Israeli and Palestinian supporters clash at Berkeley
More than 1,000 students at the University of California-Berkeley clashed during a rally on campus last week, shouting racial slurs in a violent manner, leading to the arrest of 79 people and a building takeover.
The rally was held on a day designated for remembrance of the Holocaust for the Jewish community.
Micah Bazant, a Jewish supporter of Palestine, invoked the kaddish – a traditional Jewish prayer of suffering – for the Palestinian suicide bombers, leading some Jewish students to express ill feelings.
The protest led to the takeover of a campus building, prompting police to drag Palestinian supporters from the hall. One of the arrested students was charged with felony battery after he bit a police officer.
U.S. News releases grad school rankings
Stanford topped U.S. and World Report’s list of the best education and business graduate schools, placing second in the engineering category and 11th in the medical school category.
Yale University claimed the title of best law school in the country in the latest rankings, released last week. For the fifth straight year, Harvard Medical School won the top honors, placing third in the law category and second in the business school rankings.
GW placed 35th in the list of graduate education schools, 25th in graduate law schools and outside the top 50 in all other categories.
Students call for TA’s resignation in Utah
Students at the University of Utah have drafted a petition calling for the suspension of teaching assistant Amadou Niang, who they claim verbally attacked the Church of Latter Day Saints, the main religion in Utah.
The students claim that Niang repeatedly asked how many students belong to the LDS, and then accused the religion on being a racist institution due to the lack of black leaders within the church’s hierarchy.
Niang denies the claim, saying that he was merely pointing out a fact for educational purposes.
“This is a very unfortunate incident. I didn’t mean to offend anybody,” Niang told The Daily Chronicle.
The university has not taken any official action but agreed to consider the students’ petition.
Meningitis vaccine required in Connecticut
Connecticut legislators passed a law requiring all college students to have the meningitis vaccine last week, in the wake of an outbreak in the state last year.
The law, which goes into effect for the upcoming fall semester, refuses
any student access to a dormitory or university housing until the vaccination is complete.
Universities across the state are holding special vaccination clinics in order to fulfill the state mandate before September. At Fairfield University alone, more than 1,000 students will need the vaccine, said Ann Cole, a representative of Fairfield Health Center.
-Patrick W. Higgins