Amid heightened tensions at universities across the country arising from the Israel-Hamas war, the University of California system will allocate $7 million to combat “alarming acts of bigotry, intolerance and intimidation,” including antisemitism and Islamophobia, on its campuses, officials announced this week.
“As university leaders, we cannot solve the deep and long-lasting issues that resulted in the horrific violence we saw in Israel six weeks ago and the devastation we are seeing in Gaza,” said UC President Michael V. Drake, who announced the funding during a Board of Regents meeting Wednesday. “But we have an important role to play as an educational institution.”
The UC allocation will include:
- $3 million to provide emergency mental health resources for students, faculty and staff who may be struggling with recent events or the climate on their campus.
- $2 million for educational programs at each UC campus to better understand antisemitism and Islamophobia, how to recognize and combat extremism, and a viewpoint-neutral history of the Middle East.
- $2 million to train UC leadership, staff and faculty with an emphasis on freedom of expression; academic freedom; diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging; and other key functions of higher education administration as they intersect with the Israel-Hamas conflict.
Drake has requested that Jody Stiger, UC’s director of community safety, ensure that staff members are responding appropriately to incidents of violence on campuses.
Additionally, Drake announced the creation of a systemwide civil rights office that has been in the works since 2022.
The announcement follows a joint statement from Drake and UC chancellors on Nov. 10 condemning bigotry on the system’s 10 campuses, including those in Riverside, Irvine and Los Angeles.
“Some of the rhetoric we have seen and heard over the past month at campus protests, online, in student government meetings and in classrooms has been shocking and…
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