According to the threat of administration of Trump, the Columbia University agreed to implement a number of political changes on Friday, including the renovation of the principles of protests and conducting an immediate review of the study department in the Middle East.
The changes, described in detail in a letter sent by the temporary president of New York, Katrina Armstrong, appeared a week after the Trump administration ordered the Ivy League School introduced these and other reforms or lose all federal funds, ultimatum widely criticized in the academic community as an attack on academic freedom.
In its letter, Armstrong said that the university would immediately designate a senior vice -chairman to conduct a thorough review of the regional studies portfolio, “starting with immediate Middle East.”
Columbia will also be renewed by a long -term disciplinary process and bar protests in academic buildings. Students will not be able to wear facial masks in the campus “to hide their identity”. The exception would be made for people wearing them for health reasons.
In order to extend the “intellectual diversity” at the university, Columbia will also appoint new members of the Faculty to his Institute of Israel and the Department of Jewish Studies. It will also adopt a new definition of anti -Semitism and expand programming at the Tel Aviv center, a research center from Israel.
Political changes were largely consistent with demands at the University by the Trump administration, which pulled $ 400 million on a research subsidy and other federal financing, and threatened that it would finish more, due to the support of protests against Israel's military campaign in Gaza.
Columbia University student, Ranjani Srinivasan, calls the accusation that she is an absurd “terrorist support”, informing David CBC that she was afraid of her security after immigration and law enforcement in the US.
The White House called anti -Semitic protests, a label rejected by those who participated in demonstrations led by students.
The message looking for a comment was with a spokesman for the education department.
As “preliminary conditions” to restore financing, federal officials demanded that the university place their department in the Middle East, South and African Asia in “Academic Receipt for at least five years”.
They also told the university to prohibit masks on the campus, adopt a new definition of anti -Semitism, the abolition of the current disciplining process of students and developing a plan for “bachelor recruitment reform, international recruitment and recruitment practices”.
Historians described this decision as unprecedented invasion of university rights that have long been treated by the US Supreme Court as an extension of the first amendment.
On Friday, freedom of speech supporters immediately condemned Colombia's decision about harmony.
“A sad day for Colombia and our democracy,” said Jameel Jaffer, director of Knight First Evmitment Institute at Columbia University in the post of social media.