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School Board moves ahead on day care plans
The Richmond School Board is moving ahead with plans for five schools to open for day care for families that will be provided by three outside organizations.
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Virginia Ready launches new job training program with community colleges, bonuses
Get trained for a high-paying job, network with companies that are seeking to fill thousands of vacant positions and earn a $1,000 bonus. That’s the promise of a new Virginia Ready, that launched Monday.
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Catholic Diocese of Richmond launches new victims compensation process
The Catholic Diocese of Richmond wants to ensure that people who were victims of sexual abuse by priests and deacons are compensated as part of its efforts “to assist in the healing.”
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City apparently losing money on vehicle registration fees
Last year, the City of Richmond charged city vehicle owners a $33 annual registration fee for each of their cars, a $38 fee for each pickup or heavy-duty truck and $18 for each motorcycle.
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Flying Squirrels get ready for the season with virtual tours despite coronavirus
The Diamond will be eerily quiet this early spring.
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Medical marijuana dispensaries to open in Va.
Virginians with a doctor’s recommendation soon will have access to medical marijuana through CBD and THC-A oil dispensaries throughout the state. The Virginia Board of Pharmacy has approved five companies to open the dispensaries — one in each of the commonwealth’s five health service areas.
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VUU Panthers left out of NCAA Division II regionals
Virginia Union University’s outstanding basketball season is over too soon.
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Controversial Broad Street high-rise ordinances withdrawn
The battle over possible Broad Street high-rise buildings has temporarily ended in victory for the opponents.
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Hanover School Board reaches consensus on new school names
Bell Creek Middle School and Mechanicsville High School have been selected by the Hanover County School Board as the new names for the former Confederate Stonewall Jackson Middle School and Lee-Davis High School.
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A ‘bid for cheap immortality’
Letters to the editor
Re “Confederate chair held ransom: White Lies Matter group threatens to turn stolen $500,000 chair into a ‘toilet’ unless the United Daughters of the Confederacy in Richmond posts banner on anniversary of Confederate surrender,” Free Press April 8-10 edition:
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Refunds, rate reduction expected for Dominion customers
Virginia regulators have approved a settlement that will bring to a close a review of the rates of the state’s largest electric utility and result in modest refunds and a rate reduction for Dominion Energy Virginia customers.
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Black college network to broadcast VUU weekend game
Virginia Union University fans can enjoy basketball with their lunch this Saturday.
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Tennisbums to go to nationals
The Richmond Tennisbums will carry the Virginia banner into national doubles competition for tennis players age 65 and over.
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What happens after the bike races?
What is the City of Richmond going to do after the UCI Road World Championships is over? What’s next for the city? What if the bike races hadn’t come to Richmond? Would city officials have spent the money fixing up parts of the city? Where would that money have gone?
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Dominion Energy announces $25M in grants to HBCUs
Richmond-based Dominion Energy has announced it will provide $25 million in grants to historically black colleges and universities over a six-year period.
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Beating the heat Sweltering temperatures that reached nearly 100 degrees this week were enough to convince Donovan Walker to cool off by jumping into the …
Published on August 19, 2016
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Mary Atkins, 73, takes her argument to stop the hate directly to the group of about 15 neo-Confederates, several carrying military-style weapons, who staged a …
Published on August 23, 2018
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Parade of champions
John Marshall teams headed to quarterfinals
They come at you in waves— so tall, so talented, so tenacious and so many.
