New York Metropolis colleges Chancellor David Banks sought to strike a steadiness between affirming college students’ rights to protest and disavowing hate speech as he responded to varsity campus unrest and previewed his upcoming testimony earlier than Congress.
Citing his personal historical past of involvement in scholar activism and social justice — together with within the motion to divest from apartheid-era South Africa when he was a university scholar — Banks instructed reporters on Thursday that he helps scholar activism “on the highest stage.”
However he urged activists to not “enable that discontent to morph into hatred for anybody.”
Banks was on the scene Tuesday evening at Columbia College as police raided a constructing that demonstrators had occupied. He later made his technique to Metropolis School of New York, the place police cleared a tent encampment and made a whole lot of arrests.
He stated he was troubled by an expertise at Metropolis School by which roughly a dozen protesters “surrounded” him when he tried to enter the quad and barred him from coming into, telling him, “We personal the quad.” He stated he was dissatisfied by graffiti he noticed on the campus the subsequent morning that stated “Demise to America,” and “Demise to Israel.”
The protests and police backlash have garnered worldwide consideration, and have been carefully watched by many metropolis highschool college students, a few of whom are contemplating attending the universities on the middle of the tumult.
Banks’ feedback Thursday previewed the message he intends to ship subsequent week earlier than the U.S. Home Committee on Schooling and the Workforce — the identical committee that has grilled school presidents from Columbia, Harvard, College of Pennsylvania, and MIT in latest months.
Banks is anticipated to look alongside district leaders from Maryland’s Montgomery County and Berkeley, California, to share their responses to antisemitism in Ok-12 colleges.
New York Metropolis’s faculty system, the nation’s largest, has seen a number of flare-ups over the Israel-Hamas conflict, together with a raucous scholar demonstration at Hillcrest Excessive College over a trainer posting a photograph with an “I Stand With Israel” signal, a citywide scholar walkout calling for a ceasefire within the Gaza Strip, and allegations of unchecked scholar antisemitism at a Brooklyn Excessive College — allegations officers have denied.
Banks emphasised that his method has leaned on convening neighborhood members, together with assembling an interfaith council, whereas growing curricula on Jewish and Muslim historical past and reviewing the disciplinary code with metropolis principals.
His personal background “as a Black man who’s keenly conscious of trauma and ache and oppression that my very own folks have suffered in America” has given him “an affinity for each the Jewish and the Palestinian folks,” he added.
Banks expressed concern that the questioning from the Republican-led committee, which incorporates New York consultant Elise Stefanik, can be extra centered on “viral moments and empty soundbites and low cost political speak” than substantive options.
“Placing a highlight on any specific particular person and typically making an attempt to create gotcha moments isn’t the way you finally remedy issues that you just actually, deeply care about,” he stated. “I might ask for Congress to determine a technique to carry folks collectively from throughout the nation to assist to resolve for this insidious stage of hate.”
Banks acknowledged that the town’s response to tensions over the Israeli-Palestinian battle hasn’t been “good,” however stated he’s pleased with the efforts to this point.
He additionally expressed confidence in his personal means to go toe to toe along with his congressional questioners, noting that he’s “from New York,” and that squaring off with Brooklyn Councilmember Lincoln Restler, a progressive Democrat, throughout council hearings was good preparation.
Michael Elsen-Rooney is a reporter for Chalkbeat New York, masking NYC public colleges. Contact Michael at melsen-rooney@chalkbeat.org.
