Washington Square News

01/24/2025

Members of the NYU People’s Solidarity Coalition delivered a petition to a representative for President Linda Mills in Bobst Library on Thursday afternoon. The petition, signed by 3,700 students, faculty and community members, called on the university to remove year-long suspensions for students who participated in a pro-Palestinian demonstration in the library last semester.

The 2 p.m. delivery, carried out by eight members of Faculty & Staff for Justice in Palestine, referenced a petition from earlier this month demanding that NYU disclose its investments in companies with ties to Israel, shut down its site in Tel Aviv and remove the New York City Police Department from campus. The physical folder that was handed over, however, only included blank sheets of paper.

“We aimed to communicate to the president that she has created a climate of fear within the university, which is reflected in the anxiety of students who don’t want their names to be used,” CAS professor Andrew Ross said in an interview with WSN. “They don’t trust their own administration.”

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01/23/2025

NYU has suspended at least 13 students since a group of protesters held a pro-Palestinian sit-in during finals week last semester, and has placed at least 20 others on probation for at least a year, multiple students told WSN.

The Office of Student Conduct notified most students of their sanctions — a year-long suspension from the university for the spring, summer and fall 2025 semesters — on Jan. 7. At the December demonstration, a group of students and faculty occupied Bobst Library’s 12th floor with dozens more organizing a sit-in in the building’s lobby. The protesters demanded that the university disclose its investments and withdraw from companies with ties to Israel amid its siege in Gaza.

In emails obtained by WSN, the OSC accused the students of “engaging in behavior that substantially disrupts” university operations, “failure to comply promptly” with the instruction of a university employee and “engaging in behavior as prohibited under other established NYU policies.” Each student received the same list of policy violations, regardless of their involvement in the demonstration.

LS sophomore Hafiza Khalique, one of the sanctioned students, said they were not on the library’s 12th floor and spent most of the demonstration studying in the lobby. Khalique, who was previously suspended for taking down hostage posters outside the Stern School of Business in the fall 2023 semester, learned about their suspension on Jan. 17. They said that receiving the notice just a week before the start of the spring semester was “incredibly destabilizing.”

“This was the reason why I was unhoused last year — because NYU kicked me out of the dorms after I was suspended, and I had to find a way to secure housing,” Khalique said. “As a first-gen scholarship student, it was not possible for my family at all to contribute, and I had a hard time with moving around and finding housing stability and financial stability.”

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01/23/2025

As you bundle up and head to your first classes of the semester, catch up on news around campus that you might have missed over break. Aside from experiencing New York City’s chilliest week on record since February 2023, NYU has also seen thousands sign letters criticizing the administration for its handling of on-campus protests and created an AI model to answer housing-related legal inquiries.

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01/22/2025

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12/13/2024

An NYU spokesperson said administrators “never offered” to disclose the university’s investments, countering recent claims from pro-Palestinian groups on campus who have revived calls for disclosure.

The statement comes one day after 13 students and faculty occupied the 12th floor of Bobst Library, outside the offices of President Linda Mills and Provost Georgina Dopico, while dozens more held a sit-in in the library’s main lobby. During the demonstration, organizers from Shut it Down NYU posted an audio recording they claimed to be from a negotiations meeting with administrators last semester, during which Executive Vice President Martin Dorph allegedly agreed to release details on NYU’s endowment and its investments. In a press release, the group said the university had since retracted the initial offer.

“Those claims are false,” university spokesperson John Beckman said in a statement to WSN. “It is the height of bad faith to attempt now — in the midst of ongoing violations of university rules — to use a surreptitious recording to try to secure a meeting, all while deceptively failing to acknowledge their own role in scuttling those earlier discussions.”

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12/12/2024

Police officers arrested two faculty members after about a dozen pro-Palestinian protesters blocked the main entrance to Bobst Library earlier this morning. 
 
At around 12:18 p.m., the New York City Police Department said through a speaker that the protesters are “now subject to arrest” after repeatedly telling them to evacuate the area or else they would “be charged with trespassing.” The police started arresting protesters at around 12:30 p.m. 
 
Paula Chakravartty, a Steinhardt professor and member of Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine, told WSN that the police arrested two faculty members and other community members, including alumni. 
 
The demonstration comes a day after a group of students and faculty occupied Bobst’s top floor, demanding that NYU leadership disclose its investments in companies with ties to Israel. At 12:30 p.m., Campus Safety head Fountain Walker sent a universitywide email stating that “targeted threatening graffiti in the library” incited an investigation by law enforcement, and urged students to come forward with any information regarding those involved.
 
Protesters, which included students, faculty and alumni, have been zip-tied and placed into an NYPD van since the police threatened students to evacuate as of 12:30 p.m. Around five police vans were stationed outside the law school courtyard, and are currently making their way in front of the library. A drone was also seen flying above the library.

