Dr. Wright’s conclusions correct. I have benefited tremendously from an environment in which my views are in the minority.

Bridget O’Neill
Daily Princetonian

Excerpt: In November 2015, student protesters from the Black Justice League (BJL) occupied the office of University President Christopher Eisgruber ’83 during his office hours, commencing a 33-hour sit-in. The students came prepared with a list of demands, which included mandated cultural competency training for faculty and staff, an ethnicity and diversity distribution requirement, and the removal of the name of Woodrow Wilson Class of 1879 from the then-named Wilson School and College.

Following prolonged pro-Palestine activism in the spring, this scene of the BJL sit-in takes on new relevance — not for its impact on the University’s history of racial reckoning, but for how the sit-in permanently altered Eisgruber’s understanding of his own role in responding to student demands.