April 2, 2024 Update
Per statements issued by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) on March 28 and the Middle East Association of North America’s Committee on Academic Freedom on April 1st, Dr. A. Kayum Ahmed of Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health has been informed that he would receive a letter of non-renewal by the end of June due to the School’s decision to not only remove him from the human rights module of the required Core curriculum’s Foundations of Public Health studio (8% of his salary), but also his elective Health and Human Rights Advocacy (HHRA) (30% of his salary), which he has taught since Fall 2021.
The removal of Dr. Ahmed from his teaching positions is an example of a much larger and growing pattern of censorship against academics who discuss Palestine in the classroom. A recent study shows that of 936 US-based academic scholars on the Middle East, 82 percent said they self-censor when they speak professionally about the Israeli-Palestinian issue, with 81 percent of those holding back criticism of Israel. These threats to academic freedom foster an inability and unwillingness to engage in topics deemed too controversial and too complicated in the classroom. It is all too clear that Dr. Ahmed’s removal from the Core has nothing to do with the suitability of his teaching, but with Columbia’s discomfort with free expression when it comes to the issue of Palestine.
On March 26, before this information about HHRA and the letter of non-removal came to light, students presented the Letter of Demand to Reinstate Dr. A. Kayum Ahmed to the Core Teaching Team with 280 signatures and 80 comments from Mailman School of Public Health students to Linda Fried, Dean; Michael Joseph, Vice Dean of Academic Affairs; S. Patrick Kachur, Interim Chair, Department of Population and Family Health; Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; and Sami Jarrah, Vice Dean for Finance and Administration. Signatures were accrued in under 24 hours. This letter aimed to supplement the faculty letter in support of Dr. Ahmed’s reinstatement in the Core.
In consideration of these developments, we are seeking further support from the community at large, regardless of Columbia affiliation. Signatures will be separated by affiliation. For the full and original statement, please refer to this link.
