On Monday night I had the privilege of attending President Bollinger's fireside chat, which was in response to the recent controversy regarding the NYPD's reported surveillance of Muslim students across the northeast, including Columbia's own Muslim Students Association. I was also present at the Chaplain's town hall on the subject last night.
I leave the review of these discussions to others who feel the pain of this event more profoundly and have a much better understanding of what wrongs have been done. I myself am chilled by the reports of the NYPD actively watching a religious student group without any cause, but the shock and disgust of such things happening are better verbalized elsewhere.
Instead, for this post I'll address a different aspect of the fireside chat and town hall—the presence of Columbia's new provost, former Dean of SIPA John Coatsworth. As of Feb. 17, he dropped "interim" from his title, but Coatsworth has been largely quiet and disconnected from undergraduate life. This fact is not unusual for a University administrator (and completely understandable given his very short tenure). However, all of this changed on Monday night.
