Classes canceled at Harvard, Penn, Columbia over Trump win: ‘As a queer, immigrant woman of color,’ ‘I cannot go’ ‘about my day’
Several professors at Ivy League schools canceled classes, excused absences, and allowed exams to be rescheduled because former President Donald Trump decidedly won the 2024 election.
The Harvard Crimson reported that the school’s dean, Rakesh Khurana, told students to “let yourself feel a bunch of emotions about how this is going to impact us in the future, and listen to other people and how they feel about it too.”
‘[If] you don’t feel up for class, absences today will be excused.’
The outlet noted that following Trump’s election victory, instructors for courses such as Statistics for Social Sciences, Solving and Optimizing, the Ancient Greek Hero, and Popular Culture and Modern China had canceled their Wednesday classes, made attendance optional, or extended assignment deadlines.
Economics lecturer Maxim Boycko allegedly sent an email to students in an Intermediate Microeconomics course that in-class quizzes would be optional.
“As we recover from the eventful election night and process the implications of Trump’s victory, please know that class will proceed as usual today, except that classroom quizzes will not be for credit,” Boycko reportedly wrote. “Feel free to take time off if needed.”
Physics professor Jennifer E. Hoffman purportedly wrote in an email to students and faculty that her office would be “a space to process the election.”
“Many in our community are sleep-deprived, again grieving for glass ceilings that weren’t shattered, fearful for the future, or embarrassed to face our international colleagues,” Hoffman reportedly wrote. “I stress-baked several pans of lemon bars to share.”
Citing internal emails, the Washington Free Beacon reported that a Columbia professor granted students permission to skip class.
“I hope you are hanging in there. I have been think of you over the last few days,” the Columbia professor reportedly wrote to her students. “[If] you don’t feel up for class, absences today will be excused.”
Meanwhile, because of the election results, a professor at Columbia University’s sister school, Barnard College, allegedly offered students a chance to “replace” an exam on which they performed poorly.
“In recognition of the increased stressed [sic] some of you might be feeling because of the election results, I will offer to replace your midterm Exam 2 grade with your Final Exam grade if better,” a Barnard professor reportedly wrote to students.
Campus Reform reported that Michigan State University Professor Shlagha Borah canceled classes because Trump won the election.
Borah, an assistant professor in the Department of Writing, Rhetoric, and Cultures, allegedly told her students in a memo on Wednesday night, “I am cancelling class today to grieve the presidential election results. As a queer, immigrant woman of color, I cannot, in good conscience, go on about my day like everything is alright.”
”This is a major historical event that we are witnessing,” Borah added. “I hope you take this time to take care of yourself.”
Michigan State University spokesperson Mark Bullion told the College Fix on Thursday that campus leaders are “aware of the situation and are addressing it through the appropriate leadership channels.”
The Daily Pennsylvanian reported that several professors at the University of Pennsylvania canceled classes in response to the election.
Economics professor Anne Duchene told the outlet she made attendance optional to her class in advance of the election results.
“I thought maybe, [having an optional lecture] can help everyone pretend it’s business as usual, instead of just looking at your screens constantly, trying to understand what [happened],” Duchene reportedly stated.
“I just wanted to acknowledge the wide variety of emotions that were in the classroom and also to respect these emotions,” Duchene allegedly said. “It’s really hard to know how the students are, what the students are really thinking, but my interpretation is that they wanted to have a normal class.”
Neuroscience professor Michael Kaplan also pre-emptively canceled his Wednesday classes, according to the report.
Anthropology professor Caroline Jones allegedly rescheduled an exam after “a slew of emails” from students expressed concern about preparing for an exam scheduled right after the election.
The Phoenix, a student-run newspaper at Swarthmore College, where annual tuition and room and board cost about $65,000, reported on the reaction to the election results:
As the Swarthmore community came to terms with the news, an outpouring of resources flooded their inboxes. