INDEPENDENT SINCE 1880
The Corne¬ Daily Sun 16 Pages – Free
Vol. 141, No. 20
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2025 n ITHACA, NEW YORK
News
Arts
Sports
Weather
Kava Crackdown
Bruno Bop
Final Farewell
Cloudy
Sacred Root Kava Lounge & Tea Bar has been barred from selling its signature kava drink. | Page 5
Sydney Levinton ’27 reviews Bruno Mars’ 2010 debut album in light of his recent resurgence. | Page 14
Men’s hockey head coach Mike Schafer ’86 honors the senior class and bids farewell at his last game with the team.
HIGH: 41º LOW: 33º
BSU Holds ‘Emergency Meeting’ Following ED Threats
Affinity groups, program houses are threatened by Department of Education guidelines By BENJAMIN LEYNSE Sun Senior Writer
decisions of all “aspects of student, academic, and campus life.” This includes admissions, financial aid, administrative support and housing. Educational institutions were given until Feb. 28 to comply, after which they may be subject to investigation and loss of federal funding. Faced with the threat of the letter’s directives, leaders of BSU — a registered student organization that receives University funding — chose to convene on Friday. “[We] wanted to just be a place in where we are all on the same page, so that if [Cornell does comply], we can mobilize quickly and we can make sure that we’re letting Cornell know that we aren’t taking that for an answer,” said Athena Holloway ’27, BSU co-president. “We want to preserve our communities, our identities [and] our well-being.”
Feb. 24 — Black Students United held an “Emergency Meeting” Friday evening in response to a letter sent by the Department of Education ordering the elimination of “racial preferences” and race-conscious programs from admissions, hiring and institutional programming at federally funded educational institutions. At the forefront of the nearly 60-person meeting were concerns that community spaces for marginalized groups on campus would be targeted and closed. In the Instagram post announcing the event, BSU stated, “The Trump Administration looks to end affinity groups for marginalized people across all schools & universities … we won’t allow this to happen.” The Feb. 14 ED letter called the To continue reading this article, please use of race in dormitories, such as visit www.cornellsun.com. some of Cornell’s program houses, a “shameful echo” of America’s history Benjamin Leynse can be reached at and banned the inclusion of race in bleynse@cornellsun.com.
STEPHAN MENASCHE / SUN STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Advocacy alarm | Black Students United assembles after the Department of Education ordered the elimination of race-conscious programs at federally funded educational institutions like Cornell.
Kotlikoff Affirms Cornell’s Commitment Ed Whitfield ’70 Reflects to ‘Merit-Based Decisions,’ Diversity on His Participation in the By MATTHEW KIVIAT Sun News Editor
Feb. 21 — Interim President Michael Kotlikoff sent a statement to the Cornell community on Friday morning addressing campus concerns regarding recent changes to federal regulations and guidelines relating to cuts in federal research funding and research and diversity, equity and inclusion programs. In the statement, Kotlikoff both affirmed the University’s commitment to following the law and described diversity as essential to the University’s mission. Kotlikoff announced in the statement the creation of a new university response planning team, which will be led by Provost Kavita Bala to analyze the impacts of the new federal policies. “This is a dynamic and evolving situation, and our response planning team will be prepared to address new developments as they arise,” Kotlikoff wrote. The statement addresses a Feb. 14 letter sent by the U.S. Department of Education to federally funded educational institutions, including Cornell, calling for the end of “racial preferences” regarding admissions, hiring and institutional programming. If the institutions do not comply within two weeks, they may be subject to investigation and the loss of federal funding, according to the ED. Kotlikoff wrote that Cornell will continue to affirm its “founding principle of opportunity and access”
and commitment to free inquiry and openness that “helped make Cornell the model of the modern American research university.” The statement explained that diversity is essential to the University’s mission. Kotlikoff wrote that diversity comes in many different forms — which include lived experience, geographic location, viewpoints and veteran status — and it is critical to Cornell’s “‘any person’ history.” Though Kotlikoff wrote that the University “prizes diversity as a driver of our excellence,” he also affirmed that Cornell is “committed to merit-based decisions,” in all processes.
“This is a dynamic and evolving situation, and our response planning team will be prepared to address new developments as they arise.” Interim President Michael Kotlikoff “Just as we do not exclude anyone at Cornell for reasons irrelevant to merit, neither do we admit or evaluate students, hire or promote employees, award chairs or tenure, or make any other merit-driven decisions at Cornell based on race, ethnicity, or other attributes not relevant to merit,” Kotlikoff wrote. The statement emphasized the
importance that members of the Cornell community be cautious to ensure the University follows the law amid new federal policies relating to DEI initiatives. “We must be vigilant, particularly, to ensure that when Cornell departments, organizations, or interest groups offer programming designed to support particular groups within our community, those opportunities are equally open to all, without bias for or against any groups,” Kotlikoff wrote. However, Kotlikoff also wrote that the University continues to maintain its commitment to “ensuring equal opportunity for all of our students, faculty, and staff, without regard to race, gender, or any other characteristic protected by law” and will “continue to convey this commitment to nondiscrimination in communications and our activities.“ The statement also addressed federal guidance surrounding research. After affirming that “Cornell follows the law,” Kotlikoff emphasized that as far as the University is aware, “none of the recent federal guidance limits the academic freedom of our community to research or study any subject [or] our ability to exercise free expression within a safe and respectful community.” To continue reading this article, please visit www.cornellsun.com. Matthew Kiviat can be reached at mkiviat@cornellsun.com.
1969 Straight Hall Takeover By ATTICUS JOHNSON and SHUBHA GAUTAM Sun Contributor and Sun Staff Writer
Feb. 25 — It was the photo seen around the world — a group of Black anti-war activists walking down the steps of Willard Straight Hall, rifles in hand and demands met. Ed Whitfield ’70, leader of the Cornell Afro-American Society — which is now Cornell Black Students United — helped organize the 36-hour occupation of Willard Straight Hall to protest racial injustice and the Vietnam War in 1969. At the time, tensions at Cornell and across college campuses were at their peak as groups on campus conducted teach-ins, protests and other demonstrations to bring attention to what they saw as an unjust war and lack of racial equality on campus. In an interview with The Sun, Whitfield said that regardless of what other students thought of the protest, the Vietnam War was “immoral and unreasonable.” “I didn’t think it was right for us to be killing people across the world,” Whitfield said. On April 20, 1969, during parent’s weekend, Whitfield and
other AAS student activists occupied Willard Straight Hall for 36 hours to protest the slow progress of the establishment of a University Afro-American Studies Center and frustrations with the judicial decision that found previous protestors guilty for breaking the student behavior coe. Within days, uprisings also began at Dartmouth, Princeton and several other colleges. According to Whitfield, the guns in the famous picture were not part of the original plan and instead were a response to white Delta Upsilon fraternity brothers entering Willard Straight and fighting the protesters. “We decided to throw them back out the windows they broke,” Whitfield added. Influenced by the Orangeburg Massacre of 1968, where three civil rights protesters were killed by police in South Carolina, Whitfield explained that the protesters got firearms to protect themselves from a potential other attack from the fraternity. To continue reading this article, please visit www.cornellsun.com. Atticus Johnson and Shubha Gautam can be reached at aj639@ cornell.edu and sg2563@cornell.edu.