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Higher Education

Palestine Solidarity Wins At UC Davis

February 24, 2024 Martha Grevatt, Workers World. , , , , ,
University campuses have become a major battlefield for the Palestine solidarity movement in the U.S. Students and faculty who support Palestinian liberation have been subjected to doxxing, university discipline, arrest, firings and more. School administrators, even if they are not anti-Zionist, have been removed simply for not being strong enough in backing Israel. But solidarity groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine have persevered and have scored some victories. “From McDonald’s to Sabra to Chevron, none of our student fees that fund ASUCD (Associated Students, University of California, Davis) operations will be used to financially support 30+ companies that are complicit in Zionist violence,” the University of California Davis SJP chapter said on Instagram.

Academics Form National Group To Advocate For Justice In Palestine

February 18, 2024 Michael Arria, Mondoweiss. , , , , ,
Academics have launched a new national network to advocate for Palestine. Faculty for Justice in Palestine (FJP), which was formed in solidarity with Palestinian students, already has 80 affiliate groups across college campuses. “After the genocidal war on Gaza began, groups of academic workers began to organize on campuses nationwide to support and protect students from the immediate onslaught of harassment, discrimination, and punishment,” the group’s facilitator Sherene Seikaly told Mondoweiss. “With 80 affiliate groups on campuses across the country, the Faculty for Justice in Palestine (FJP) national network is committed to the cause of Palestinian liberation through education, advocacy, and action.

Contract Faculty Wrest Neutrality From New York University

February 14, 2024 Jeff Schuhrke, Labor Notes. , , ,
Contingent professors scored a victory January 3 when they got New York University to agree to a union election this semester, and to remain neutral during the process. The election is scheduled for February 27 and 28. If they vote yes, Contract Faculty United (CFU)-UAW Local 7902 will become the largest union in the country of full-time, non-tenure-track faculty at a private university, with 950 members. Nationwide, two-thirds of faculty positions are contingent—meaning they lack the possibility of tenure. Many are adjunct instructors, who are hired on a course-by-course, semester-by-semester basis and typically make low wages and lack benefits. But there is another, lesser-known category of contingent faculty: those who work full-time on long-term contracts. The number of such full-time, non-tenure-track faculty in the US has almost tripled since 1987.

CUNY Workers Launch New Strike Campaign

February 14, 2024 Olivia Wood, Left Voice. , , , ,
As faculty, staff, and graduate student workers at the City University of New York (CUNY) approach one year without a contract, a new strike campaign is forming, fueled by outrage over decades of underfunding, low wages compared to other New York City schools, and fresh cuts to the university’s 25 campuses. Just last month, dozens of faculty were laid off right before the start of the semester — with full or nearly full classes getting cut from the schedule, leaving students in disarray — after the university ordered enhanced cuts at nine CUNY schools. Furthermore, Governor Kathy Hochul’s proposed executive budget cuts CUNY funding by $528 million. Most of this decrease comes from the capital budget, which provides for building upkeep and other infrastructure costs, even though only eight percent of CUNY’s buildings are considered to be in a “state of good repair.”

Israel Destroyed My University – Where Is The Outrage?

February 10, 2024 Chris Hedges, The Real News Network. , , , ,
On Jan. 17, the Israeli military detonated 315 mines to destroy Gaza’s last standing university, al-Israa University, located south of Gaza City. For 70 days prior, the Israelis occupied the university as a military base, posting snipers in its buildings and using it as a detention and interrogation center. According to university authorities, prior to the detonation Israeli soldiers looted the university museum, which contained 3,000 artifacts dating back as far as the Roman era. With al-Israa University’s destruction, Israel has now destroyed or damaged all of Gaza’s 12 universities, and also targeted 280 government schools and 65 UN schools, many of which were sheltering civilians when they were attacked.

Open Letter On The Anti-Palestinian And Islamophobic Environment At Emory University

January 31, 2024 Open Letter, Mondoweiss. , , , , ,
We are a coalition of community and civil rights organizations, writing on behalf of Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim students and students perceived to be Palestinian or Muslim at Emory University (“the University”) who have been targeted by racist, anti-Palestinian, xenophobic, and Islamophobic harassment and doxing attacks for their support for Palestinian human rights. We write to express our concern about the University’s failure to protect its students from these bigoted doxing and harassment campaigns and the lack of official, public support shown to Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim students.

What Do Faculty Owe Future Generations?

January 30, 2024 Sharon Stein, Resilience. , , ,
I’m a millennial faculty member. The millennial generation – also known as Generation Y – came of age with 9/11, followed by the US-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and then the 2007/8 financial crisis. While we were growing up, promises of perpetual progress and prosperity abounded. However, as we entered adulthood, we confronted the harmful realities and precarious nature of the prevailing social and economic system. It became clear to many of us that these were not only false promises but they also came at a high cost. Yet when we expressed our disillusionment, some from previous generations suggested our generation was the problem, not the system itself.

