President Garimella’s 9/15/22 Letter with Annotations

Below, the President’s initial statement to the UVM community is annotated to highlight concerning statements and correct the record, using the OCR investigation as the standard.

Highlighted text indicates hostile or accusatory language.

Red text indicates inaccurate, misleading, or incomplete statements of fact.
Clicking on the red text will show corrective information as determined by the OCR’s investigation.


Dear Members of the UVM Community,

This week’s media coverage of an investigation by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) into an anonymous third party’s allegations that the university failed to adequately respond to complaints of anti-Jewish, biased behavior at UVM has painted our community in a patently false light.

While common wisdom dictates remaining patiently silent as we cooperate diligently with an agency’s investigation, I simply cannot do so. These public allegations and our community’s deeply held values call for a strong and immediate response.

UVM is a community with a long, proud history of inclusiveness. We denounce hateful actions and respond briskly and decisively whenever those responsible are identified. UVM is home to a strong and vibrant Jewish community and is recognized as a place where—year after year—many Jewish students, faculty, and staff choose to study, teach, conduct research, practice medicine, and work. As a community, we adhere to Our Common Ground values of respect, integrity, innovation, openness, justice, and responsibility.

The uninformed narrative published this week has been harmful to UVM. Equally importantly, it is harmful to our Jewish students, faculty, staff, and alumni. There is no doubt that antisemitism exists in the world and, despite our best efforts, in our community. Exploitation of fear and divisiveness by advancing false claims that UVM failed to respond to complaints of antisemitic behavior creates confusion and a sense of insecurity for the entire community.

I therefore would like to set the record straight regarding the OCR complaint by sharing the core elements of UVM’s forthcoming response.

Allegation 1. The complaint alleges that the university did not adequately respond to student reports of antisemitism by a teaching assistant.

University response to the incident:

A university community member reported on September 6, 2021 [click for corrective info] Multiple students reported feeling threatened by the behavior of the Teaching Assistant and those reports were passed to the University through official channels. Three reports about antisemitic social media posts by a UVM teaching assistant were filed with UVM’s Affirmative Action & Equal Opportunity Office (AAEO) on May 17, 2021, not on September 6 as previously stated.
, that an undergraduate teaching assistant made antisemitic remarks and threatened to lower the grades of Jewish students on their personal social media accounts
prior to serving as a TA. The university took prompt action to ensure that the objectionable statements did not adversely impact students in the classroom and further, to perform a thorough review to ensure all grades were awarded on a non-discriminatory basis. No student reported to the university that this teaching assistant harassed or discriminated against them. [click for corrective info] ● No action was taken in response to these reports until they were brought up again in a letter to President Garimella; with four months of silence before any investigative action was taken, the university's action cannot be considered “prompt” by any reasonable standard.
● In direct contrast to the President’s claim that the University “took prompt action to ensure that the objectionable statements did not adversely impact students in the classroom,” the AAEO did not interview any students to determine if the teaching assistant’s behavior adversely impacted them. In the end, it was left up to the professor she was working with in Fall 2021 to decide whether to take any action regarding the teaching assistant. That professor fired the teaching assistant and regraded all of the work she had done in the Fall 2021 semester. However, it is unclear whether the teaching assistant was a TA in Spring 2021 as claimed in her social media posts, or in previous semesters. The university did not examine grades prior to Fall 2021 for potential bias.
● Ultimately, the AAEO declined to pursue a formal investigation.
The university’s response to the report was completed by September 30, 2021.

Allegation 2. A group of university students threw rocks at the Hillel building.

University response to the incident: On September 24, 2021, UVM Police responded to a report regarding students throwing small rocks at the Hillel building. The incident was reported to the university administration as an incident of hate and bias the following day. The investigation was immediate,

and it was quickly determined that the students who threw the small rocks at a window of the Hillel building were doing so to get the attention of a friend who was convalescing in the building while recovering from an illness, that the throwing stopped after they got a student’s attention, [click for corrective info] Two witness statements were obtained regarding the incident. One student reported that the men asked her if she was Jewish and then threw rocks at her window, while another student said that the men were his friends and threw rocks at his window to get him to come outside. The student who knew those who threw the rocks did not feel comfortable sharing their names and was not pressed to report this information.
and that there was no reported damage to the building.
There was no evidence of any threatening behavior or that the conduct was motivated by antisemitic bias. [click for corrective info] While there were contrasting narratives in the witness statements, it is not accurate to say that there was no evidence of antisemitic bias. President Garimella’s statement related the story of only one witness statement while ignoring the witness statement that indicated this was an antisemitic incident.
The university’s review and response to the police and administrative reports was completed by September 28, 2021.

Allegation 3. Two UVM student organizations excluded students who “expressed support for Zionism” from membership in their organizations.

University response to the incident:

On September 30, 2021, students reported this conduct to university administration. The university investigated the report quickly and thoroughly [click for corrective info] Multiple reports were filed in May 2021 about anti-Zionist comments and exclusion by @ShareYourStoryUVM. However, the AAEO did not investigate these reports and did not document the reason for its decision not to do so. Instead, the matter was referred to the Bias Response Team.
and determined that the groups who apparently made these statements were not recognized UVM student organizations. The unrecognized organizations received no university support and
were not bound by UVM’s policies governing student organizations. [click for corrective info] ● During a meeting with the Provost, students identified the Revolutionary Socialist Union (RSU) as excluding Jewish/Zionist students. The RSU's draft constitution requires every member to pledge "no" to Zionism. The university administration concluded that since the RSU was not a registered student organization, the university had no jurisdiction over it.
● Unrecognized student organizations are not subject to UVM's policies governing student organizations, however, the University ignored the violations of the Discrimination Policy, which applies to students' off-campus conduct. To ensure an inclusive environment within recognized UVM student organizations, student leaders were reminded of university policies prohibiting discrimination on the basis of religion, national origin, or any other protected category.

It is important that our community know the truth about what happened, and how the university responded. Although the allegations were investigated and addressed, we recognize we can and should do more to support the success of our students. University leaders have reached out on several occasions to our Jewish students over the last year to understand their experiences on our campus, to provide them with the tools they need to respond to incidents of bias and discrimination, and to work with them to better understand the climate in which they are living and learning.

Our work in understanding and eliminating antisemitism will never be complete. Over the past year, university leaders have reviewed, updated, and consolidated our bias reporting processes to make them more accessible to those who need them. A few weeks ago, I joined other university leaders, government officials, and civic leaders for Project Interchange, a hands-on immersive learning opportunity hosted in Israel by the American Jewish Committee (AJC). Our provost and senior vice president, Patty Prelock, actively participated in a Summit to Combat Campus Antisemitism with more than 40 higher education leaders in New York. We will continue to learn and support UVM’s Jewish community to ensure that any future incidents that might occur will be addressed with immediacy and sensitivity to what they are experiencing.

If you have concerns or want to report an incident of antisemitism, please know that you can do so at any time at uvm.edu/report. The university’s response will be supportive, thorough, and timely.

Sincerely,

Suresh V. Garimella
President