Latest news with #BrandeisCenter
RNZ News
16-05-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
Harvard settles Jewish student's lawsuit over alleged antisemitism
By Jonathan Stempel , Reuters Harvard University. Photo: AFP/Maddie Meyer Harvard University has settled a high-profile lawsuit by an Orthodox Jewish student who accused the Ivy League school of ignoring antisemitism on campus. Alexander Kestenbaum, who is known as Shabbos, and Harvard jointly agreed to end the case, according to a dismissal notice filed on Thursday in Boston federal court. "Harvard and Mr Kestenbaum acknowledge each other's steadfast and important efforts to combat antisemitism at Harvard and elsewhere," the university said in a statement on Thursday. "Harvard and Mr. Kestenbaum are pleased to have resolved the litigation." Settlement terms were not disclosed. Lawyers for Kestenbaum did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The settlement came four months after Harvard promised additional protections for Jewish students, as it resolved two lawsuits claiming it was a hotbed of rampant antisemitism. Both lawsuits were among many accusing universities of encouraging antisemitism after war broke out in Gaza in October 2023, leading to pro-Palestinian protests on many American campuses. Jewish students said Harvard tolerated their being maligned as "murderers" and subjected to viral attacks, and accused the university of hiring professors who promoted anti-Jewish violence and spread antisemitic propaganda. The lawsuits were brought by Students Against Antisemitism, and by Jewish Americans for Fairness in Education and the Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law. Kestenbaum was a plaintiff in the Students Against Antisemitism lawsuit, but did not settle at the time. He graduated from Harvard Divinity School last year, and has become a growing voice in a Republican-led campaign to root out antisemitism in major American universities. Harvard is one of the chief targets of that campaign, and U.S. President Donald Trump's administration has frozen or terminated more than $2.6 billion of the university's federal grants and contracts in recent weeks. The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based school is suing the Trump administration over grant cutoffs, mainly in medical sciences, calling them an unconstitutional attempt to curtail academic freedom and free speech. Another Ivy League school, Columbia University, is also a prime White House target over antisemitism. - Reuters
New York Post
30-04-2025
- Politics
- New York Post
Jewish group urges Trump to investigate DEI programs for promoting antisemitism
A Jewish legal advocacy group is urging the Trump administration to launch a sweeping investigation and to halt federal funding to K-12 schools that are using DEI — diversity, equity and inclusion programs — to promote antisemitism. The Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law sent a bombshell 15-page letter to US Education Secretary Linda McMahon citing evidence of Jews being labeled as 'inherently racist [and] oppressive' and claiming that Jewish students are being discriminated against to achieve DEI for other minority groups. The group said DEI programs fomenting Jew hatred both violate the 1964 civil rights law and President Trump's Jan. 20 executive order to ban such initiatives, which the commander in chief himself described as 'illegal and immoral.' 3 The Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law is calling on the Trump administration to launch an investigation into K-12 schools using DEI to promote antisemitism. Photo by'If President Trump is serious about ending radical indoctrination in K-12 schooling, he should start with some of the antisemitic educators whom we have found,' said Kenneth Marcus, chairman & CEO of the Brandeis Center and former US assistant secretary of education. 