Experts: New Accreditation Rules Threaten Academic Freedom The draft proposals, up for discussion this week, could change how accreditors oversee colleges and what they measure, but some say they violate existing federal law.

The Trump admin’s rewriting of rules governing college accreditation “obliterates” autonomy & is is being described as “a cluster bomb being dropped on American higher education.”

Opinion | The Hostile Takeover of Higher Education Business interests captured governing boards long before Trump.

“Faculty members & students continue to speak up & organize to oppose the radical reconfiguration of American institutions launched by the Trump administration & its private-sector allies. Frequently, this has included organizing outside the gates.”

— Reinhold Martin & Robert Newton, Columbia AAUP

What A Wonder School (This Would Be) YouTube video by Austerity Singers

Admin at The New School are threatening the cancellation of 23 academic programs.

Students, faculty, & staff are fighting back, demanding a public meeting & an end to the manufactured austerity crisis.

Check out this powerful song produced by TNS students:

@newschoolaaup.bsky.social

New CPHE Accrediting Body Is Illegitimate Rather than protecting educational quality, the CPHE appears designed to give partisan political actors a powerful new tool to pressure universities to conform to a narrow ideological agenda—backed by...

The far right's new politicized higher ed accreditor is illegitimate.

"Rather than protecting educational quality, the CPHE appears designed to give partisan political actors a powerful new tool to pressure universities to conform to a narrow ideological agenda"

— Todd Wolfson, AAUP President

Following faculty pushback to Customs and Border Protection recruitment listing, SPS removes all external postings from career opportunities website Following faculty pushback for listing an external Customs and Border Protection recruitment event on its career opportunities <a href="https://careerdesignlab.sps.columbia.edu/events/" rel="">web pag...

💥💥💥

Congrats to Columbia AAUP on successfully standing up against ICE recruitment on campus.

Let's keep organizing and go all out to get ICE off our campuses.

@swcolumbia.bsky.social
@aaupcu.bsky.social

Boston judge warns Trump officials on changing plaintiffs’ immigration status The ruling from U.S. District Judge William Young follows a prior ruling in which he found the Trump administration violated the Constitution.

“Judge Young affirmed unequivocally, without a doubt, that non-citizens lawfully present here in the US have the same free speech rights as everyone else. He established that the federal government clearly & unconstitutionally pursued a policy of discrimination against pro-Palestinian speech.”

JOIN OR DIE cartoon snake now featuring segments for MIT, PENN, UVA, Brown, Dartmouth and USC. Not colored in because they have not said no to Trump‘s loyalty oath (yet): AZ, Texas, Vanderbilt.

The snake is growing.

✊🏽✊🏻✊🏿✊🏾✊🏼

Vanderbilt, Texas, AZ…now’s the time.

The world is watching.

The resistance is here.

#NoLoyaltyOaths
#NoKings
#DefendHigherEd

Students, faculty, & campus workers are leading this incredible pushback.

We will not back down in defense of higher education & our democracy.

There is an unstoppable wave of unified rejection of Trump’s authoritarian agenda cresting throughout higher education.

Join Us.

#DefendHigherEd

Penn rejects White House proposal for special funding treatment With the decision, Penn becomes the third university to decline the offer.

🚨🚨🚨

And THREE stood up!

Penn has joined MIT & Brown in rejecting Trump’s loyalty oath compact.

When we join together and fight back, WE WIN!

No amount of federal bribery is worth surrendering the freedom to question, explore, and dissent.

LET’S GO!

#DefendHigherEd
@aaup-penn.bsky.social

🎙️ Last week, a group of Columbia professors — most of them Jewish — took a stand. Risking reprisal, they publicly rejected the university’s recent incorporation of a controversial definition of antisemitism. Their statements, excerpted here, can be read in full at cu-standsup.org/events/free-....

University Administrations: Reject Trump's "Loyalty Oath" Compacts The Trump administration is trying to blackmail schools to let him and his unqualified bureaucrats run our schools. They want to dictate what schools teach, who they admit and hire, what researchers s...

NO LOYALTY OATHS IN HIGHER ED!

Trump's attacks on our universities are an attempt to consolidate power. This loyalty oath directly undermines our right to academic freedom & goes against every democratic principle our country should uphold.

Please click below, sign, & share.

#DefendHigherEd

Proposed cuts could have ‘catastrophic effect,’ 110 biomedical, health sciences industry leaders tell Congress Proposed cuts will have “a catastrophic effect on the advancement of biomedical and biotechnology capabilities in the United States,” more than 100 leaders of biomedical/health sciences companies tell...

