A diverse coalition of 120 Fordham faculty members have expressed their disapproval of Fordham’s continued legal battle with Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP).

On Thursday, Jan. 30, a faculty member emailed a petition to high ranking Fordham administration, urging them to rescind the university’s appeal of the August 2019 New York Supreme Court ruling that required  the university to recognize Fordham Lincoln Center’s chapter of SJP. 

The petition has two requests: first, that “the university drop its appeal of the New York Supreme Court decision;” second, that “The FCLC Office of Student Life should continue to treat Students for Justice in Palestine as the recognized student club” in accordance with the August 2019 New York Supreme Court decision and the November 2016 approval of the Lincoln Center United Student Government executive board and senate.

Catch up on SJP’s legal fight for club status here

Among the 120 signatories of the petition are faculty from six undergraduate and graduate schools and 26 academic departments across Fordham’s Lincoln Center, Rose Hill and Westchester campuses. 

“There is a large group of faculty that are dismayed by the situation,” said Glenn Hendler, professor of English and American studies, and former faculty adviser to SJP. 

Faculty from Fordham College at Lincoln Center, Fordham College at Rose Hill, Fordham Law school, and the graduate schools of both Social Service and Education are represented among the 120 names.

Aseel Sawalha, associate professor of anthropology, co-director of Women, Gender and Sexuality studies, and current faculty adviser to SJP, is the second signatory on the list and sent the email containing the petition to administrators. “We teach critical thinking, open-mindedness and then the university does not tolerate a student organization advocating for social justice,” she said. “It’s almost a joke.”

For many signatories, principle came before explicit support for the cause. “The faculty who signed the petition did not sign it because they are for SJP; they signed it because they disagree with the silencing of students on campus,” Sawalha said.

The petition is addressed to university president Rev. Joseph M. McShane, S.J., and copied to, among others, Interim General Counsel Margaret Ball, Esq. 

Assistant Vice President for Communications Bob Howe spoke on behalf of the university: “Fordham acknowledges the issues raised in the petition, which the University has addressed in its procedures and in court filings. The University will await the outcome of its appeal before deciding upon any course of action.

“We view the University’s appeal of the NY Supreme Court decision as problematic for several reasons,” the petition reads. 

Quoting Arturo Sosa, Superior General of the Society of Jesus, in his 2018 address to the International Association of Jesuit Universities, the petition portrays the appeal as contradictory to Fordham’s Jesuit mission. The university “is a privileged space for exercising human freedom … to search and find the paths of social transformation,” Sosa said. 

“The students of SJP fully believe they are on one such path of social transformation,” the petition read. “The university should support their search for their path, not block it.”

A representative of SJP spoke to both the petition itself and Fordham’s official response. The petition “is significant because it shows what Fordham has done is a clear misdeed and neither the faculty nor the students are standing for it,” they said. 

“Fordham’s response is both significant and insignificant,” the representative said. “It is insignificant because it does not address any of the issues raised in the petition. It is significant because of the Fordham administration’s overt censorship of what SJP stands for, and because SJP is the first club on campus to be explicitly anti-colonialist, anti-racist and anti-imperialist, where does that leave Fordham?”

Dean of Students Keith Eldredge, Senior Vice President for Student Affairs Jeffery Gray and Faculty Senate President Eve Keller were also recipients indicated on the document.

“The Faculty Senate Executive Committee realizes that the debate surrounding Fordham’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine involves many difficult questions, as does the University’s decision to appeal last summer’s New York Supreme Court ruling,” Keller said, speaking for the Executive Committee of the Faculty Senate.

“As is true of the student body, the faculty at large, and the full Faculty Senate, members of the Executive Committee bring a range of different perspectives to these issues and are not of one mind about them.”

Copied to the email were Chief Diversity Officer Rafael Zapata, FCLC Dean Laura Auricchio and FCRH Dean Maura Mast. Auricchio and Mast did not add further comment to the university’s official statement, and Zapata did not respond to a request for comment. 

