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The Syracuse University Senate focused its second meeting of the semester on the Israel-Hamas war Wednesday, discussing how to further address the issue.

Chancellor Kent Syverud and Vice Chancellor Gretchen Ritter addressed the conflict at the opening of the meeting, saying it has been a challenging two weeks and thanking the university community for its support.

Both Syverud and Ritter acknowledged that SU students come from different ethnicities and opinions across campus will vary. Syverud said that although everyone on campus is entitled to their own separate opinion, it is important to make the campus an inclusive place.

“I continue to ask to call on all of us in our communities to show kindness and grace and empathy and compassion to all our students, faculty and staff, particularly those who are suffering and grieving and to do this regardless of your individual views and perspectives,” Syverud said.

On Friday, SU leadership announced the university was looking into “a small number of classroom interactions” where students felt unfairly targeted related to the conflict. University leadership also confirmed that the Department of Public Safety is partnering with local and federal law enforcement to conduct “security assessments.”

Syverud noted that many people across the country have shown dissatisfaction with how universities have handled the heightened tensions amidst the conflict. For this reason, he said, SU is addressing the situation with caution so that nobody feels misrepresented and that SU wants to listen to everybody’s concerns.

Some University Senators at the meeting, however, expressed dissatisfaction with the university’s approach to the situation. University Senator Amy Kallander, a professor in the history department who specializes in Middle Eastern studies, said that as a Jewish American, she felt that the Chancellor and Vice Chancellor were “ignoring the suffering” of Palestinian victims.

“I urge students to consider cause and effect to situate events in their proper context,” Kallander said. “And I would expect that the university administration would do the same in our efforts to understand what is going on.”

Kallander also said that SU is failing to critique the Israeli occupation and the Israeli government’s actions.

“My question for you is how many Palestinians can the Israeli military massacre before you will acknowledge Israeli responsibility in the depths of what is now over 6.5 thousand Palestinians?” Kallander said.

In response, Syverud said he is still trying to learn as much as he can from students, faculty and staff about how to go forward and that he wants to take time to formulate the right response.

“I value human life, including the human life of Palestinians, of all religions and non-religions in Gaza, including human life in Israel and in the West Bank … The challenge for me as a university leader is how much to say and when to say it,” Syverud said. “I appreciate the guidance from this group and helping me out at knowing that no matter what I say, it may not be … there may not be words that will comfort all or be enough for all.”

Other University Senators brought up concerns surrounding nonconsensual videos being taken in their classrooms when discussing the Israel-Hamas war. Senator Biko Mandela Gray, an assistant professor in the department of religion, said there is a video of him circulating online that was taken by one of his students in class while he was discussing the conflict.

Gray said it made him uncomfortable to be filmed without knowing and said that even though all faculty have the right to exercise their opinion, he feels “terrified” of being reported for violating the university’s commitment to safe classroom environments.

“We are also conceding that classrooms are no longer spaces for what you all call the equitable or free exchange of ideas, they cannot be,” Gray said.

University Senator Suzette Meléndez — faculty fellow for the Office of Strategic Initiatives in Academic Affairs and the Office of Diversity and Inclusion and teaching professor in the College of Law — said the recent conflicts not only affect students, but also faculty and staff, which the university should acknowledge. As chair of the University Senate’s Committee of Race, Ethnicity, Equity and Inclusion, Meléndez said she is trying to advocate for everyone who is affected by the recent conflicts.

University Senator Himika Bhattacharya, associate professor and department chair of women’s and gender studies, asked Syverud what exactly SU will do to protect students and staff who are impacted by the conflict.

Syrverud said it is SU’s responsibility to respond to these situations in a way that protects students and faculty, particularly to protect the academic freedom of the faculty.

“Our obligation is to stand up for our faculty’s opportunity to express their views appropriately given their obligations to students and other contexts, but also, to make clear not that we disagree, but that we’re a university where a range of views have to be expressed,” Syverud said.

SU is also working on negotiating contract bargaining with Syracuse Graduate Employees United. As SGEU collects feedback from graduate student workers, the union has been working on formulating a contract with SU that addresses their concerns regarding unfair treatment in terms of wages, stipends, hours and workplace harassment. This contract is used to negotiate with SU to come to a fair consensus, Ritter said.

The SGEU bargaining committee has met with the SU bargaining committee six times so far, Ritter said. She said they will continue working toward a “fair and strong” contract and that they have already reached tentative agreements.

“We recognize that such contracts can sometimes be months in the making, and we have much work yet to do,” Ritter said. “Nonetheless, we remain confident that the process will continue to be constructive, and that the ultimate outcome will be positive.”

Ritter also said SU is starting its search for a new dean of the College of Law and hopes to announce a finalist by the end of this academic year. The search for a new director for the Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence is already underway, and SU and the search committee are aiming to announce a finalist by the end of December, she said.

The University Senate itself is working on reconstructing its committees. The Bylaws Ad Hoc Committee is leading this task, which Senator Harriet Brown, the committee’s chair, said has been a work in progress for years. The ultimate goal is to cut the number of committees from 17 to seven, which she said will create a more equitable workload among the committees.

“We feel that consolidated committees with broad interests and flexible internal structures will be more nimble and able to respond to emerging issues,” Brown said.

The next University Senate meeting will be held Nov. 15.

Published on October 26, 2023 at 12:48 am

Contact Roxanne: rmboychu@syr.edu