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How Academic Efforts to Boycott Israel Harm our Students
(Washington Post) Jill S. Schneiderman - In March 2014, I stood with 27 Vassar College students at the Auja Spring in the West Bank together with Palestinian environmental educators. This learning experience almost didn't happen due to opposition from faculty and students at our own academic institution. I am a tenured geology professor who teaches about the connections between land and water resources and social justice. Several months before the trip, my course and the study trip associated with it were subject to a boycott debate on campus. Protesters bearing anti-Israel signs stood chanting outside my classroom; students were pressured by their peers to drop the course. I would have liked for the students holding placards and chanting slogans outside my classroom to come inside and debate in full sentences. By fostering narrow perspectives, bullying stymies learning and is anti-intellectual. I understand that what happened at Vassar is happening at academic institutions across the country. Instead of engaging in debate, students and faculty are shutting down avenues of inquiry and blocking attempts to examine difficult issues. The writer is a professor of earth science at Vassar College.