The petition further criticizes the legal appeal for its “chilling effect — both on how Fordham students experience a university that takes its students to court for starting a club that addresses issues of social justice; and also on the credibility of our university as a place that supports free speech and intellectual exchange.”

“This is the big free speech issue of our time,” Hendler said. “Fordham had the chance to let that speech happen, or to take the other side.”

As of Feb. 4, Fordham administration has not responded directly to Sawalha’s email. “One of the things that really annoyed some of us on the (petition) committee was that we did not receive a response. They didn’t even acknowledge that we sent the email,” she said.

“Faculty lose faith in the upper administration’s judgment when they make decisions like this,” Hendler said.

A final criticism of frugality argues that “money that will be swallowed in legal fees could be spent on more fruitful academic purposes.” 

The university’s appeal is still in litigation and the future at Fordham of “the promotion of justice, the exercise of free speech, and the fostering of critical intellectual exchange,” as outlined by the petition, is yet to be determined.

For the signatories of the petition, the appeal sends a clear message, but not a permanent one. 

“It’s not a good message for free speech on campus. It will prevent students from doing something similar in the future,” Sawalha said. “We need to bridge the gap between the generations; between students and the administration.” 

“I wish they will talk to the students instead of taking them to court.”

The transcript of the SJP petition reads as follows:

To: Fr. Joseph McShane, SJ, President of Fordham University
CC: Jeffrey Gray, Senior Vice President for Student Affairs, Fordham University
Keith Eldredge, Assistant Vice President and Dean of Students, FCLC
Eve Keller, President Faculty Senate
Faculty Senate Committee on Student Life
Margaret T. Ball, Interim General Counsel
Re: Petition asking that Fordham not appeal the New York Supreme Court ruling requiring that the university recognize Students for Justice in Palestine

We the undersigned faculty members at Fordham University are concerned about recent developments pertaining to Fordham University College at Lincoln Center students’ right to organize a club called Students for Justice in Palestine.
The Supreme Court of the State of New York ruled on August 5, 2019 that Fordham’s decision to overturn the FCLC student government’s recognition of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) was “arbitrary and capricious” and that the university’s decision had no “rational basis.” The court concluded that Fordham’s rules do not empower it to restrict recognition of a student club based on its potential for raising issues or taking political positions that might be controversial or unpopular with a segment of the university community.
Therefore, in August 2019 Judge Nancy Bannon ordered that “Fordham University is directed to recognize Students for Justice in Palestine at Fordham University as a university-sanctioned club.” While the students who initially sought to form SJP at Fordham in 2016 have graduated, current students have successfully organized themselves. Fordham should embrace SJP as an active student club, especially after this clear 2019 legal victory. Yet as both student newspapers have reported, Fordham University’s administration has filed an appeal of the New York State Supreme Court ruling.
In light of this recent turn of events, we the undersigned Fordham faculty members support the former and current students’ court-approved right to form this club as members of a University community oriented toward the promotion of justice, the exercise of free speech, and the fostering of critical intellectual exchange. Specifically, we request that:

(1) The university drop its appeal of the New York Supreme Court decision, and;

(2) The FCLC Office of Student Life should continue to treat Students for Justice in Palestine as the recognized student club that it is, in compliance with the court’s August 2019 decision and the November 2017 votes of the United Student Government Executive Board and the Senate.

We view the University’s appeal of the NY Supreme Court decision as problematic for several reasons.

First, it contradicts Fordham University’s Jesuit mission, which aspires to foster “the intellectual,
moral and religious development of its students and prepares them for leadership in a global society”–a society that is fraught with complicated political, social, and economic realities, and for which Jesuit universities hold a particular responsibility–and opportunity to–foster the conditions that facilitate intellectual and moral reflection on pressing issues of our time. As Fr. Arturo Sosa, Superior General of the Society of Jesus, observed in his 2018 address to the International Association of Jesuit Universities: “The university is a diverse environment in which the conditions for dialogue and in-depth understanding of historical, personal and intellectual processes are produced. It is a privileged space for exercising human freedom…to search and find the paths of social transformation.” The students of SJP fully believe they are on one such path of social transformation. The university should support their search for their path, not block it.

