Gaza protesters wore keffiyehs as Biden tried to assure the crowd: ‘Your voices should be heard, I promise you I hear them’
It was, in the end, an artful compromise.
Joe Biden got to speak uninterrupted and renew his pitch to Black voters. Protesters got to make their point by wearing keffiyehs or raising a fist. Even the skies were merciful, hinting at but never quite unleashing rain.
Continue reading...Speech warmly received at historically Black college despite backlash from students in weeks leading to address over war
Joe Biden told graduating students of Morehouse College that American democracy has failed the Black community, but vowed to continue fighting “the poison of white supremacy”, in a widely watched speech to a historically Black college during an election year.
Despite a backlash from some students and alumni in the weeks leading up to Biden’s commencement address, including over the Hamas-Israel war and concerns that Biden would use the speech as a campaign event, the president’s address to the all-male school was warmly received. He used his speech to reaffirm his commitment to democracy in the wake of the January 6 insurrection, and to reiterate his call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
Continue reading...A school district in Houston has voted to redact chapters on vaccines and climate change, and parents and educators are worried
The wave of book bans sweeping the US, typically reserved for works of fiction deemed controversial, has hit textbooks used in public schools, marking the next step in Republicans’ war on education.
The board of trustees for the Cypress Fairbanks independent school district in Houston voted 6-1 earlier this month to redact certain chapters in science textbooks, including those about vaccines, human growth, diversity, and climate change.
Continue reading...State’s Republicans passed the bill, which the governor is now expected to sign, despite criticism from teachers and parents
Tennessee lawmakers passed a bill on Tuesday that would allow teachers to carry concealed handguns in schools despite protests at the state capitol.
House Republicans passed the bill, one of the biggest gun moves since a mass shooting in a Nashville Christian school left three children and three adults dead last year.
Continue reading...Letter from 25 senators including Mitch McConnell says president ‘must act immediately to restore order’ on university campuses
Senior Republican US senators on Tuesday waded into growing tensions at leading universities over the Israel-Gaza war, demanding the Biden administration send in federal law enforcement officers to curb pro-Palestinian protests that have led to hundreds of arrests.
Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, and John Thune, his deputy, wrote to Merrick Garland, the US attorney general, and Miguel Cardona, the education secretary, calling demonstrators “antisemitic, pro-terrorist mobs”.
Continue reading...Hundreds of members of teaching staff demonstrate in solidarity with arrested students as protest tents put back up on campus
Hundreds of faculty members at Columbia University in New York held a mass walkout on Monday to protest against the president’s decision to have police arrest students at a pro-Palestinian encampment protest last week.
The solidarity protest came as students put protest tents back up on campus. They had been torn down last week when the New York police department arrested more than 100 students, who were also suspended by the university.
Continue reading...Minouche Shafik appeared beleaguered as House members grilled her over reported upsurge in antisemitism on campus
The head of a prestigious US university clashed with members of Congress today in highly charged hearings over a reported upsurge in antisemitism on campus in the wake of Israel’s war in Gaza.
Minouche Shafik, the president of Columbia University, appeared beleaguered and uncertain as one Congress member after another assailed her over her institution’s supposed inaction to stop it becoming what one called “a hotbed of antisemitism and hatred”.
This article was amended on 17 April 2024 to correctly identify the school where Elizabeth Magill resigned as president last year. The school was the University of Pennsylvania, not Pennsylvania University.
Continue reading...Asna Tabassum says university is ‘succumbing to a campaign of hate meant to silence my voice’ after decision to scrap speech
The University of Southern California is facing intense backlash for the decision to cancel the valedictorian speech of a Muslim student at the commencement ceremony in May, a decision which the student has criticized as being silenced by anti-Palestinian hatred for her views on human rights.
In a missive to the USC community, the university’s provost, Andrew Guzman, wrote that the Los Angeles university took the unprecedented step of canceling Asna Tabassum’s planned speech because the “alarming tenor” of reactions to her selection as valedictorian – along with “the intensity of feelings” surrounding Israel’s ongoing military strikes in Gaza – had created “substantial risks relating to security”.
Continue reading...College announces new member activities are suspended pending investigation of possible activities that threatened people’s safety
Program activities of fraternities and sororities at the University of Maryland have been suspended indefinitely, the university announced.
The University of Maryland’s decision comes after the University of Virginia suspended its Kappa Sigma chapter and all fraternity events following an alleged hazing incident last month which left a student injured.
Continue reading...Jim Pillen breaks with 14 other Republican governors to enroll in Summer EBT, a new food program for school vacation months
Nebraska’s governor announced this week that the state would accept federal dollars to help feed children from low-income families, breaking away from the more than a dozen other Republican governors around the US who have refused to do so.
Just last month, Jim Pillen joined 14 other Republican governors in opting not to enroll in Summer EBT, a new federal food program that provides low-income families with a monthly payment of $40 per child during summer vacation. In participating states, families with children in free or reduced-price school lunch programs will get $40 per qualifying child on an electronic benefits transfer (EBT) card throughout each of the three summer months. That money can be used to purchase groceries and food from farmers’ markets.