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12/12/2024

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12/12/2024

A group of 13 students and faculty sat outside administrators’ offices on Bobst Library’s top floor and dozens more held a pro-Palestinian sit-in in its main lobby at 3 p.m. Wednesday, demanding that the university revisit a spring agreement to disclose its investments in companies with ties to Israel.

The group, members of Shut it Down NYU, claimed in a press release that university leadership agreed to disclose its endowments and investments last semester during negotiations with student and faculty protesters at the Gaza Solidarity Encampment outside the Paulson Center. When the group posted an audio recording of the alleged agreement on Instagram at 4:45 p.m., students stationed on the library’s mezzanine, second and seventh floors dropped a procession of banners reading “TO BE SEEN, TO BE HEARD, TO BE FREE. SHUT IT DOWN,” “WE DEMAND 1. DISCLOSE 2. DIVEST 3. SHUT DOWN NYU TEL AVIV” and “NYU OUT OF PALESTINE.”

An NYU spokesperson did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

In the press release, Shut it Down NYU said that key administrators — Provost Georgina Dopico, Dean of Students Rafael Rodriguez and Counselor to the President Kristie Patten — had aimed to cease on-campus protests by negotiating with students. The students said that when they refused to abandon the Paulson Center encampment, administrators called off the disclosure meeting — which had been scheduled for the following week — and did not raise the offer again.

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12/10/2024

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.

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12/09/2024

12/09/2024

Strand Bookstore workers went on strike Saturday, with dozens of union members picketing all day outside the East Village location to demand higher wages and equitable paid time off for all employees.

Demonstrators circled in front of the bookstore, chanting and heckling passersby who cut through the picket to enter the store. Members of the union representing Strand Bookstore employees, UAW Local 2179, told WSN that the strike and picket began in the wake of the union’s contract expiring on Nov. 28 and is set to continue until a new agreement is reached.

Andrew Stando, an organizer for the union’s bargaining committee, said that there is no scheduled date for the group to bargain a new contract with the company and that he expects the strike — the bookstore’s first in three decades — to continue for at least one week.

“The worst part about Strand is that I like it,” Stando, who has worked at the bookstore for over a year, said in an interview with WSN. “On the whole, conditions are not too bad, but the problem is I want to stay here for a long time — which is why I want to be paid enough to make that a viable option.”

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12/06/2024

New York City has an incredibly rich sports history with iconic teams ranging from hockey to baseball. However, despite the number of colleges in the city, collegiate athletics are not often included in its history. Within Division III sports, NYU Athletics has made a name for itself while cultivating an environment where student-athletes can thrive and play with passion and enjoyment. In WSN’s latest issue of the Under the Arch magazine our team of editors and designers sought to give an inside look into our university’s world of varsity sports. Coaches and athletes alike tell the story of their teams’ past seasons, shedding light on the ins and outs of the life of student-athletes at NYU.

WSN’s Under the Arch magazines will be available for pick up at newsstands around campus, including Bobst Library, the Kimmel Center for University Life and select residence halls!

Click the link in our bio to read this semester’s fourth issue of Under the Arch Magazine.

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12/06/2024

While NYU Langone Health’s hospital system consistently yields some of the nation’s highest profits, medical accounting experts have noted that it allocates a smaller percentage of its expenses on charity care than other nonprofit hospitals. A spokesperson for the medical center said the analysis was based on unrepresentative data.

NYU Langone made $14.2 billion in operating revenue in the 2024 fiscal year, with a 3% operating margin. The health center spent about $108 million on charity care, defined as unreimbursed free or discounted treatment for patients unable to pay for services. The hospital’s charity care expenses comprised 1.2% of its total expenses — while the nationwide average was 2.6% in 2020, according to the healthcare research nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation.

Steve Ritea, a spokesperson for NYU Langone, told WSN that the 2.6% average in 2020 reported by KFF was “a complete anomaly” because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and that Langone did not include pandemic-related expenses in its charity care numbers that year. KFF’s 2020 report, however, said that the 2.6% was consistent with previous years — with 2019’s average at 2.7%.

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12/05/2024

An administrator at the School of Law threatened a group of students with disciplinary action for hosting a pro-Palestinian study-in at the law school library, the NYU Law Students for Justice in Palestine claimed in a Wednesday Instagram post.

At the silent demonstration, which LSJP said took place Monday, law students displayed signs on the backs of their laptops reading “NYU FUNDS GENOCIDE,” “NYU: DIVEST FROM DEATH” and “FREE PALESTINE.” In the post, the student group said an NYU Law administrator “disrupted each student’s peaceful study” with threats of disciplinary action for presenting signs with pro-Palestinian sentiments.

“NYU Law continues to prove that its commitment to ‘global justice’ is a farce by silencing pro-Palestinian speech and continuing to fund Israel’s genocide,” the Instagram post reads. “We, as students, refuse to be complicit!”

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11/25/2024

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