Spread the word: when scientific training and research funding is cut, EVERYBODY loses.

@statnews.com

www.statnews.com/2025/06/27/b...

Findings of Fact & Conclusions of Law – #261 in American Association of University Professors v. Rubio (D. Mass., 1:25-cv-10685) – CourtListener.com Judge William G. Young: ORDER entered. FINDINGS OF FACT AND RULINGS OF LAW, PURSUANT TO FED. R. CIV. P. 52(A)(Sonnenberg, Elizabeth) (Additional attachment(s) added on 9/30/2025: # 1 Main Document) (J...

BREAKING: WE WON!!!
💥 💥 💥

Federal Judge William G. Young ruled today in our lawsuit against the Trump administration that the policy of arresting, detaining, & deporting noncitizen students & faculty members for their pro-Palestinian advocacy violates the 1st Amendment.

Full ruling here:

On Title VI, Discrimination, and Academic Freedom This report considers how Title VI has been used to create an enforcement apparatus that sidesteps long-established AAUP-recommended procedures of shared governance and offers recommendations for facu...

🚨🚨🚨
NEW AAUP Report Analyzes Trump Admin Weaponization of Title VI
to Undermine Civil Rights Protections.

#Academicfreedom
#AcademicSky
#DefendHigherEd

The AAUP & @aft.org are fighting back to remind our elected leaders that higher education & public health research are transformative public goods.

We must keep life-saving NIH research fully funded & stop the Trump admin’s devastating funding cuts that are halting medical breakthroughs.

The Resistance Is Inevitable.

We’re sick & tired of ICE & FBI agents profiling, harassing, & violently arresting our neighbors.

#wearealldc

Incredible turnout in DC yesterday, including a strong AAUP contingent.

@aaupmason.bsky.social
@gwaaup.bsky.social
@afthighered.bsky.social

In April, the AAUP & our Harvard chapter sued the Trump admin for demanding that Harvard censor speech & restructure core operations or else face $8.7 billion in funding cuts.

We hope this decision clarifies to Harvard’s administration that bargaining w/ tyrannical authoritarians is unacceptable.

Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: Legal Perspectives on the Columbia Agreement. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar. Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: Legal Perspectives on the Columbia Agreement. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar.

TODAY! 4–5:30pm ET
Zoom panel discussion by CU-AAUP: LEGAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE COLUMBIA AGREEMENT

An expert panel of law professors will address questions about CU’s resolution agreement.

Open to Barnard & Columbia faculty. MUST register by 12pm, link here: us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

Columbia must resist narratives that single out some students for protection while ignoring the suffering of others. These narratives misrepresent the nature and causes of campus tensions and provide the cover for outside attacks that undermine our university's mission. Columbia must reject pressures-whether from donors, alumni, political actors, or internal stakeholders-to privilege some views and silence others in the name of safety or institutional reputation. At its best, a university defends the full spectrum of intellectual freedom, not only fostering inclusion based on identity, but also protecting the right to protest, question, critique, and hold power accountable. This means respecting students and scholars across political, religious, and ideological spectra and protecting their civil rights. The current lopsided treatment of students by this administration regarding the war in Gaza risks worsening the very divisions it claims to address.

“Columbia must resist narratives that single out some students for protection while ignoring the suffering of others…The current lopsided treatment of students by this administration regarding the war in Gaza risks worsening the very divisions it claims to address.” (6/6)

What's at stake Across the country, universities are under intensifying political pressure to suppress protest, narrow intellectual discourse, and align with authoritarian narratives. Higher education has long served as a vital space for critical thinking and dissent-a necessary counterweight to authoritarianism and the abuse of power. But that crucial role is possible only if universities support discourse that includes dissent and uphold their core values of inclusion, equity, and academic freedom consistently, not selectively.

‼️🚨WHAT’S AT STAKE: Higher ed “has long served as a necessary counterweight to authoritarianism…

But that crucial role is possible only if universities support discourse that includes dissent and uphold their core values of inclusion, equity, and academic freedom consistently, not selectively” (5/6)

The findings presented in the task force's report fall short of capturing the range of experiences of Jewish students on campus. Embedded within the data, and reflected in accounts since October 7, 2023, are the facts that many Jewish students have reported feeling alienated for criticizing Israel's assault on Gaza and some have been targeted by alumni and professors, or labeled as "self-hating Jews" for their support of Palestinian rights. In addition, Jewish students, like students of all backgrounds, have been exposed to threats, harassment, administrative punishment, arrest, and physical attacks for participating in a noble tradition of Columbia student protests against global injustices. Therefore framing all of the "immense challenges faced by our Jewish students" as a problem of antisemitism as Columbia's prevailing discourse does, oversimplifies and obscures these complex and painful realities, thereby undermining our community's ability to address the challenges.

