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The U.S. Education Department late Thursday night published a list of six colleges and universities that are under investigation by its Office for Civil Rights for allegedly violating federal law prohibiting discrimination based on “shared ancestry.”
The department’s news release said that it had released the list as “part of the Biden-Harris administration’s continued efforts to take aggressive action to address the alarming nationwide rise in reports of antisemitism, anti-Muslim, anti-Arab, and other forms of discrimination and harassment on college campuses and in K-12 schools since the October 7 Israel-Hamas conflict.”
The institutions under investigation for alleged shared ancestry violations of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 are Columbia University, the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, Cornell University, Lafayette College, the University of Pennsylvania, and Wellesley College. The list also included one high school, and the department’s news release said that five of the total of seven complaints allege antisemitic harassment and two allege anti-Muslim harassment.
“Hate has no place in our schools, period. When students are targeted because they are—or are perceived to be—Jewish, Muslim, Arab, Sikh, or any other ethnicity or shared ancestry, schools must act to ensure safe and inclusive educational environments where everyone is free to learn,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona. “These investigations underscore how seriously the Biden-Harris Administration, including the U.S. Department of Education, takes our responsibility to protect students from hatred and discrimination.”
The agency did not provide any details about the institutions under investigation, but some of the situations might be surmised from recent headlines.
In recent weeks, for instance, pro-Palestinian students reportedly banged on locked library doors while shouting “Free Palestine” at Cooper Union in New York City while Jewish students were inside the library; Columbia suspended two pro-Palestinian groups; and Jewish students at Cornell, Penn and Wellesley were allegedly subjected to antisemitic threats and taunts. The Brandeis Center was reported to have submitted complaints to the Education Department about Penn and Wellesley.
In an email to students, employees and alumni at Lafayette on Friday, Nicole Hurd, the college's president, said that the letter it received from the Office for Civil Rights cited a complaint that the Lafayette "discriminated against students on the basis of national origin (shared Jewish ancestry) by failing to respond to incidents of harassment in October 2023.” Hurd said that referred to a "problematic poster at a peaceful event on Oct. 25 that was quickly addressed. The college maintains a firm stance against antisemitism, Islamophobia, and hate speech of any kind." (Note: An earlier version of this article mentioned an incident from last spring at Lafayette that appears to be unrelated to the federal inquiry.)
In an interview Friday, Cardona told CNN This Morning that he anticipates more investigations and acknowledged colleges could lose federal funding as a result.
However, that’s unlikely, he said, because the college leaders he’s spoken with want to do everything they can to help students.
The department and Office for Civil Rights is working to provide colleges with more support and resources to address issues on campus.“The level of intensity is very high,” he said. “We need to match it with a level of response that meets the moment. We need to be listening to our students. We need to let them know that they will be safe in our schools and that we're not going to tolerate pain or threats on campus.”
