CV NEWS FEED // Columbia University’s president has announced her resignation months after the “period of turmoil” wherein students at the prestigious university kickstarted a wave of violent protests and pro-Palestine encampments across the country.
“I write with sadness to tell you that I am stepping down as president of Columbia University effective August 14, 2024,” former President Minouche Shafik wrote in a statement announcing her decision ahead of the next term.
“This period has taken a considerable toll on my family, as it has for others in our community,” she stated, adding: “Over the summer, I have been able to reflect and have decided that my moving on at this point would best enable Columbia to traverse the challenges ahead.”
On April 17, Columbia University students set up their “Gaza Solidarity Encampment,” with the alleged aim of pressuring the school’s administration to divest from Israel over the rising onslaught of civilian casualties in Gaza. The Columbia students’ demonstration galvanized a massive wave of similar protests at progressive public universities and Ivy Leagues across the US, and abroad.
As CatholicVote reported, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), a group that was largely responsible for organizing the encampments at Columbia, was discovered to have ties to Hamas, the terrorist group behind the Oct. 7 attack on Israel.
Calls for Shafik’s resignation were numerous in the wake of the protests, which saw arrests of over 2,950 people across 61 universities in the US.
Shafik further announced in her statement that the UK’s Foreign Secretary has asked her to “chair a review of the government’s approach to international development and how to improve capability.” Shafik is Egyptian-born and holds dual British and American citizenship.
“I have tried to navigate a path that upholds academic principles and treats everyone with fairness and compassion,” Shafik continued: “It has been distressing—for the community, for me as president and on a personal level—to find myself, colleagues, and students the subject of threats and abuse.”
Shafik referenced the quotation famously attributed to President Abraham Lincoln, “A house divided against itself cannot stand,” and asserted that “we must do all we can to resist the forces of polarization in our community.”
“I remain optimistic that differences can be overcome through the honest exchange of views, truly listening, and—always—by treating each other with dignity and respect,” she wrote, concluding: “That is what we owe each other.”
The head of Columbia’s health and biomedical sciences campus, Katrina Armstrong, MD, has stepped in as the University’s interim president.