'Ironically, some of the worst antisemitism is coming from 'progressive educators' who purveying anti-Jewish hatred in the name of 'liberated ethnic studies' and social justice education,' Marcus told The Post. The April 28 letter to McMahon cites blatant examples of school officials and teachers bashing Israel and Jews, particularly in California, including: A California district Office of Equity circulated a message to teachers and staff stating, 'Hands off Sacred Land from Shellmo[u]nd to Jerusalem' and 'Zionism is Racism.' A Berkeley second-grade teacher told her 7-year-old students to write messages on sticky notes condemning US support for Israel, stating, 'Stop bombing babies.' The notes were then posted outside the classroom of the only Jewish teacher in the school, the complaint said. The Los Angeles Unified School District approved materials for a 'Free Palestine' event and the teacher responsible for the event provided material to students that referred to Israel as 'Occupied Palestine' and used antisemitic tropes to demonize Israelis and Jews. The civil rights group also said teachers' unions in California and Massachusetts promote DEI- based, antisemitic teachings. And an unapproved course of study called 'Teach Palestine' is spreading across the US 'thanks to the teachers' union,' the Brandeis Center lawyers said. 3 The group sent Secretary of Education Linda McMahon evidence that schools are discriminating against Jews. Photo by JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images The complaint claimed school districts are contracting with outside groups like the Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC) and allowing them to 'indoctrinate' students with their own DEI-based, antisemitic agendas. 'We have evidence that California school districts in San Francisco, Oakland, and Berkeley have allowed AROC to come onto school grounds and gain access to schoolchildren, whom they engage outside of class, and ply with propaganda and hateful messages about Jews and Israel,' the letter said. Brandeis Center lawyers told McMahon, 'Anti-Semitic indoctrination is an increasingly pervasive and dangerous part of DEI programming that is being taught in K-12 schools across America. The anti-Semitic propaganda brought into schools by teachers, unions, and third-party contractors …. indoctrinate students with messages of anti-Jewish and anti-American hate and fosters a hostile environment for Jewish students in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. 'Any plan for eliminating federal funding pursuant under Trump's executive order should include provisions target educators who condone or enable anti-Semitic curricula, instruction, programs, or activities disguised as 'DEI,' the group said. 3 The group is asking the Trump administration to halt federal funding to schools found to have been promoting antisemitism. AFP via Getty Images The group asked McMahon to: Investigate and when substantiated, halt federal funding for school districts that refuse to address or 'intentionally perpetrate' acts that are 'harming Jewish and other children in their care.' Review anti-Semitic DEI materials promoted by teachers and their unions, third party contractors and so-called 'liberated' ethnic studies curricula that are being installed in high schools. 'We at the Brandeis Center have seen DEI used as a tool by teachers, teachers' unions, and third-party contractors to foment Jew-hatred in K-12 schools,' Rachel Lerman and Denise Katz-Prober of the Brandeis Center said in the letter. 'Jewish parents and children have suffered—and are suffering—directly from DEI-based lessons that teach students, inter alia, to regard Jews as evil `oppressors' who should be marginalized, outcast, and justifiably subject to discrimination, harassment or worse.' The DEI narrative categorizes Jews and Jewish children as 'oppressors' who are 'white' and 'privileged' — regardless of skin color or family history, the center said. Many DEI-proponents also praise and justify the October 7, 2023 Hamas terrorist attacks against Israel as legitimate 'resistance' and 'falsely teaching children that the State of Israel is a 'settler colonial' and 'apartheid'' regime that has no right to exist. The US Education Department had no immediate comment. McMahon's agency did not open a civil rights probe into the Chicago Public School System for launching a remedial program that only aided black students and not other students who are struggling academically.
