Students, Faculty at Columbia are Furious With School for Cooperating With Trump
“This is an all-out attack on science and academic freedom”
These folks are still trying to frame this as being about academic freedom and freedom of expression. That is simply not true.
NBC News reports:
Students and faculty demand Columbia University stand up to federal government
Columbia University students, faculty, staff and alumni launched a “speak out” Monday to criticize school leaders for bowing to the Trump administration’s demands after it pulled $400 million in federal funding from the campus.
Hundreds of students, faculty, staff and alumni were taking part in the 25-hour event that organizers said was intended to amplify a growing position within the Columbia community that the school administration had caved-in to Washington and that the school’s academic freedom was under attack.
The administration has paused billions of dollars in federal grants and research funding at universities nationwide to target what it describes as a failure to deal with antisemitism and its handling of protests against Israel’s military action in the Gaza Strip.
“All of us have dedicated our lives to both a continual process of learning but also educating,” Brooke West, a professor of social work at Columbia said, as dozens of students walked by. “But how can we do that when our students, when our institutions and academic freedom and free speech are under attack?”
David Guirgis, who will graduate next month with a master’s degree in social work, said he’s ashamed his school didn’t stand up to the administration.
“This is an all-out attack on science and academic freedom,” he said just before the rally began. “We are pioneers in biomedical research, legal research and environmental science research and all of that got cut simply because the Trump administration had a vendetta against universities.”
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Comments
Here’s an idea for Columbia. Students leave. Faculty resign. Problem solved. You;re welcome.
What were these freaks saying five years ago about US COVID policy, which WAS an “all-out attack on science!”?
Whatever works. Columbia gets less credit than JHU which cooperated with deporting pro-Hamas demonstrators without a whimper. Columbia had to be helped to reach a less impressive conclusion, but they’re bending a little which is good to see.
Columbia can just spend its own endowment rather than receiving federal money or student loans, and then it can have all the academic freedom it wants.
What percentage of faculty and students? Are they a self selecting subgroup that Columbia can simply tell thanks for coming, you’re no longer required to return – teachers teach, students study, and protesters can find somewhere else to live.
“Students, Faculty at Columbia are Furious With School for Cooperating With Trump”
So?
Social work students…typical…blabbing on and on about “scientific” this and that when his own field is the least scientific of all.
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