thursday, december 4, 2025
celebrating 122 years
free
O • Holidays in college
C • Bridging distance
S • ROAD BACK
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Our columnist reflects on holiday seasons spent at SU, recognizing the change and emotion that comes with them.
For first-year students who don’t live on the East Coast, coming to Syracuse can present culture shocks, but also new friendships.
Steve Angeli is working to return from an Achilles injury as Syracuse’s starting quarterback in 2026.
suny esf
I want to believe that they are going to choose integrity over convenience in this matter.
We were certainly blindsided by it, because we had no clue that the decision had been made.
If the department goes away,
will I be able to take these classes?
With admissions to 18 majors paused, programs brace for ‘uncertain’ futures By Delia Sara Rangel, Griffin Uribe Brown, Julia Boehning, Kate Jackson, Samantha Olander
A
the daily orange
s a self-taught German student, Cooper Childres never expected to fall in love with the language — let alone declare a major in it. Childres, a Syracuse University sophomore, said he was anxious after testing into a high level on the language placement exam. But after meeting with one of the program’s professors, his nerves faded.
His first German class freshman year ultimately convinced him to declare it as a second major. A similar feeling returned earlier this semester, he said, when he heard admissions to his second major, along with 17 others in SU’s College of Arts and Sciences, had been paused. “At first it was kind of a blow, like, ‘Ouch, that’s how you feel about us,’” Childres said. “That really speaks volumes to how low on the totem pole we may be to you.” In September, SU paused admissions to 18 majors as part of an ongoing academic portfolio review, an effort ordered by Vice Chancellor and Provost Lois Agnew to evaluate the university’s academic offerings. While major-specific courses continue and current students can still enroll in these paused programs, the Arts and Sciences majors no longer appear on the Common Application. All students currently enrolled in affected programs will be able to complete their degrees, see pauses page 4
deisgn by ilana zahavy presentation director | elizabeth billman daily orange photo file
on campus
How Claude AI collects, uses SU student data By Chloe Fox Rinka asst. news editor
When Syracuse University granted campus-wide access to Claude in September, it became one of the first universities to provide access to the AI chatbot through an enterprise agreement. Now, SU personnel are using Claude AI
each day, Information Technology Services shared at a Nov. 12 AI at Work presentation. Claude, an artificial intelligence model developed by Anthropic, includes an AI chatbot and other AIpowered tools used for education. As the tool gains popularity at the university, some users hold concerns about data privacy.
Under SU’s partnership with Anthropic, all user data collected by Claude is kept within the university and not used to train the larger learning model, Jeff Rubin, SU’s senior vice president for digital transformation and chief digital officer, said. “If you look at the writings (Claude) puts out, it’s on the future of education
and artificial intelligence now that plays a role in pedagogy,” Rubin said. Faculty, students and staff can claim a license with their SU email to get started with the enterprise version, which allows users to upload documents, prompts, connect with Microsoft 365 and work on longterm projects. see claude page 3
ESF forms committee amid fiscal tension By Brenne Sheehan asst. news editor
When SUNY ESF’s United University Professions chapter raised alarms over the broader SUNY system’s stability plan in September, it left the campus community and administration in contention. Since then, ESF students and faculty said they’ve had sharp exchanges with ESF and SUNY administrators, from town halls hosted by the Mighty Oak Student Assembly to closed-door discussions. Even with the administration’s efforts to improve transparency about the stability plan, students and faculty are still unsure of the school’s future. MOSA President Daniel Vera said many students wish ESF administrators, like ESF President Joanie Mahoney, were more present in activism about the stability plan — joining the campus community’s greater movement against the broader SUNY system. Instead, he feels like the university has become complacent. “What originally was a fight against a united front from ESF as an institution toward SUNY has turned a little bit more into a fractured system within our own institution,” Vera said. “Students are feeling a little bit like, ‘Can we trust our administration? Can we not trust them to advocate for us?’” In a Tuesday statement to The Daily Orange, Mahoney said misconceptions about the plan circulate in campus circles. She emphasized that the stability plan is an “active, living” budget projection. “There is no plan beyond what has been shared widely and we welcome broad campus input on determining the critical next steps necessary to achieve our revenue and spending targets,” Mahoney wrote. Put in place by the SUNY system, ESF’s five-year stability plan asks ESF to cut 18.9% of its full-time staff by 2029 while increasing undergraduate enrollment by 16.1%, according to a document obtained by The Daily Orange in September. The plan also requires cuts to ESF’s athletics program and the school’s five major forest properties across the state. The plan comes as the university has operated at a deficit for the past 13 years, since SUNY took away the school’s $10 million recurring mission funding in 2012. Since learning about the stability plan, many faculty and students have been taking steps to revise the stability plan and encourage a collaborative relationship when creating university policy. While Vera said students have had several recent successes — including the development of a Stability see esf page 3