Boston Globe
21-03-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Columbia University grants President Trump's demands
Columbia also expelled students last week who had been involved with a building takeover during the protest movement, meeting another of the administration's demands. In the Friday announcement, the school said it has hired 36 'special officers' who will have the power to remove people from campus and make arrests. Advertisement Although the announcement never mentions Trump or last week's letter, the four-page document closely tracks the Trump administration's demands, responding to them point-by-point with only minor departures. The demands and Columbia's capitulation mark an extraordinary intervention by the federal government in a private university's affairs, which may presage how the Trump administration pursue its wider crackdown on elite universities. Some academics and higher education leaders have seen the Trump-Columbia confrontation as a test case, giving an early indication of how other university leaders may weigh values, such as independence and academic freedom, against the threat of devastating financial cuts threatened by the Trump administration. Trump and his allies are seeking to reshape American universities, purging them of diversity programs and rooting out what they regard as leftist ideology that radicalizes students and undermines the academic mission. Supporters see the administration's funding cuts, DEI bans, and focus on antisemitism as an overdue corrective. Advertisement 'This is a smart, bold, forceful set of demands,' said Kenneth Marcus, a former Department of Education official in the first Trump administration who is now founder and chairman of the Brandeis Center, a Jewish advocacy group. Contrary to the department's usual bureaucratic approach to civil rights violations, he said, the Trump administration's methods have 'real teeth.' But many academics, advocates, and higher education leaders — including those concerned about campus antisemitism or who are politically moderate or libertarian — see Trump's moves as abuses of federal power meant to punish institutions he views as hostile to his worldview. 'The major motivation for these measures I think is just raw punitive retribution,' said Steven Pinker, a Harvard psychology professor. 'It's not that there aren't problems with universities, including protecting Jewish students against intimidation and harassment, which is a legitimate goal. But it's completely irrational to pursue that goal by withholding funding from biomedical research.' Days after the Trump administration announced the $400 million of funding cuts on March 7, Columbia scientists began receiving notice from the National Institutes of Health of specific grants that were terminated, said Jacqueline Gottlieb, a professor of neuroscience at Columbia University Medical School. She lost funding for a PhD candidate who works in her lab. She has pulled funding from another grant so the student will be able to finish her degree, Gottlieb said. 'But that's not free. That's a cut' to her lab's overall funding, she said. James Applegate, a Columbia professor of astronomy, said the Trump administration's punishments are disconnected from the protest movement or the university's handling of antisemitism. 'All of a sudden people who have been spending their lives and careers doing cutting-edge biomedical research discovered their grants had been suspended or canceled because of know nothing about, had nothing to do with, and don't sympathize with,' he said. Advertisement Columbia was an epicenter of the nationwide student protest movement last year over the Israel-Hamas war. Many protests were peaceful. Others involved vandalism and forceful entry into campus buildings resulting in injuries to Columbia workers. Protesters who set up an encampment on Columbia's quad said After the encampment, Columbia revamped some of its disciplinary policies and suspended or expelled some students. Pro-Palestinian activists and their faculty allies said the university was repressing political expression, undermining the university's long tradition of student activism, and targeting pro-Palestinian speech as a matter of political expedience. Other professors, as well as Jewish students and advocates, said the university's leaders had allowed to protests to spiral out of control by failing to enforce existing rules. The school's president, Minouche Shafik, resigned in August. A Jewish and Israeli students 'were on the receiving end of ethnic slurs, stereotypes about supposedly dangerous Israeli [military] veterans, antisemitic tropes about Jewish wealth and hidden power, threats and physical assaults, exclusion of Zionists from student groups, and inconsistent standards,' the report said. Mike Damiano can be reached at
Yahoo
03-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
California school district agrees to remove alleged antisemitic content from ethnic studies curriculum