Greek Students Hit The Streets For Protests Against Private Universities

January 28, 2024 People's Dispatch. , , ,
For the third consecutive week, Greek student and youth groups and other progressive sections hit the streets, denouncing the conservative New Democracy (ND) government’s bid to open private universities. On Thursday, January 25, massive protest rallies were held in more than 40 cities, including Athens. Tens of thousands of students from coordination committees, and members of the Students’ Struggle Front (MAS), Panspoudastiki KS, Communist Youth of Greece (KNE), parents’ associations, teachers’ unions, and university workers demanded that the government scrap the proposed bill.

Palestine And The Crisis Of Free Speech On College Campuses

January 25, 2024 Mel Buer, The Real News Network. , , , ,
Colleges and universities have long acted as incubators for social movements, and the movement in solidarity with Palestine is no exception. While repression against students and faculty for support of Palestine is nothing new, the upsurge in mobilization and agitation for Palestinian liberation since last fall has been met with a frenzied response from actors within and outside of university administrations. Students and faculty alike have faced retaliation from university administrators and Zionists within and beyond the student body, ranging from revocation of scholarships to expulsions, firings, and even physical assault.

A Strike Is Coming To The Nation’s Largest Public University System

January 22, 2024 Matthew Ford, Jacobin. , , , ,
For over a decade, the administration at California State University (CSU) has been disinvesting in the United States’ largest public university system. The result has been the destruction of the institution’s academic integrity and the undermining of its basic goal: to serve the public good. Thankfully, a formidable opposition is growing among the faculty. This came to a head when, after a recent breakdown in negotiations with CSU management, the California Faculty Association (CFA) pledged to strike at all twenty-three campuses beginning this Monday, January 22. The twenty-nine thousand striking teachers are officially walking out over a bargaining impasse, but the conflict has roots far deeper than the recent breakdown in negotiations.

University Suspends Student Group For Supporting Palestine

January 5, 2024 Tristan Taylor, Left Voice. , , , , ,
The student group of Central Ohio Revolutionary Socialists (CORS) has been suspended by Ohio State University. They were notified of the suspension following an event they did on campus entitled “Intifada, Revolution, and the Path for a Free Palestine.” The OSU administration sent a letter December 13 alleging that CORS’ “activities pose a significant risk of substantial harm to the safety or security of your organization’s members, other members of the university community or to university property.” How a meeting to discuss the struggle against a genocidal war by the Zionist state of Israel creates “significant risk of substantial harm” is anyone’s guess.

Open Letter To The Columbia University Administration

December 24, 2023 Rashid Khalidi, Mondoweiss. , , , ,
Our deans state that the Columbia community should acknowledge “that hearing chanted phrases such as ‘by any means necessary,’ ‘from the river to the sea,’ or calls for an ‘intifada’—irrespective of intentions and provenance—is experienced by many Jewish, Israeli, and other members of our community as antisemitic and deeply hurtful.” They have thus unilaterally decided that no one should rise up [the actual meaning of “intifada”] against 56 years of illegal military occupation; that Palestine should remain unfree from the river to the sea; and that the oppressed should take permission from the oppressor as to the means to relieve their oppression.

The Longest Adjunct Strike In US History Comes To A Close

December 23, 2023 Jeff Schuhrke, In These Times. , , , ,
The longest adjunct strike in U.S. history ended this week after part-time faculty at Columbia College Chicago voted overwhelmingly in favor of ratifying a new four-year contract that will grant them greater job security and more decision-making power over their working conditions. The 49-day strike was led by the Columbia College Faculty Union (CFAC), which represents approximately 600 part-time adjunct instructors at the private, arts-and media-focused institution in Chicago’s South Loop. The tentative agreement was reached on December 17. Eighty-five percent of the membership participated in the ratification vote, with 99.7% approving.

The Selective Silencing Of Campus Speech

December 14, 2023 Kevin Young, Amherst Indy. , , , ,
“Fears of Violence on Mass. Campuses Are Silencing Many on Israel-Hamas War,” reads a recent news headline from western Massachusetts. The article quotes several professors who say they feel silenced by those who criticize US-Israeli policy. It also quotes several critics of US-Israeli policy who say they feel silenced. What should we make of these dueling claims? The key practical question here is what campus leaders are doing to protect free speech. It’s problematic whenever an individual infringes on another’s free-speech rights, but what’s most important is how administrators respond. They’re the ones who set policies and they also exercise the most influence over campus culture.

University Of Michigan Administration Caves To Zionist Pressure

December 10, 2023 Brian H. Silverstein, Left Voice. , , , , , ,
Last week, the University of Michigan student body was set to vote on a resolution calling for the university to recognize the genocide in Gaza and to assess the ethics of the institution’s investments, including investments in the State of Israel. The campaign has been led by the Tahrir Coalition, a broad and diverse group of over 60 student organizations. As the vote was underway, the university administration buckled to pressure from a coalition of off-campus Zionist organizations and canceled the vote, citing improper use of a university listserv to promote the vote. Michigan Hillel, with the support of an off-campus Zionist coalition including Maccabee Task Force, the Anti-Defamation League, Stand With Us, The iCenter, and the Israel Forever Foundation, raised $46,000 to influence the student vote and promote their own pro-Zionist resolution.
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