BOSTON (WHDH) - Six Massachusetts colleges are at risk of losing federal funding.
Boston University, Emerson, Harvard, Tufts, UMass Amherst and Wellesley College all received letters from the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, warning them money could be pulled if they don’t protect Jewish students.
Jeff Robbins is the former board chair of the New England anti-defamation league. He says investigations into anti-Semitic discrimination and harassment on campuses are warranted.
“I think there’s plenty of evidence that a lot of universities and colleges here indulged in antisemitism, that there’s a real fear on the part of Jewish students and faculty in the aftermath of October 7,” said Robbins. “There’s been a lot of intimidation, there’s been a lot of harassment, there’s been a lot of ostracizing that has to be addressed.”
“They should be praised for the investigations,” continued Robbins. “They should not be announcing punishments before the investigations are even conducted let alone concluded.”
Tufts University says the letter is under review.
UMass Amherst released a statement, saying, “The university condemns hatred, including antisemitism, in all forms. The University of Massachusetts Amherst will continue to cooperate fully with the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights.”
Wellesley College also released a statement, saying, “We are continuing to make progress to improve the climate on campus … including encouraging reporting and establishing mandatory Title VI anti-discrimination training for students and for other community members.”
Tensions on local college campuses are high since the Israel-Hamas war broke out.
“I’ve seen things kind of debatable people make pretty compelling argument that they are anti-Semitic and bad, also that they aren’t and are reasonable criticism of Israel’s actions. I don’t really trust the federal government to mediate that so, I don’t know. I don’t like it,” said Tufts student Douglas Rogers.
Some students say colleges have already sent out emails about the situation.
“It was more of just a warning that the executive orders might impact what the school can offer as far as like research funding and stuff like that. So I think it was like a brace for impact,” said Tufts student Owen Haver.
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