education
University of Southern California censures president and provost for handling of anti-Israel protests, commencement cancellation
The University of Southern California faculty censured their own president and provost this week over the administration’s handling of anti-Israel protests and the decision to cancel the main commencement ceremony for its graduating class.
The USC Academic Senate voted 21-7 in favor of censuring the university’s president, Carol Folt, and provost, Andrew Guzman. Six members of the faculty body abstained from voting, reports National Review.
USC leaders initially canceled the valedictorian Asna Tabassum’s commencement speech, who holds pro-Palestinian views and has made anti-Semitic and hateful comments publicly. The the entire ceremony itself was scrapped later, with the university claiming its actions were due to safety concerns following the arrest of 93 anti-Israel protesters on campus.
There was “widespread dissatisfaction and concern among the faculty about administrative decisions and communication related to these events,” the censure resolution states.The threats “escalated to the point of creating substantial risks relating to security and disruption at commencement,” Guzman said in a campus-wide letter on April 15.
Now that the censure resolution has passed, USC will create a task force to investigate the university leadership’s response to those events. The task force is expected to present a public report of its findings by September 15, according to the document. Both Folt and Guzman are expected to fully cooperate with the task force’s investigation.
“I understand there are many different viewpoints among members of the Trojan Community regarding our recent decisions,” Folt said in an emailed statement provided to National Review. “I’m committed to working with the Academic Senate, and the wider faculty who weren’t present at today’s session.”
Instead of holding one large commencement, which was expected to draw an estimated 65,000 people to campus, USC opted to hold multiple smaller ceremonies and celebrations over the course of four days, starting Wednesday. Columbia University made a similar decision earlier this week. Prior to its cancellation, USC’s main graduation ceremony was originally scheduled for Friday.
“Provost Guzman and I welcome ongoing engagement with the newly created task force,” Folt said. “For now, our focus is on celebrating the 19,000 graduates of USC’s Class of 2024.”
An elementary school in the suburbs of New York City has been teaching a “gender curriculum” to kindergarten children in an effort to promote “inclusion” in the school. Hillside Elementary School, part of the Hastings-on-Hudson Union Free District, uses photos of children to introduce “different identities.”
The New York Post reports that the course includes showing kindergarten students photos of other children which are used to “introduce vocabulary to describe characters of different identities,” including teaching them about the terms “cisgender, transgender, and non-binary,” according to a message to parents regarding the curriculum.
“Our gender curriculum focuses on Hillside’s core value of respect and aims to center discussions on gender identity. The students will learn and discuss that there is a lot you can’t tell about a person by simply looking at them,” the kindergarten level course description reads.
“The students will look at pictures of children and talk about what they notice and what they think they know about the children just from the pictures. Using their observations, we will then take the opportunity to introduce vocabulary to describe characters of different identities,” the school writes.
The “identity” being taught to children includes discussing “gender and the pronouns that you use,” and that “as we learn and grow, the words we use to describe our gender identity can grow too,” as described by the school.
Fox News Digital reached out to the school about the curriculum, to which the Hastings-on-Hudson Union Free District communications team said that the lessons have been in place for several years and are rooted in “Hillside’s core values of respect and fostering dignity for all students.”
“One 30-minute gender lesson is taught in each class one time per year. The classes are led by a certified educator, following a specific set of lessons designed to help students value the full diversity of their classmates,” Superintendent William S. McKersie said in a message to faculty and parents.
“The lessons have been created in alignment with the NYS Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education Framework,” he wrote. The school noted that the lessons do not address sex education or sexuality. The school district said that while they usually have the courses posted publicly online, the gender lesson description has been taken off the website since going viral.
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