{"id":21015,"date":"2025-03-21T23:26:54","date_gmt":"2025-03-21T23:26:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=21015"},"modified":"2025-03-21T23:26:54","modified_gmt":"2025-03-21T23:26:54","slug":"columbia-university-cedes-to-donald-trumps-demands-with-series-of-reforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=21015","title":{"rendered":"Columbia University cedes to Donald Trump\u2019s demands with series of reforms"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> \n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__content-sign-up-topic-description\">Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the world<\/p>\n<p><iframe class=\"article__content-sign-up-iframe close\" scrolling=\"no\" id=\"signUpIframe\" data-prev-url=\"\/register\/in-article-sign-up?ft-content-uuid=af25e2dc-e2d9-4baf-8520-d037b5aa87e3&amp;newsletter-id=65b8fec772badb00166eafc6\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div id=\"article-body\">\n<p>Columbia University will overhaul aspects of its governance following pressure from the Trump administration that has stoked fears of restrictions on academic freedom across the US.<\/p>\n<p>Katrina Armstrong, Columbia\u2019s interim president, on Friday outlined a series of measures \u2014 including centralising disciplinary procedures against students and appointing a senior official to \u201creview\u201d its regional studies programmes, starting with those covering the Middle East.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAt all times, we are guided by our values, putting academic freedom, free expression, open inquiry, and respect for all at the fore of every decision we make,\u201d Armstrong said in a statement <\/p>\n<p>The move, which was criticised by the Ivy League institution\u2019s faculty and national academic associations, followed a fierce campaign led by Republicans alleging antisemitism on its New York City campus sparked by protests following Hamas\u2019s October 7 2023 attack in Israel and the Israel\u2019s subsequent offensive in Gaza.<\/p>\n<p>Federal officials withdrew $400mn in funding from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/stream\/82707a70-3bf1-4f91-8238-b564cfc670b2\" data-trackable=\"link\">Columbia<\/a> earlier this month and threatened to cut future financial support unless the university swiftly met a series of demands for reform. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>That sparked a week of intense negotiations which included pressure by Columbia\u2019s lawyers to prevent academic associations launching legal challenges to the validity of the Trump administration\u2019s demands.<\/p>\n<p>The<a href=\"https:\/\/president.columbia.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/content\/03.21.2025%20Columbia%20-%20FINAL.pdf\" data-trackable=\"link\"> measures<\/a> announced on Friday included initiatives such as centralising student discipline, banning masks that hide the identities of protesters and appointing a senior vice-provost to review \u201call aspects\u201d of leadership, curriculum and non-tenured faculty appointments and ensure programme offerings are \u201ccomprehensive and balanced\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>However, the university stopped short of meeting the government\u2019s demands to impose formal \u201cacademic receivership\u201d on the department of Middle Eastern, South Asian and African studies for five years and abolishing its judicial board. Instead, the president will have much tighter control over the board\u2019s membership. <\/p>\n<p>Michael Thaddeus, vice-president of the Columbia chapter of the American Association of University Professors, called the measures \u201cprofoundly disappointing and alarming\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking in a personal capacity, he said:\u00a0\u201cThe appointment of a new senior vice-provost for regional studies must not be used to police the content of research and teaching on contentious topics at Columbia. That would strike at the heart of our academic freedom.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Lynn Pasquerella, president of the Association of American Colleges and Universities, said: \u201cThis undermines the strength of American higher education, which presupposes freedom from unwarranted governmental intrusion and undue political influence over the curriculum.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside aria-labelledby=\"aside-label\" class=\"n-content-recommended--single-story n-content-recommended--inset\" data-component=\"recommended\">\n<p class=\"n-content-recommended__title\">Recommended<\/p>\n<div class=\"o-teaser o-teaser--article o-teaser--small o-teaser--stacked o-teaser--has-image js-teaser\" data-id=\"7bbb477a-0bf4-4222-9e28-817c2ae996ec\">\n<div class=\"o-teaser__image-container js-teaser-image-container\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/7bbb477a-0bf4-4222-9e28-817c2ae996ec\" data-trackable=\"image-link\" tabindex=\"-1\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/p>\n<div class=\"o-teaser__image-placeholder\" style=\"aspect-ratio:2234\/1257\"><\/div>\n<p><\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>In a nod to concerns from Republicans and some academics that many American universities have become dominated by faculty with more progressive opinions, Columbia also pledged that its searches for new faculty \u201cwill be expanded to ensure intellectual diversity across our course offerings and scholarship\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>It noted there had been a recent downturn in both Jewish and African American enrolment, and said \u201cwe will closely examine those issues\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/af25e2dc-e2d9-4baf-8520-d037b5aa87e3\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":21016,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-us","cs-entry","cs-video-wrap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21015"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21015\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}