It's Time to Prioritize Student Safety on College Campuses

All students deserve to be safe on campus. The American Association of University Professors’ (AAUP) new position on academic boycotts puts our next generation’s security in jeopardy. 

Academic boycotts prevent the free exchange of ideas, undermining academic freedom and opportunities for faculty and students. They halt research, collaboration with other universities, and more of the necessary work that can change the world.

The old school AAUP of 2006 would agree. 

The Association was long opposed to these “tactical weapons in political struggles,” affirming this position after a call in Britain’s academic community to boycott Israel in 2005. In its 2006 stance, AAUP argued that “Colleges and universities should be what they purport to be: institutions committed to the search for truth and its free expression . . . . The need is always for more academic freedom, not less.”

Now the AAUP asserts the opposite. Now academic boycotts are “legitimate tactical responses.” 

So what has changed?

Leadership. 

Once again, the world’s eyes are on Israel and Palestine. Including the eyes of those leading this association. 

The new AAUP president Todd Wolfson, who proclaims from his ivory tower that J.D. Vance is a fascist, has spent his time protesting with pro-Palestine Rutgers students. These students wanted their university to divest from Israel—and failed. 

Wolfson wants to make his association a “fighting organization,” causing a dramatic shift from just a few years ago. So much so the former president of the group has started a petition against the new academic boycott stance. That letter has more than 3,500 signatures as of this writing. 

This new age “leadership” extends to Columbus. The Ohio State University chapter of the AAUP is run by Professor Pranav Jani. 

Professor Jani has a long history of supporting the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel, including in academia and at Ohio State. According to the Canary Mission, he has “expressed support for terrorists, promoted violent protestors, as well as anti-Israel agitators.” Jani has spent years at OSU promoting the BDS movement against Israel through lectures, events, and student groups. 

Professor Jani is also the academic advisor for Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP). SJP was founded by a former UC Berkeley professor who called for an intifada against the United States. SJP has hosted Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives, a veteran of the Marxist-Leninist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and attempted hijacker Leila Khaled, among other terrorists and their supporters. The organization has long called for the boycott, divestment, and sanction of Israel throughout the country. SJP has a strong presence throughout what it calls “Turtle Island” (North America for all us normal people), with 350 groups under its umbrella.

Notably, the OSU chapter of SJP that Jani advises took to Instagram on October 8, the day after the terror attack on Israel, to praise the “heroic” resistance “to Zionism and Western imperialism” and to promote their rally to “uplift and honor our resistance and our martyrs.”

Calling terrorism “heroic” is frightening. So much so some universities are kicking SJP off their quads. Columbia suspended the campus group and Brandeis University has banned the organization, citing its call for “the elimination of the only Jewish state in the world and its people.” 

It all adds up now, doesn’t it?

It should not shock anyone that the AAUP has switched its stance right before a new academic year. It’s their political agenda in the making with students coming back to campus.

Following October 7, protests occurred on campuses across America. Some were peaceful. Some were far from it. 

We all remember the stories of harassment, intimidation, and violence, especially against Jewish students—61% of whom reported anti-Semitism at campus protests. We all remember college graduation ceremonies being moved or disrupted and the chaos of protestors at Columbia taking over Hamilton Hall.

All this while anti-Semitic incidents on campuses are increasing in America. 

Now add the greenlight for academic boycotts.

It’s a recipe for disaster.

Let me be clear: I support the free exchange of ideas on campus and free inquiry about them in a civil manner. My firm belief in the Chicago principles means this is paramount for academic freedom to thrive. 

That free exchange of ideas must not lead to harmful attacks or chaos. We must protect students from harassment, intimidation, and acts of violence. 

The Ohio legislature recently passed Senate Bill 94, which gives our colleges the tools to keep your children safe. I was proud to support and advocate for this measure in the Senate.

Senate Bill 94 requires state institutions of higher education to adopt and enforce policies on racial, religious, and ethnic harassment and intimidation. Our colleges and universities must address training, complaints, and security concerns through these plans. 

The legislation also creates state grant programs that fund security upgrades on campuses throughout Ohio. This way all students, faculty, and staff are safe inside and outside the classroom.

Our higher education institutions must submit annual reports to the Chancellor of Higher Education of all harassment and intimidation reports on campus, ensuring we hold university leadership accountable through transparency.

We are all watching what will happen this fall on campuses across the nation, especially now that academic boycotts are on the table. 

Luckily, the effort to force boycotts of Israel will likely be fruitless at our state institutions. Last General Assembly, I sponsored legislation which prohibits them from entering contracts with companies that are boycotting Israel or other nations the Buckeye State openly trades with. That bill is the law of the land.

Ohio is standing strong to protect our next generation and our relationships with our allies. I hope other states follow suit.