A California school that attempted to cover up its alleged antisemitic ethnic studies program is no longer permitted to teach the curriculum, according to a settlement reached between the school district and Jewish advocacy groups. The Santa Ana Unified School District (SAUSD) agreed to settle the lawsuit brought by the Brandeis Center, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the American Jewish Committee (AJC), who alleged that the district's Ethnic Studies courses were developed in secret and infused with antisemitism. As part of the settlement, SAUSD will cease instruction of Ethnic Studies World Geography, Ethnic Studies World Histories and Ethnic Studies: Perspectives, Identities, and Social Justice until the courses are reworked in line with public input and in accordance with California's open meeting laws. Marci Miller, director of legal investigations of the Brandeis Center, which is both a plaintiff and counsel in the case, oversaw the lawsuit and negotiated the settlement. She told Fox News Digital that she believes the effects of the settlement send a strong message to school districts throughout the state and country that they can't use ethnic studies to inject antisemitism into the classroom. Los Angeles High School Freshmen Will Be Required To Take Ethnic Studies Class In Order To Graduate "Hopefully this will be a cautionary tale for other school districts that are considering this type of wrongful behavior. We're watching, and we're willing to enforce the law," she said. "Curriculum can't be created in secret. It needs to be available to the public and to parents to avoid this in the future." Read On The Fox News App When reached for comment, SAUSD said it was pleased that it had reached an amicable resolution of the lawsuit filed by the Brandeis Center, but added there were some "misperceptions" that led to the filing of the lawsuit that have now been cleared up, according to a statement attributed to Superintendent Jerry Almendarez. "At no time has the District supported the teaching of instructional content to students that reflects adversely on any group on the basis of religion, race, ethnicity, or national origin as alleged in the lawsuit," he said. "The settlement of this lawsuit affirms that principle and resolves any misunderstanding that may have occurred." As part of the settlement agreement, the school district said there is no finding that it violated the Brown Act, California's open meeting law, as alleged in the lawsuit. The district also said "the work of the ethnic studies committee is preserved and may continue with an opportunity for members of the public to provide input as the courses will be reviewed and possibly modified." But, James Pasch, ADL vice president of national litigation, said Santa Ana's past board and committee members knew that antisemitism was infecting their curriculum process and intentionally excluded the public. "Open meeting laws exist to prevent exactly what unfolded in Santa Ana," he said. "This case sends a message – not just in Santa Ana, but from coast-to-coast – that if school leaders proceed with implementing anti-Semitic curriculum and material in violation of the law, we will use the courts to protect the community." Ethnic Studies School Administrator Argued Some Jewish Americans Have 'Control Of Systemic Power' SAUSD also agreed to recognize the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a controversial issue and to strictly adhere to the two policies that apply when teaching under this banner. As a result, instruction should be based on facts that allow for alternative views, ensure teachers discuss all sides of a controversial issue and that they are impartially presented, that students are taught to separate opinion from fact and that no teacher or speaker uses the classroom or materials to advocate their own religious, political, economic or social views. Additionally, the controversial Steering Committee will be permanently disbanded, the district will stop working with the outside consultant who expressed antisemitic views and SAUSD will allow input from members of the public before any new courses are presented to the school board for approval, according to the Brandeis Center. The antisemitic content will be removed from Ethnic Studies World Histories so that the course can continue being taught for the remainder of the school year. The lawsuit, originally filed in September 2023, was brought against SAUSD on behalf of The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, which works to advance the civil and human rights of the Jewish people, and its membership arm, Southern Californians for Unbiased Education (So-CUE). The ADL, along with the Brandeis Center, the AJC and the Covington & Burling law firm, filed a motion with new evidence in August 2024 alleging the school district prevented the public, in particular the Jewish community, from providing public comment to prevent antisemitic and biased content in its ethnic studies curricula. Under the Brown Act, California's open meeting law and AB 101, which was passed in 2021 and made ethnic studies a requirement for graduation from all public high schools in California, school boards must make the public aware of the course's proposed curricula and allow for public comment before approving any new content. School districts are also required to create courses free from bias, bigotry and discrimination. California Organizers Defend Pro-palestinian 'Teach-in' Against Criticism It's Anti-israel Propaganda' The Jewish organizations uncovered antisemitic statements by the school board and the SAUSD Ethnic Studies Steering Committee, which was in charge of developing the curriculum, through depositions, affidavits, documents, text messages and emails. Examples uncovered in the discovery period of the lawsuit show that members of SAUSD's Ethnic Studies Steering Committee noted in an official agenda that it needed