The Middle States Commission on Higher Education formally closed an accreditation complaint against NYU on Thursday, concluding that the university does not need to undergo investigations into its free speech policies. The complaint, submitted by the free speech watchdog organization Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, cited sanctions, suspensions and arrests of students and faculty at pro-Palestinian demonstrations last semester.
The September complaint was written by Graham Piro, a faculty legal defense fund fellow at FIRE, and addressed to MSCHE — the accreditation agency that oversees NYU. Piro claimed the university violated MSCHE’s requirement that member institutions maintain “a commitment to academic freedom, intellectual freedom, freedom of expression and respect for individual property rights.” Piro said MSCHE responded to the complaint on Thursday, affirming it had reviewed the case but would not pursue formal action.
Piro said that while his team was disappointed by the commission’s decision, FIRE will continue to publicly pressure NYU to codify academic freedom and free expression. He said because private institutions are not bound by the First Amendment, it can be more challenging to form a legal argument against them — making university accreditors one of few ways advocates can tangibly threaten to cut resources.
“These accreditors with private institutions are oftentimes the last lines of defense for students and faculty, and they should take their accreditation standard seriously,” Piro said in an interview with WSN. “When an institution is violating a standard, the accreditors should take that into account and hold their institutions responsible for those violations.”
In order to receive any federal funding, all universities’ ethics, policies and practices must be approved by an accreditation agency. Per MSCHE’s accreditation guidelines, member institutions like NYU must submit periodic self-study evaluations, generally every eight years, with NYU’s most recent evaluation taking place this past summer. Upon receiving complaints about specific institutions, agencies evaluate whether to revisit the accreditation process.
In its complaint, FIRE claimed NYU violated academic freedom and free speech on campus by sanctioning and suspending dozens of students and faculty for participation in pro-Palestinian demonstrations, restricting on-campus events related to Palestine and deploying police to arrest more than 60 students and faculty at pro-Palestinian encampments last spring. In a statement to WSN, NYU spokesperson John Beckman said university administrators “strongly disagree” with FIRE’s complaint.
David Bloomfield, an education law professor at Brooklyn College and the City University of New York Graduate Center, said that although FIRE’s complaint would have struggled to gain traction from MSCHE, it still draws attention to NYU’s handling of free speech on campus .
“FIRE’s strategy is to needle NYU and to hope for better policies in the future,” Bloomfield told WSN. “I would call it a low profile strategy, but advocacy groups use whatever tools they have to do to force change, and this is a clever move by FIRE.”
Piro also cited NYU’s free speech rankings — an analysis conducted by FIRE in September where NYU ranked third to last — and the organization’s initial request for NYU to address concerns over free speech. He said he and his team filed the accreditor complaint after not hearing back from the university after giving it a two-week deadline.
In a February letter to NYU President Linda Mills, FIRE criticized NYU for the suspension of Gallatin professor Amin Husain, referencing a university policy that protects faculty from repercussions when they “speak or write as citizens.” The free speech group demanded that the university rehire Husain after a video of him calling Hamas militants “rapists” and “people that behead babies” at a December teach-in at The New School circulated online.
“When an administration repeatedly signals to its student body, to its faculty, that it will not take seriously its promises of free expression or academic freedom, that can create a chilling environment on campus for expression,” Piro said.
Contact Mariapaula Gonzalez at mgonzalez@nyunews.com.
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