Second, as faculty we are concerned that the University’s effort to undermine the NY Supreme Court ruling by appeal will have a chilling effect–both on how Fordham students experience a university that takes its students to court for starting a club that addresses issues of social justice; and also on the credibility of our university as a place that supports free speech and intellectual exchange.

Finally, as faculty we are puzzled by the apparent waste of university resources: Court battles are costly and time-consuming, and the money that will be swallowed in legal fees could be spent on more fruitful educational purposes.

Respectfully,

1. 1. 1. Glenn Hendler, Professor of English and American Studies
      2. Aseel Sawalha, Associate Professor of Anthropology, Co-Director of WGSS
      3. Kathryn Kueny, Professor of Theology
      4. Shapoor Vali, Associate professor of Economics
      5. Jordan Alexander Stein, Associate Professor of English
      6. Fawzia Mustafa, Professor of English, African Studies, Comparative Literatureand WGSS

1. 1. 7. Laura Wernick, Associate Professor

1. 1. 8. Christiana Zenner, Associate Professor of Theology, Science, and Ethics
      9. James Kim, Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature
      10. Susan Berger, Professor
          
      11. Andrew H. Clark, Chair, Dept. of Modern Languages and Literatures
      12. Diane George, Adjunct
      13. Cristiana Sogno, Associate Professor of Classics
      14. Christopher GoGwilt, Professor of English and Comparative Literature
      15. Carey Kasten, Associate Professor of Spanish
      16. Ronald S. Méndez-Clark, Associate Chair, Modern Languages and Literature
      17. Kathryn Reklis, Dr./Associate Professor
      18. John Seitz, Associate Professor
      19. Cynthia Vich, Associate Professor
      20. John Andrew Foster, Associate Professor
      21. O. Hugo Benavides, Chair, Sociology/Anthropology Department
      22. Micki McGee, Associate Professor of Sociology & American Studies
      23. Ben Dunning, Professor
          
      24. Robert Davis, Associate Professor of Theology
      25. Jeannine Hill Fletcher, Professor of Theology
      26. Sarah Zimmerman, Professor of English
      27. Arnaldo Cruz-Malave, Professor, Modern Languages, LALSI and Comp Lit
      28. Robin Andersen, Professor of Communication and Media Studies
      29. Ayala Fader, Professor of Anthropology
      30. Tom Beaudoin, Professor of Religion
      31. Sandy Turner, Assoc Professor GSS
      32. Shonni Enelow, Associate Professor of English
      33. Mark R. Patterson, Professor of Law
      34. Jerome Lahaye, Associate Professor of Economics
      35. Martin Chase, Professor of English and Medieval Studies
      36. Amir Idris, Professor, Chair of Dept. of African and African American Studies
      37. Amanda Armstrong, Assistant Professor of History
      38. Elizabeth Stone , Prof of English
      39. John Craven, Associate Professor
          
      40. Annika Hinze, Associate Professor Urban Studies
      41. Diane Rodriguez, Professor
          
      42. Zephyr Teachout, Associate Law Professor
      43. Maryanne Kowaleski, Professor of History and Medieval Studies
      44. Alex Markle, Assistant Professor, Gabelli School of Business
      45. Ivelisse Cuevas-Molina, Assistant Professor of Political Science
      46. Hooman Estelami, Professor of Business
          
      47. Yuko Miki, Associate Professor of History and Associate Director of LALS
      48. Mark D Naison, Professor of African American Studies and history
      49. Karen Siedlecki, Associate Professor of Psychology
      50. Bradford Hinze , Professor Theology.
      51. Samir Haddad, Associate Professor of Philosophy
      52. John J. Drummond, Robert Southwell SJ Distinguished Professor of Philosophy & the Humanities

1. 1. 53. Sarah P. Lockhart, Associate Professor of Political Science
      54. Leonard Cassuto, Professor of English and American Studies
      55. Su-Je Cho, Professor of Education
      56. Steven J. Franks, Professor
          
