59 h. ago Harvard University faculty sue to block Trump review of nearly $9bn in funding

Lawsuit filed along with motion for temporary restraining order calls threats an existential ‘gun to the head’Harvard University professors are suing to block the Trump administration’s review of nearly $9bn in federal contracts and grants awarded to the Ivy League school as part of a crackdown on what the White House says is antisemitism on college campuses.The Harvard faculty chapter of the American Association of University Professors and the national arm of the academic organization said in a lawsuit filed on Friday in a Boston federal court that the administration was trying to unlawfully undermine academic freedom and free speech on the school’s campus. Continue reading...

Politics

3 d. ago Judge says Trump lawyers’ failure to explain how they plan to return wrongly deported man ‘extremely troubling’ – live

US district judge Paula Xinis demands administration identify whereabouts of Kilmar Abrego GarciaAdvocates for academic freedom are bracing for what they expect to be the next phase of the government’s effort to reshape higher education: an overhaul of the system accrediting institutions of higher learning.Donald Trump has made no secret of such plans. During the campaign, he boasted that accreditation would be his “secret weapon” against colleges and universities the right has long viewed as too progressive.We may lose a lot of materials.All of the states, we are in dire shape. We have had a reconsideration of everything with regard to what Doge [is doing].” Continue reading...

Events

3 d. ago ‘A huge cudgel’: alarm as Trump’s war on universities could target accreditors

Advocates braced for revamp of certification system as experts warn of political pressure being brought to bearAdvocates for academic freedom are bracing for what they expect to be the next phase of the government’s effort to reshape higher education: an overhaul of the system accrediting institutions of higher learning.Donald Trump has made no secret of such plans. During the campaign, he boasted that accreditation would be his “secret weapon” against colleges and universities the right has long viewed as too progressive. Continue reading...

Events

5 d. ago Academic freedom in the US is under threat – universities of the world, unite! | Andrew Graham

We cannot be neutral with respect to fake news, misinformation or outright liesIn western academia, everything began with philosophy. Ever since, especially since the Enlightenment and the scientific revolution of the 17th century, there has been a long, centrifugal process, with discipline after discipline making its distinctive contribution and marking out its methods and its domain of inquiry. Raphael’s painting The School of Athens displays this perfectly, with the two great philosophers Plato and Aristotle in the centre. Yet even here, Raphael points at the specialisation of knowledge that is about to explode. Plato points upwards, symbolising his interest in the timelessness of metaphysics. Aristotle gestures downwards, emphasising his interest in the empirical.Today, at university, students and researchers focus on a single sub-branch of, say, modal logic, labour economics or organic chemistry. Knowledge has accumulated and fragmented. Renaissance men (or women) are almost no...

Events

7 d. ago Academic Freedom to Support Hamas at the London School of Economics

Academic Freedom to Support Hamas at the London School of Economics  Algemeiner.com

Economics

8 d. ago Trump is targeting US universities as never before. Here are four ways to help them | Cas Mudde

Supporters in Europe can offer new opportunities and minimise the isolation. Certainly they can avoid making things worseUniversities in the US are under attack. While the Trump administration pretends to punish them for their alleged compliance with or support for “antisemitism” (ie pro-Gaza demonstrations) and “anti-white racism” (ie diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives), the real targets are academic freedom and freedom of speech. Going after the most prominent and privileged universities, such as Columbia and Harvard, kills two birds with one stone: it garners prime media attention and spreads fear among other, far less privileged universities.The rest of the world has taken note and has started to respond, though mostly without knowing much about the specifics of US academia and without asking US-based academics what they need. Obviously, different academics face different challenges – depending on, for example, their gender and race, legal status, the state they live in...

Politics

1 week ago Who actually runs Columbia University? | Arjun Appadurai and Sheldon Pollock

Trustees aren’t academics – and they’re often political wolves in sheep’s clothing. We need reform to save the American university as we know itLate on Friday evening, the trustees of Columbia University announced that its interim president, Katrina Armstrong, was leaving her post.Six days earlier, she had convened an emergency meeting with 75 faculty members after the university had cravenly surrendered to the demands of the Trump administration in the hopes of recovering $400m in federal grants and contracts. The president and her staff called their predicament “heartbreaking” and sought to reassure faculty that academic freedom and departmental autonomy remained intact. Continue reading...

Culture

2 w. ago ‘Canary in the coalmine of totalitarianism’: how Columbia went from a home for Edward Said to a punching bag for Trump

The university had a history of being a home for cutting-edge discourse on Palestine – until it capitulated to the administration’s demands Last week, Columbia University announced that it would cave to demands by the Trump administration and adopt sweeping measures against pro-Palestinian activity on campus, including new restrictions on protest and the takeover of an academic department from faculty control.The news sent shock waves across higher education institutions nationwide for what appeared a stunning capitulation to attacks on academic freedom and the independence of the department of Middle Eastern, south Asian and African studies, or Mesaas, which became a scapegoat for what the administration viewed as a pro-Palestinian climate on campus. It was also a remarkable turn of events for a university that had for years been a home for cutting-edge academic discourse on Palestine, beginning with the scholarship of Edward Said, a leading Palestinian intellectual. Continue readi...