to "address the Jewish question" when they learned about antisemitism concerns from the Jewish community. Members of the Steering Committee also reportedly said, "Jews are the oppressors" and do not belong in ethnic studies, referred to Jewish organizations as "racist" and urged that SAUSD not "cave" to their concerns. The committee also reportedly floated the idea of using Jewish holidays to approve courses to reduce the likelihood that Jews would attend school board meetings. According to the motion, one committee leader allegedly referred to the sole Jewish member as a "colonized Jewish mind" and a "f---ing baby" for expressing concerns over antisemitism, while another leader referred to the Jewish Federation of Orange County as "racist Zionists" and suggested that SAUSD should not "cave" to their representatives. That same representative reportedly refused to call Hamas a terrorist organization even after the October 7 terrorist attack at the hands of Hamas, arguing that it would be "dehumaniz[ing]" to call Hamas members "terrorists." That same committee also hired an external consultant whose social media musings equated Israel with "settler colonialism" and actively promoted anti-Israel bias and antisemitism, according to the motion. "Israel is nothing more than European settler colonialism draped in religion defended by white guilt and capitalism," the consultant espoused on social media. AJC Chief Legal Officer Marc Stern said the lawsuit and settlement should serve as a warning to other California districts that try to conceal anti-Zionist or antisemitic ethnic studies materials. "Ethnic studies are acceptable only if adopted in the light of day and, if, in the end, all sides of a controversial issue are taught by educators free of judgment," he said. "Classrooms must be places for education, not indoctrination." Miller explained that every state has an open meetings act similar to the Brown Act. The settlement "shows that in order to comply with the law, everything has to be made available to the public and that should hopefully shine some light on the process and help districts avoid this in the future," she said. Brandeis Center Vice Chair L. Rachel Lerman said similar "dangerous and deceitful behavior" is being attempted in other school districts. "We are watching those jurisdictions and will not hesitate to address similar violations of the law," she said. "School boards must operate in the light of day, and not 'under the radar' as SAUSD described its own conduct."Original article source: California school district agrees to remove alleged antisemitic content from ethnic studies curriculum
Fox News
03-03-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
California school district agrees to remove alleged antisemitic content from ethnic studies curriculum
A California school that attempted to cover up its alleged antisemitic ethnic studies program is no longer permitted to teach the curriculum, according to a settlement reached between the school district and Jewish advocacy groups. The Santa Ana Unified School District (SAUSD) agreed to settle the lawsuit brought by the Brandeis Center, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the American Jewish Committee (AJC), who alleged that the district's Ethnic Studies courses were developed in secret and infused with antisemitism. As part of the settlement, SAUSD will cease instruction of Ethnic Studies World Geography, Ethnic Studies World Histories and Ethnic Studies: Perspectives, Identities, and Social Justice until the courses are reworked in line with public input and in accordance with California's open meeting laws. Marci Miller, director of legal investigations of the Brandeis Center, which is both a plaintiff and counsel in the case, oversaw the lawsuit and negotiated the settlement. She told Fox News Digital that she believes the effects of the settlement send a strong message to school districts throughout the state and country that they can't use ethnic studies to inject antisemitism into the classroom. "Hopefully this will be a cautionary tale for other school districts that are considering this type of wrongful behavior. We're watching, and we're willing to enforce the law," she said. "Curriculum can't be created in secret. It needs to be available to the public and to parents to avoid this in the future." When reached for comment, SAUSD said it was pleased that it had reached an amicable resolution of the lawsuit filed by the Brandeis Center, but added there were some "misperceptions" that led to the filing of the lawsuit that have now been cleared up, according to a statement attributed to Superintendent Jerry Almendarez. "At no time has the District supported the teaching of instructional content to students that reflects adversely on any group on the basis of religion, race, ethnicity, or national origin as alleged in the lawsuit," he said. "The settlement of this lawsuit affirms that principle and resolves any misunderstanding that may have occurred." As part of the settlement agreement, the school district said there is no finding that it violated the Brown Act, California's open meeting law, as alleged in the lawsuit. The district also said "the work of the ethnic studies committee is preserved and may continue with an opportunity for members of the public to provide input as the courses will be reviewed and possibly modified." But, James Pasch, ADL vice president of national litigation, said Santa Ana's