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College presidents on antisemitism, by Annie Ma
Over five hours at a con- gressional hearing, lawmakers pressed the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania and MIT on the topic of anti- semitism. In some instances, they were unable to say whether calls for the genocide of Jews would violate their schools’ conduct policies. The backlash started almost immediately. Penn’s leader stepped down within days. Har- vard’s presi- dent was on the hot seat for nearly a week before a university gov- erning board announced she would stay on the job. R e p u b l i - cans and Dem- ocrats alike criticized responses the presidents gave at the Dec. 5 hearing of a U.S. House committee on antisemitism on college campuses. In particular, the uproar centered on a line of questioning from Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., who repeatedly asked how each university’s code of conduct would handle calls for the genocide of Jews. Early in the questioning, Rep. Stefanik asked the presi- dents about chants for “intifada,” an Arabic word for “uprising” or “resistance.” Rep. Stefanik equated calls for an intifada as a call for a global Jewish genocide. Here is a look at the testimony given by Claudine Gay, of Har- vard, Liz Magill of Penn, and Sally Kornbluth of MIT. Liz Magill of PENN During the hearing, Rep. Ste- fanik asked Ms. Magill, “Does calling for the genocide of Jews violate Penn’s rules or code of conduct? Yes or no?” Ms. Magill repeatedly de- clined to give a yes or no answer. She emphasized the university’s policies considered whether “speech turns into conduct,” in which case it would be consid- ered harassment. Rep. Stefanik continued to demand a definitive answer. Ms. Magill responded that if speech were “directed and severe, pervasive, it is harassment,” and that whether a student would be punished is “a context-dependent decision.” That answer became a flash- point of the criticism of Ms. Magill. The day after the hearing, Ms. Magill said in a video statement released by the university that a call for the genocide of Jewish people would be considered harassment or intimidation. Still, Penn alumni and donors increased pressure on the board for Ms. Magill to resign, a cam- paign that dated to earlier in the fall, when the university allowed a Palestinian literary festival to take place on campus despite allegations that some speakers had shown antisemitism in other comments. Amid growing pressure from donors who said they would pull money from the university, Ms. Magill and board chairman Scott Bok resigned. Claudine Gay of Harvard Dr. Gay, the first Black woman president of the 400-year-old university, also was asked by Rep. Stefanik whether similar speech would violate Harvard’s policies. She gave a similar response to Ms. Magill, emphasizing that context and whether the speech turned into conduct would factor into any disciplinary decisions. “Antisemitic rhetoric, when it crosses into conduct, that amounts to bullying, harassment, intimidation. That is actionable conduct, and we do take action,” Dr. Gay said. “So the answer is yes. That calling for the genocide of Jews violates Harvard’s Code of Con- duct. Correct?” Rep. Stefanik asked. Dr. Gay reiterated that it depended on the context. “It does not does not depend on the context,” Rep. Stefanik responded. “The answer is yes, and this is why you should resign.” A day after the hearing, Dr. Gay condemned calls for violence against Jewish students in a state- ment posted by the university to X, formerly Twitter. Sally Kornbluth of MIT Dr. Kornbluth also was ques- tioned by Rep. Stefanik about policies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She responded by saying speech targeted at individuals, not public statements, would be considered a violation of bullying and harass- ment policies. Rep. Stefanik then asked, “Yes or no: Calling for the genocide of Jews does not constitute bullying and harassment?” Dr. Kornbluth responded that she had not “heard calling for the genocide of Jews on our campus.” Rep. Stefanik then asked Dr. Kornbluth whether she had heard demonstrators calling for an intifada. Palestinians have launched two intifadas against Israel — one in the late 1980s and one in the early 2000s. Both were to protest Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and both involved violence. But since Hamas’ massacre in Israel in October, some Jews have interpreted calls for globalizing the intifada as a call for broader attacks against Jews. “I’ve heard chants which can be antisemitic, depending on the context when calling for the elimination of the Jewish people,” Rep. Kornbluth said. Speech would be investigated as harassment if it were “pervasive and severe,” she said. In a written note to the MIT community two days after the hearing, the chair of the MIT Corporation signaled the execu- tive committee’s support for Rep. Kornbluth, who is Jewish. “She has done excellent work in lead- ing our community, including in addressing antisemitism, Islamo- phobia, and other forms of hate, all of which we reject utterly at MIT,” the statement said. The writer covers education, race and ethnicity for the Associ-
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Personality: The Rev. Cora Harvey Armstrong
Spotlight on honoree of gospel tribute and appreciation service
Churches and religious music groups are uniting under the auspices of the Friends of Gospel Music at Trinity Bap- tist Church on Saturday, Nov. 16, to pay tribute to a pianist, composer and preacher, the Rev. Cora Harvey Armstrong.