      57. Samantha Iyer, Assistant Professor
          
      58. Maria Farland, Assoc Prof of English
      59. Wolfgang P. Mueller, Professor of History
      60. Mary Bly, Chair of English
      61. John Davenport, Professor of Philosophy
      62. Lise Schreier, Professor of French
      63. Sarah Gambito, Associate Professor / Director of Creative Writing
      64. Ian Morrison, Professor of Mathematics
      65. Ann Higgins-D’Alessandro, Professor
          
      66. Robert J. Penella, Emeritus Professor of Classics
      67. Asato Ikeda, Assistant Professor
          
      68. Rosemary Wakeman, Professor of History
      69. Vassilios Fessatidis, Professor of Physics & Engineering Physics
      70. Jeffrey Flynn, Associate Professor of Philosophy
      71. Kathryn Moore Heleniak, Professor of Art History
      72. Falguni Sen, Professor
          
      73. Claire Gherini , Assistant Professor of History
      74. Mary Ann Forgey, Professor
          
      75. Carl Fischer, Associate Professor
          
      76. Shiloh Whitney, Associate Professor of Philosophy
      77. Michael Lee, Professor, Theology and
          
      78. Daisy Deomampo, Associate Professor
          
      79. Francesca Parmeggiani, Professor, Mod Langs & Lits and Comp Lit
      80. Nina Rowe, Associate Professor of Art History
      81. Zein Murib, Assistant Professor, Political Science
      82. Diane Detournay, Lecturer
          
      83. Heather Dubrow, John D. Boyd, SJ, Chair in Poetic Imagination
          
      84. Chad McArver, Chair, Department of Theatre Visual Arts
      85. Daniel A. Jones, Associate Professor, Dept. of Theatre and Visual Art
      86. Mark Street, Program Director, Visual Arts
      87. Elisabeth Frost, Professor of English and Women’s/Gender/Sexuality Studies
      88. Patricia Belen, Artist-In-Residence, Visual Arts
      89. Elizabeth Margid, Head of Directing
      90. Matthew Maguire, Professor of Theatre
      91. Silvana Patriarca, Professor
          
      92. Jeanne Flavin, Professor of Sociology
      93. Asif Siddiqi, Professor of History
      94. Joseph Lawton, Clinical Associate Professor
          
      95. Matthew Gelbart, Associate Professor
          
      96. Johanna Francis, Associate Professor, Economics
      97. Barbara Hilkert Andolsen, Professor Emerita of Theology
      98. Garrett Broad, Assistant Professor, Communication and Media Studies
      99. Kirsten Swinth, Professor of History
      100. Irma Watkins-Owens, Associate Professor Emerita
           
      101. Thierry Rigogne, Associate Professor of History
      102. Kathleen LaPenta, Senior Lecturer
           
      103. Maria Ebner, Senior Lecturer , Modern Languages and Literatures
      104. Michael Latour , Lecturer,
           
      105. Alessia Valfredini, Senior Lecturer
           
      106. Kate Wilson , Adjunct, English & Soc-Anth
      107. Jacqueline Reich, Professor
           
      108. Jonathan Larson, Adjunct, Modern Languages and Literatures
      109. Sara Lehman, Professor of Spanish
      110. Christina Greer, Associate Professor
           
      111. Guillermo Severiche, Lecturer, Modern Languages and Literatures
      112. Vicente Rubio-Pueyo, Adjunct Instructor-Modern Languages Department
      113. Lunia Vera, Adjunct
           
      114. Jane Bolgatz, Associate Professor, Graduate School of Education
      115. Marciana Popescu, Associate professor,
           
      116. Patricia Romero , Spanish Lecturer
      117. Akane Zusho, Professor and Chair of Division of Psychological and Educational Services, GSE

1. 1. 118. Hagit Halperin, Adjunct professor of Modern Hebrew
           
      119. Nicole Fermon, Professor
           
      120. Mariko Aratani, Japanese adjunct professor