Affirming our Mission
Dear members of the Columbia community:
At the beginning of this semester, I set out several priorities for this academic year, first among them affirming Columbia’s mission and placing our mission and principles at the center of our decision-making. Over the final weeks of the semester, we will be sharing updates on these priorities, reflecting on the progress, challenges, and road ahead. Today, I am writing to engage you in what it means for our community to actively embody our mission and principles at this turbulent time.
The starting place for this conversation is straightforward: Columbia and universities like ours have long played a unique role in society by providing a level of teaching, scholarly research, and, in our case, patient care, found nowhere else. This essential mission, supported by academic freedom and inclusive excellence, has succeeded for many decades in educating new generations of leaders, advancing knowledge, and improving society. At a time when the enduring value of this endeavor is being questioned and challenged, we have an opportunity to double down to demonstrate the value of the education we provide and reaffirm the principles of academic freedom and inclusive pluralism that define a great university.
Over the past several months, as I have engaged throughout our university, I have been inspired by our collective commitment to the intellectual growth and personal journeys of our students. This is evident in our classroom teaching, formal and informal advising, and mentorship, and perhaps most importantly in our desire to create a vibrant community life that draws on the vitality of the remarkable city around us. So many faculty stay at Columbia because of their students and so many alumni tell me how Columbia changed their life trajectory. As we look forward, I believe we must deepen this commitment, asking how we can strengthen the connections between students and faculty, ensure that students have the resources needed to succeed, and create an environment, both in and outside the classroom, where everyone can grow and thrive.
Columbia has a storied tradition of embracing intellectual debate. The daily debates that occur in and beyond our classrooms have long brought the most brilliant minds to study and teach at Columbia, joining a university community that celebrates how respectful dialogue among people with differing views and ideologies can lead to greater learning and understanding—and even change minds. While opinions within our community differ, sometimes sharply, we share a fundamental belief in the power of exploring ideas with intellectual rigor and curiosity. Even as we continue our efforts to remove barriers to ideological diversity, we have to recapture and sustain our ability for robust and constructive debate that challenges orthodoxies, deepens understanding, furthers knowledge, and ultimately influences the world. This is how we will preserve the academic freedom and open inquiry that are the bedrock of our university.
To preserve these distinctive qualities in our Columbia community, we also must redouble our commitment to the norms and guardrails that protect free expression and enable a vibrant, diverse community to thrive. We have made substantial progress this year in the fair and effective application of our Rules of University Conduct and our policies, but our work must continue. Too many members of our community have felt unheard or unseen as they struggle with immensely distressing events on our campus and in the wider world. We must stand up as a community to repudiate antisemitism, discrimination, and harassment of any kind. No one here should feel threatened or fear for their wellbeing, and it should go without saying that we have zero tolerance for anyone promoting or calling for terror or violence. Over the last months, I have also been moved by the many times when our community has responded to the pain or vulnerability of others with the empathy and humility required to truly support those in need. We must continue to learn from these experiences, strengthen our commitment to addressing discrimination of any form, and draw on these experiences to build a stronger, wiser, and more resilient community.
We have navigated many difficult and disruptive events throughout Columbia’s long history, including, and perhaps especially, over the last year. Undoubtedly, we will face new challenges ahead. Truly embodying our academic mission and living by our principles is never more important than in times of change and challenge. We will succeed if we commit to continuing to grow and learn. We must listen to each other, remain open to ideas that challenge fixed ideologies and ourselves, and preserve the open intellectual discourse and rigorous research that define what Columbia means to the City, the nation, and the world. I have every confidence that we have the will, the ability, and the strength to fulfill this commitment.
All my best,
Katrina Armstrong
Interim President, Columbia University in the City of New York