On-campus tensions over the war in Gaza left NYU’s administration scrambling to meet the needs of its student body. University policies have evolved in response to its crackdown on pro-Palestinian demonstrations and a monthslong legal battle with Jewish students, including updated protest guidelines and a new administrative position. However, NYU isn’t the only university to undergo sporadic changes to its administration, policies and guidelines.
Last semester, schools including Columbia University, Harvard University and the University of Pennsylvania formed task forces — groups that research how effectively university policy addresses specific issues — dedicated to combating antisemitism on campus. Harvard also established a task force aimed at mitigating anti-Muslim, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian incidents. While NYU did not create any task forces, it did release a 10 Point Plan for Student Safety and Well-Being that included an increase in campus security measures and police presence on campus amid rising student and faculty protests. The task forces and NYU’s approach had one thing in common: developing a cohesive plan of action and providing clarity on where each university stood.
When other colleges’ task forces delivered their recommendations at the end of the summer, many found themselves reporting to university administrations in flux following lawsuits concerning antisemitism on campuses, congressional hearings and eventual resignations. Entering the fall semester with new students, new insight — and, in many cases, new leadership — universities have taken varied stances on their definitions and disciplinary actions as they relate to antisemitism and Islamophobia.
Defining antisemitism
Ahead of this semester, NYU updated its student conduct guidelines to include “code words, like ‘Zionist,’” as examples of potentially discriminatory language, adding that “For many Jewish people, Zionism is a part of their Jewish identity.” The updates were accompanied by mandatory modules on Brightspace, which prompt students to read through its Non-Discrimination and Anti-Harassment policies and watch a video with example scenarios, before affirming their compliance.
Last week, Columbia’s Office of Institutional Equity also released a new non-discrimination policy after a Democratic state representative encouraged them to emulate NYU’s rhetoric for the protection of terms like “Zionist” under Title VI. Columbia also included example scenarios that would violate university conduct, similar to NYU’s NDAH training.
In response to a statement from on-campus groups claiming that NYU’s NDAH guidelines “set a dangerous precedent,” a university spokesperson said the updates would not change existing policies and came after “calls for greater clarity” at a series of listening sessions over the summer. NYU has not responded to multiple requests for additional information regarding the content of the listening sessions, which involved more than 300 community members over 20 sessions. UPenn released data from similar listening sessions last year, where some of its most common discrepancies were in how the university defined antisemitism.
Defining what language constitutes an example of antisemitism has become a topic of contention across universities. NYU has faced backlash for its implementation of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition, which includes “the targeting of the state of Israel,” among other conditions. Unlike Columbia, Harvard and UPenn, the definition is engrained in NYU’s NDAH policies and students may be subject to disciplinary action for not complying with it.
Ahead of the start of the academic year, Columbia’s Task Force on Antisemitism outlined a “working definition” of antisemitism — which similarly included “exclusion or discrimination based on Jewish identity or ancestry or real or perceived ties to Israel” — after initially refusing to define the term. Harvard’s task force also published an editorial, where it said that it would not define antisemitism but that “shunning, excluding and intimidating students is wrong regardless of their identity or beliefs.”
While UPenn’s task force referenced the IHRA definition in its final report, it ultimately decided to define it as discrimination or hatred “against Jews because they are Jews.” The task force also said that while opposition to Zionism — which it called a “political idea” — was acceptable, the targeting of Zionists as a group was not.
Protesting and Title VI
Nearly every university saw protests following rising tensions amid the war in Gaza, with many culminating in pro-Palestinian encampments on campus at the end of last semester. At Columbia, the encampment lasted two weeks before its former president authorized the New York City Police Department to arrest more than 100 protesters as they occupied a university building. At the University of Pennsylvania, the 16-day encampment ended with 33 arrests. At both encampments at NYU, which — unlike several other universities — were largely centralized on publicly accessible areas as opposed to university property, there were 120 arrests. Harvard’s encampment was the only one that ended peacefully, after students occupied the Harvard Yard for 20 days.
As a result of on-campus protests, universities released temporary guidelines that clarified or altered their existing restrictions on behavior at protests or the location of the demonstration. Columbia updated its guidelines in October to require 10 working days of advance notice before “special events,” including protests. UPenn similarly released temporary protest guidelines in June that required organizers of “non-academic” events to reserve spaces two weeks in advance and hold them during “stated business hours.” Encampments are not allowed at any of the universities.
UPenn’s new guidelines also prohibit amplified sound and light projections on university surfaces, much like NYU which has banned amplified sound and requires approval from the Office of Student Conduct for any light projections. Some schools have also designated protest zones; Harvard had said protests cannot block building entrances or occur in classrooms or libraries, and NYU has specifically banned protests in libraries.
Universities have also created new positions to enforce Title VI, the civil rights law addressing on-campus discrimination relating to race, color and national origin. In July, NYU announced its plans to hire a Title VI coordinator, who will oversee investigations, complaints and other issues relating to the title. On Sept. 5, UPenn announced the establishment of the Office of Religious and Ethnic Inclusion to lead university responses to Title VI violations, and Columbia similarly established its Office of Institutional Equity over the summer. Harvard has no such universitywide position or policy.
Harvard’s task force also reported that students felt as though “extracurricular student life is now characterized by political litmus tests,” suggesting that the university take additional measures to keep such environments “vibrant and accessible.” This is similar to NYU’s specification that a “‘no Zionist’ litmus test” would be in violation of their NDAH policy.
Doxxing and Islamophobia
Following an uptick in protests, Columbia, Harvard and UPenn all saw “doxxing trucks” on campus placed by conservative media group Accuracy in Media. Last October, the trucks were seen at Columbia, as well as UPenn — where students and faculty received death threats as the trucks circulated campus with messages calling for the university’s president to resign. They returned to Columbia in December, when they were also seen at Harvard and resulted in dozens of students having their names, faces and addresses leaked. Harvard saw another bout of trucks early April, targeting members of the law school’s student government who passed a resolution calling on the school to divest from “illegal Israeli settlements.”
Although NYU has received “a number of complaints” against doxxing trucks on campus, its incidents of on-campus doxxing have been more individually targeted. Last October, NYU graduate student Hala Al Shami received threats of death and rape after she was identified posting signs of a student walkout over posters of hostages, and a first-year student received threats and harassment after they were identified taking down posters of hostages taken by Hamas.
In response to incidents involving doxxing trucks, Columbia created a Doxing Resource Group responsible for “connecting those who have been doxxed with legal advice, privacy scrubbing, report filing, and support services.” NYU has also directed students to a website, which contains a brief statement condemning doxxing and links to on and off-campus support for cybersecurity and wellness. Harvard and UPenn both offer similar sites that more broadly provide resources for all forms of online harassment.
In response to requests to denounce doxxing specifically, Harvard’s president released a Sept. 5 statement stipulating that it violates the university’s Non-Discrimination and Anti-Bullying policies, including those against “intense personal harassment of such a character as to amount to grave disrespect for the dignity of others.” NYU has not released a statement specifically addressing doxxing on campus, although a university spokesperson had told WSN that several students had been referred to conduct proceedings due to “allegations of engaging in doxxing” and student conduct guidelines state that doxxing is “prohibited under the Student Conduct Policy.”
Contact Naisha Roy at [email protected].