“The findings…fall short of capturing the range of experiences of Jewish students on campus…

Columbia's prevailing discourse…oversimplifies and obscures these complex and painful realities, thereby undermining our community's ability to address the challenges.” (4/6)

The University's responsibility is to respond to these complexities, not reduce them to a singular narrative of antisemitism. The current framing-which is endorsed by Columbia's leadership, exploited by the federal government, and echoed by their allies in the media- oversimplifies and obscures, risks deepening divisions rather than healing them.

“The current framing—which is endorsed by Columbia's leadership, exploited by the federal government, and echoed by their allies in the media—oversimplifies and obscures, and
risks deepening divisions rather than healing them.” 🎯 (3/6)

The data reflects a campus community struggling with grief, moral urgency, intense polarization, and the failure of University administration to broker the ensuing tension in a constructive manner. As described below, these struggles affect Jewish students and Muslim students at comparable rates. The administration's narrative obscures these facts, marginalizes the pain and suffering of Muslim students, and erroneously homogenizes Jewish students' experiences by ignoring the pressures many encountered for protesting Israel's assault on Gaza. Changing our understanding of the problem changes the solutions needed to address it.

“The administration's narrative obscures these facts, marginalizes the pain and suffering of Muslim students, and erroneously homogenizes Jewish students' experiences by ignoring the pressures many encountered for protesting Israel's assault on Gaza.” (2/6)

Reframing the narrative on antisemitism at Columbia: What the data says In March, President Donald Trump’s administration abruptly terminated numerous federally funded scientific research projects at Columbia. According to personal correspondence with multiple Columbia Un...

Out today in the Columbia Spectator — faculty from CUIMC Stands Up & CU Faculty Alliance reframe the narrative about antisemitism at Columbia through an analysis of the HEALS data. Read it here ⬇️

www.columbiaspectator.com/opinion/2025...

Columbia's Agreement with the Federal Government The Columbia administration has finally done what many of us have urged it not to do: it has signed a bad agreement with the federal government to address the government’s phony concerns about Columbi...

“But, looking at this agreement, one has to think that it wasn’t worth it. What value is there to saving lives and extending them if these lives are lived in a world of restricted speech, arbitrary arrest, and cheerful physical violence?”

Read more here:

open.substack.com/pub/riseupco...

I don't think the values of the Trump administration are the values of the Columbia medical faculty. In fact, I am certain they are not. We have made a deal with the devil. Those don't usually work out. 1 And far from all of them were on board with a deal. See the web page of CUIMC Stands Up, a group of medical faculty who have and continue to oppose any deal under these circumstances. They have even launched a satirical newsletter, check it out!

We couldn’t have said it better ourselves:

“I don’t think the values of the Trump administration are the values of the Columbia medical faculty. In fact, I am certain they are not. We have made a deal with the devil. Those don’t usually work out.”

We can confirm ‼️

Columbia's Agreement with the Federal Government RISE UP, COLUMBIA TODAY AT 12:17 PM The Columbia administration has finally done what many of us have urged it not to do: it has signed a bad agreement with the federal government to address the government's phony concerns about Columbia. Here is the document. And here, importantly, is President Shipman's letter outlining her view of the document.

Thank you to Rise Up, Columbia for the astute analysis as usual and the footnote shoutout to CUIMC Stands Up!

We’re a group of medical campus faculty & staff firmly against the exchange of our values for grant funds, even as our jobs & careers are at risk.

🔗 open.substack.com/pub/riseupco...

Post #7 — CUIMC Stands Up Reading Between the Lines : Columbia’s July 22, 2025 University Statement on UJB Determinations for Butler Library Disruption and Alumni Weekend Encampment by The Spector Editorial Staff From ...

www.cuimcstandsup.org/specter/post-7

Latest on Columbia with words by historian Ellen Schrecker www.vqronline.org/spring-2025/...

At Columbia, we’re also facing challenges as layoffs continue, threatening the integrity of research + diversity driving our excellence. We need ACTION to protect academic freedom, scholars, & research.

We demand our leaders:
🧬 Protect science
🔬 Preserve innovation
👩‍🔬 Support education & research