Politics

2 w. ago Professors sue Trump administration over Columbia University overhaul

Legal challenge reflects concerns over pressure on US academic freedom

Politics

2 w. ago Does Columbia still merit the name of a university? | Rashid Khalidi

Columbia’s long been run more like the vast business empire, than as an educational institution. Now it’s acting like Vichy on the HudsonIt was never about eliminating antisemitism. It was always about silencing Palestine. That is what the gagging of protesting students, and now the gagging of faculty, was always meant to lead to. While partisans of the Israeli-American mass slaughter in Gaza may have been offended by their protests, large numbers of the students whose rights of free speech have been infringed upon via draconian punishments were themselves Jewish.Many of those faculty members who are about to be deprived of academic freedom and faculty governance, and perhaps fired, are themselves Jewish, indeed some are Israelis. If it were ever really about discrimination, the university would have taken action against the ceaseless harassment of Palestinian, Arab and Muslim students and faculty, and their allies and supporters, instead of endorsing and enabling it.Rashid Khalidi ...

Culture

3 w. ago European universities offer ‘scientific asylum’ to US researchers fleeing Trump’s cuts

Academics from US hoping to escape funding freezes and ideological impositions are being actively recruitedLaced with terms such as “censorship” and “political interference”, the Belgium-based jobs advert was far from typical. The promise of academic freedom, however, hinted at who it was aimed at: researchers in the US looking to flee the funding freezes, cuts and ideological impositions ushered in by Donald Trump’s administration.“We see it as our duty to come to the aid of our American colleagues,” said Jan Danckaert, the rector of Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), in explaining why his university – founded in 1834 to safeguard academia from the interference of church or state – had decided to open 12 postdoctoral positions for international researchers, with a particular focus on Americans. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago Columbia University cedes to Trump’s demands with series of reforms

Measures at Ivy League institution trigger concern over academic freedom

Culture

3 w. ago Trump has turbocharged the attacks on free speech at US universities. I have seen it first

For speaking up for Palestine, I have been targeted – and have seen colleagues and students face arrest and sanctions Sandy Tolan is a professor at the University of Southern California in Los AngelesThe Trump administration’s attempted deportation of the Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil, a permanent legal resident of the US, is sparking outrage and nationwide protests. But as shocking as his arrest may have seemed to the world, it was sadly unsurprising to those of us on the frontlines of the war at home over Gaza. Here in the US, a building fury of anti-Palestinian hatred, especially since the October 2023 Hamas attacks on Israel, is giving Donald Trump cover to cleanse the country of “undesirables” and undermine free speech and academic freedom.“If you love Hamas so much why not pack up and move to south Gaza,” an infuriated reader wrote to me last spring, after the LA Times published my opinion article criticising my own university, the University of Southern Californ...

Politics

3 w. ago The US government has sent Columbia University a ransom note | Sheldon Pollock

Like a mob boss, the government threatens to cut off two of the university’s fingers: academic freedom and faculty governanceOn 15 March, Columbia University received what can only be described as the most dangerous letter in the history of higher education in America. The sender was the United States government. Like a ransom note, the government letter insists that Columbia comply with a list of Trump administration demands in order to even have a chance at recovering the $400m in federal funding for scientific research that the government canceled on 7 March.Oddly, one of the specific targets identified in the letter was Columbia’s Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies (Mesaas), a small humanities department devoted to studying the languages, cultures and history of those regions. The government demanded the Mesaas department be put into “receivership” – basically, be taken over by the University – as a precondition to further negotiations. Continue readi...

Politics

3 w. ago Academic freedom in America needs to be defended. Here’s how | Jan

To begin with, universities should not be intimidated by the claim that public opinion is turning against them. That’s not necessarily trueLess than two months in office, the Trump administration has conclusively demonstrated two things: if it declares you an enemy, it will come after you; and when it comes after you, it will test the limits of legality.JD Vance already professed years ago that professors are the enemy in his view. And the president himself is encouraging his underlings to adopt the strategy familiar from his decades in business: do something illegal and see if anyone sues. It is crucial that university leaders see the measures taken against Columbia not as an isolated incident, but as a test for how far the education system can be subjugated. In other words, it is not an isolated problem for one place but a collective challenge that requires a collective response.Jan-Werner Müller is a Guardian US columnist and a professor of politics at Princeton University. Conti...

Politics

4 w. ago Former Ofsted chief accuses Labour ministers of putting union wishes ahead of children's welfare by brutally attacking the freedom of academies

Amanda Spielman, who was chief inspector of the schools watchdog from 2017 to 2023, demanded Bridget Phillipson drop proposed reforms that would rein in academies.

Politics