New report from MESA and AAUP: “Discriminating Against Dissent: The Weaponization of Civil Rights Law to Repress Campus Speech on Palestine,” which is the first systematic empirical study of government investigations and private lawsuits against US colleges and universities alleging antisemitism under Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
MESA's Task Force has created a new advocacy resource center for our members to consult in response to the repression of rights on campuses across North America and beyond.
Our letter expressing concern about the capricious and hasty suspension of Assistant Professor Tamar Shirinian of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and your decision to terminate her for remarks she made on social media regarding Charlie Kirk
Our letter expressing concern about the decision to prevent students from enrolling in classes unless they complete the deeply flawed online anti-bias training that Northwestern University has mandated for all undergraduate and graduate students
The Committee on Academic Freedom received a response from the Vice President for university relations at the University of Kentucky in response to our letter regarding Professor Ramsi Woodcock
Our letter expressing concern about the University of Kentucky’s summary suspension of Ramsi Woodcock, Wyatt, Tarrant & Combs Professor of Law, pending an investigation of statements he has made regarding Palestine
The Committee on Academic Freedom received a response from the Dean of the Claremont Colleges Library in response to our letter regarding Bilal Nasir of Pomona College
Our letter expressing concern about the University of California, Berkeley’s decision to give the federal government the names of 160 individuals associated with allegations of antisemitism on campus without informing them of the nature of those allegations and in violation of university policies and procedures
Our letter expressing concern about the demand by the Claremont Colleges Library that Professor Bilal Nasir of Pomona College change the title and abstract of a lecture he had been invited to present in the library’s “Claremont Discourse” series.
MESA welcomes a court decision striking down the Trump administration’s freezing of over $2 billion in federal grants to Harvard University.
Our letter expressing concern at the decision of Occidental College to subject three students to investigation and disciplinary action for seeking to exercise their constitutionally protected right to protest
Letter to the City University of New York protesting the non-reappointment of four adjunct faculty members and the suspension of a student.
Our letter expressing grave concern at the decision of the Harvard Educational Publishing Group (HEPG), which publishes the Harvard Educational Review (HER), to cancel a planned special issue on the topic of education and Palestine.
Our letter expressing concern regarding the new policy about boycotts of companies as a serious threat to academic freedom and to the free speech rights of University of California students, faculty and staff.
Our letter expressing concern about Georgetown University’s punitive actions and statements against Professor Jonathan A. C. Brown, the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Chair of Islamic Civilization in Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service
Our letter expressing concern at the decision of the San José State University (SJSU) administration to terminate the employment of Professor Sang Hea Kil, a tenured member of the Department of Justice Studies, due to alleged violations of university time, manner and place rules.
MESA has filed an amicus curiae brief in support of Harvard University in its federal lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s funding cuts.
Our letter expressing concern about the decision of the administration of the George Washington University to ban graduating senior Cecilia Culver from campus and threaten to investigate her for possible student conduct code violations.
Our letter expressing concern about the decision of NYU to withhold the diploma of graduating senior Logan Rozos and subject him to disciplinary action because of remarks he made about Israel’s war on Gaza during the recent graduation ceremony of the Gallatin School of Individualized Study
MESA has been building out the Academic Freedom Initiative (AFI), a project funded by the Mellon Foundation, to identify and track trends regarding academic freedom and repression on campuses across North America. Two initial datasets focus on recent immigration actions affecting higher education, and adverse employment outcomes for university employees since October 2023.
A federal judge has ruled that the case of AAUP v. Rubio can move forward. The lawsuit alleges that the administration’s ideological-deportation policy violates the First Amendment by targeting constitutionally protected speech that Americans have a right to hear and engage with.
Our letter condemning the last-minute cancellation of a keynote lecture that was to be given by Professor Eman Abdelhadi, purportedly on grounds of security.
Our letter expressing concern about the University of Colorado-Boulder’s apparent failure to meaningfully respond to a physical assault committed on campus against students advocating for Palestinian rights
Our letter expressing concern about the termination of Dr. Helyeh Doutaghi, deputy director of Yale University’s Law and Political Economy Project and associate research scholar at Yale Law School, in the wake of allegations made on an obscure website whose founders and contributors are anonymous
The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) today filed a motion for a preliminary injunction in their lawsuit seeking to block the Trump administration from carrying out large-scale arrests, detentions, and deportations of noncitizen students and faculty members who participate in pro-Palestinian protests and other protected First Amendment activities.