Editorial: UPenn president Liz Magill’s resignation is lesson to other college presidents
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The departure of Liz Magill from her post as president of the University of Pennsylvania may not have been written in stone when she testified before Congress about antisemitism on college campuses.
However, it wasn’t exactly written on a chalkboard, easily wiped away with a swipe of the hand, either.
When U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., asked if “calling for the genocide of Jews” is a code of conduct violation at Penn, the possibility was there. When Magill said “it is a context-dependent decision, congresswoman,” possibility became likelihood.
Despite an attempt to clarify, the damage was permanent. Magill, a former Supreme Court law clerk and law school dean whose world is all about parsing simple sentences into complex ideas, was undone by the inability to say the word “yes” — or at the very least “maybe.”
Are other Pennsylvania schools likely to fall into the same trap?
Penn made the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression’s annual list of Worst Colleges for Free Speech this year over reactions by tenured law professor Amy Wax’s racial and immigration statements. The school also scored poorly for student free expression.
It is not the only Pennsylvania college to receive the dubious designation. Penn State made the list this year, too. Duquesne University did in 2021 after terminating professor Gary Shank for his use of the N-word during a lesson about such questionable words.
The University of Scranton. Drexel University. Widener University. Bucknell University. All have been singled out for attention by FIRE.
Others have made their own headlines. Carnegie Mellon faced controversy over appointing former ambassador and Trump administration director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell to its Institute for Politics and Strategy. The University of Pittsburgh had protests in March over events on gender issues.
This is nothing new. Colleges have historically been a battlefield where ideas collide and protest flourishes. The Israel-Hamas war is a rerun of protests over actions in Vietnam, Afghanistan and more. The struggle to balance free speech and safety is the job of every college president.
But this has been different.
Magill was not just done in by her words but also by the passion they evoked from donors. A $100 million gift was pulled by an alum. That’s a major loss — the kind of number that might equal months of campaigning. It was something the board couldn’t ignore.
But it also is something other college presidents can’t overlook. Magill’s testimony and the days leading up to her resignation five days later are a lesson.
Magill’s resignation was inevitable because in the multibillion dollar business of higher education, it’s the math that matters.