Post #13
The Diversity Formerly Known as Diversity
Notes from Nowhere Near Low Library
On September 2, 2025 Acting President Claire Shipman began the semester with a love letter to the School of General Studies. GS, she told us, is home to a “sensational array of students,” whose “varied interests, backgrounds, and stories” redefine excellence. The numbers are impressive: 38% first-gen, 24% veterans, 33% international, 35% Pell recipients. Students range from age 18 to 69, from community college transfers to dual-degree seekers in Dublin, Hong Kong, and Tel Aviv.
It was, in other words, a textbook celebration of diversity — except for one small problem. The word diversity never appeared. In the new Columbia lexicon, “diversity” has been quietly retired, a forbidden relic in the age of federal settlements and Trump-era oversight. Instead, we now honor “unique life experiences” and “non-traditional paths.” The demographics formerly known as diversity have been rebranded as admissions brochure statistics.
On the very same day, another statement dropped. This one, from the Office of Institutional Equity and the Office of Rules Administration, announced immediate disciplinary action against students who presumably were carrying signs protesting the genocide in Gaza and criticizing Israeli soldiers while walking on campus. Free expression, the memo reminded us, is “deeply valued and respected” — right up until it names uncomfortable truths. Then it’s campus bans, interim suspensions, and the full weight of Columbia’s “process.”
The pairing could not be more poetic:
Letter One: Celebrate your identities, your histories, your differences! Just don’t call it diversity.
Letter Two: Express those identities in solidarity with Palestinians, and you’ll be investigated.
So, welcome to Columbia, GS students. Your identities will be counted in admissions brochures and recruitment slides, but if you raise them in solidarity with Gaza, they’ll be counted in disciplinary hearings.