Continue reading...Republican bills likely to reach Governor Ron DeSantis, who has railed against indoctrination of students by ‘liberal elites’
Kindergartners in Florida might soon be compelled to balance learning their ABCs with lectures on the history of communism, if a Republican proposal moving through the state’s legislature becomes law.
House bill 1349 would also create a “history of communism taskforce”, hand-picked by the Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, to recommend how the subject is presented in classrooms from elementary to high school starting in 2026.
Continue reading...Satanic clubs, whose members do not worship the devil, usually formed in response to presence of religious groups in schools
Community members in a Tennessee school district want to banish Satan from their children’s halls after the formation of a new club was announced.
The After School Satan Club (ASSC) wants to establish a branch in Chimneyrock elementary school in the Memphis-Shelby county schools (MSCS) district.
Continue reading...This live blog is now closed. For our latest reporting on Giuliani trial, you can read our latest report:
The Giuliani defamation trial is one of the first tests of the many prongs pro-democracy groups are using in the courts to try to hold purveyors of election lies accountable.
Several lawsuits use anti-defamation laws in civil lawsuits against big names who joined with Trump to deny the results of the 2020 election, including Giuliani, Mike Lindell and Dinesh D’Souza.
Continue reading...Claudine Gay and presidents of UPenn and MIT faced backlash over responses on campus policy at congressional hearing
The Harvard Corporation, the highest governing body at the university, has backed the university’s president, Claudine Gay, to remain in post after calls for her removal following controversial testimony over antisemitism on campus.
Gay and the presidents of University of Pennsylvania and MIT faced backlash for their remarks at a congressional hearing into antisemitism on college campuses. Congresswoman Elise Stefanik demanded a “yes” or “no” response to her question of whether calling for the genocide of Jews would violate their university’s code of conduct. The presidents’ various responses were criticized for not being unequivocal enough in their condemnation of calls for genocide.
Continue reading...Academics at Columbia College in Chicago are in a fierce dispute over cuts to courses and poor working conditions
The longest strike of adjuncts in US labor history is still ongoing, with academics at Columbia College in Chicago remaining in a fierce dispute over cuts to college courses and a host of complaints over poor working conditions.
The fierce dispute began when Columbia College leadership suddenly announced plans to implement significant cuts to courses and course sections, and consolidating classes which have ballooned class sizes, citing a $20m budget shortfall.
Continue reading...Congressional testimony on campus policies by heads of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania and MIT draws criticism
The presidents of three of the nation’s top universities are facing intense backlash, including from the White House, after they appeared to evade questions during a congressional hearing about whether calls by students for the genocide of Jews would constitute harassment under the schools’ codes of conduct.
In a contentious, hours-long debate on Tuesday, the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) sought to address the steps they were taking to combat rising antisemitism on campus since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas war. But it was their careful, indirect response to a question posed by the Republican congresswoman Elise Stefanik of New York that drew scathing criticism.
Continue reading...About 29,000 workers of the California Faculty Association are on strike as disparity between admin and professor pay increases
California State University faculty at four campuses went on strike on Monday to demand higher pay and expanded parental leave for thousands of workers at the largest public university system in the US.
The California Faculty Association, which represents 29,000 workers, is staging one-day work stoppages at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona; San Francisco State University; California State University, Los Angeles and California State University, Sacramento.
Continue reading...Joan Donovan says funding was cut off for criticizing Meta when university was receiving $500m from Mark Zuckerberg’s charity
One of the world’s leading experts on misinformation says she was fired by Harvard University for criticising Meta at a time that the school was being pledged $500m from Mark Zuckerberg’s charity.
Joan Donovan says her funding was cut off, she could not hire assistants and she was made the target of a smear campaign by Harvard employees. In a legal filing with the US education department and the Massachusetts attorney general first published by the Washington Post, she said her right to free speech had been abrogated.
Continue reading...Suit by several families and organizations seek to have law declared as violation of students’ and teachers’ free speech
Several families are suing to stop Iowa’s new law that bans books from school libraries, forbids teachers from raising LGBTQ+ issues and forces educators in some cases to out the gender identity of students to their parents.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa and Lambda announced the federal lawsuit on Tuesday, saying the law passed earlier this year by the Republican-led legislature and enacted this fall “seeks to silence LGBTQ+ students, erase any recognition of LGBTQ+ people from public schools, and bans books with sexual or LGBTQ+ content”.
Continue reading...Portland school district reaches agreement with teachers’ union allowing 45,000 students to resume classes
Oregon’s largest school district said late on Sunday it had reached a tentative agreement with its teachers’ union and roughly 45,000 students would be back in school on Monday after more than three weeks without classes.
The agreement must still be voted on by teachers who have been on the picket line since 1 November over issues of pay, class sizes and planning time. It must also be approved by the school board, but the union agreed that classes could resume while those votes go forward. Portland Public Schools students missed 11 days of school before the district began its weeklong Thanksgiving break.
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