Prez Princeton calls for incumbent professor to be fired after speaking out against special treatment of black colleagues

Princeton University President Christopher Eisgruber is demanding the dismissal of a tenured professor amid student anger after the professor objects to giving his black colleagues more paid leave and higher salaries than white staff.

In a resignation letter sent by Eisgruber to the school board last week, Professor Joshua Katz was accused of not cooperating with an investigation into alleged sexual harassment in 2018. diary letter.

The 2018 investigation examined a professor’s relationship with a female student in 2006 and was eventually resolved when the professor was suspended for one year without charge.

However, the students felt that the problem was not resolved and started a second investigation through the school newspaper. Princeton Dailyit follows that the professor did not fully cooperate with the investigation.

The student-led investigation reportedly began after Katz said she was “ashamed” of certain policies implemented by Princeton in response to George Floyd’s death in 2020, a campaign that addressed the history of the “racist” school and demanding it be given to black professors. more leave time and higher salaries than white professors.

Eisgruber’s request to fire Katz is viewed by many as a political move, suggesting that the university president had previously sentenced the professor at Quillette for a Katz column on campus criticizing the Black Life Matters movement.

Katz, who began teaching at Princeton in 1998, wrote a column detailing the hard work of social justice protesters and calling a left-wing student group a “local terrorist organisation.”

Eisgruber later reacted by issuing a statement stating that Katz did not exercise “freedom of expression” responsibly and did not appropriately “insult” students who participated in the protests.

“While freedom of speech allows students and teachers to make bold, provocative or offensive arguments, we all have an obligation to exercise this right responsibly,” Eisgruber said in a statement. Said. “Katz failed to do so, and I personally and strongly oppose his designation of the Princeton student group as a ‘local terrorist organisation’.”

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