past board and committee members knew that antisemitism was infecting their curriculum process and intentionally excluded the public. "Open meeting laws exist to prevent exactly what unfolded in Santa Ana," he said. "This case sends a message – not just in Santa Ana, but from coast-to-coast – that if school leaders proceed with implementing anti-Semitic curriculum and material in violation of the law, we will use the courts to protect the community." SAUSD also agreed to recognize the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a controversial issue and to strictly adhere to the two policies that apply when teaching under this banner. As a result, instruction should be based on facts that allow for alternative views, ensure teachers discuss all sides of a controversial issue and that they are impartially presented, that students are taught to separate opinion from fact and that no teacher or speaker uses the classroom or materials to advocate their own religious, political, economic or social views. Additionally, the controversial Steering Committee will be permanently disbanded, the district will stop working with the outside consultant who expressed antisemitic views and SAUSD will allow input from members of the public before any new courses are presented to the school board for approval, according to the Brandeis Center. The antisemitic content will be removed from Ethnic Studies World Histories so that the course can continue being taught for the remainder of the school year. The lawsuit, originally filed in September 2023, was brought against SAUSD on behalf of The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, which works to advance the civil and human rights of the Jewish people, and its membership arm, Southern Californians for Unbiased Education (So-CUE). The ADL, along with the Brandeis Center, the AJC and the Covington & Burling law firm, filed a motion with new evidence in August 2024 alleging the school district prevented the public, in particular the Jewish community, from providing public comment to prevent antisemitic and biased content in its ethnic studies curricula. Under the Brown Act, California's open meeting law and AB 101, which was passed in 2021 and made ethnic studies a requirement for graduation from all public high schools in California, school boards must make the public aware of the course's proposed curricula and allow for public comment before approving any new content. School districts are also required to create courses free from bias, bigotry and discrimination. The Jewish organizations uncovered antisemitic statements by the school board and the SAUSD Ethnic Studies Steering Committee, which was in charge of developing the curriculum, through depositions, affidavits, documents, text messages and emails. Examples uncovered in the discovery period of the lawsuit show that members of SAUSD's Ethnic Studies Steering Committee noted in an official agenda that it needed to "address the Jewish question" when they learned about antisemitism concerns from the Jewish community. Members of the Steering Committee also reportedly said, "Jews are the oppressors" and do not belong in ethnic studies, referred to Jewish organizations as "racist" and urged that SAUSD not "cave" to their concerns. The committee also reportedly floated the idea of using Jewish holidays to approve courses to reduce the likelihood that Jews would attend school board meetings. According to the motion, one committee leader allegedly referred to the sole Jewish member as a "colonized Jewish mind" and a "f---ing baby" for expressing concerns over antisemitism, while another leader referred to the Jewish Federation of Orange County as "racist Zionists" and suggested that SAUSD should not "cave" to their representatives. That same representative reportedly refused to call Hamas a terrorist organization even after the October 7 terrorist attack at the hands of Hamas, arguing that it would be "dehumaniz[ing]" to call Hamas members "terrorists." That same committee also hired an external consultant whose social media musings equated Israel with "settler colonialism" and actively promoted anti-Israel bias and antisemitism, according to the motion. "Israel is nothing more than European settler colonialism draped in religion defended by white guilt and capitalism," the consultant espoused on social media. AJC Chief Legal Officer Marc Stern said the lawsuit and settlement should serve as a warning to other California districts that try to conceal anti-Zionist or antisemitic ethnic studies materials. "Ethnic studies are acceptable only if adopted in the light of day and, if, in the end, all sides of a controversial issue are taught by educators free of judgment," he said. "Classrooms must be places for education, not indoctrination." Miller explained that every state has an open meetings act similar to the Brown Act. The settlement "shows that in order to comply with the law, everything has to be made available to the public and that should hopefully shine some light on the process and help districts avoid this in the future," she said. Brandeis Center Vice Chair L. Rachel Lerman said similar "dangerous and deceitful behavior" is being attempted in other school districts. "We are watching those jurisdictions and will not hesitate to address similar violations of the law," she said. "School boards must operate in the light of day, and not 'under the radar' as SAUSD described its own conduct."
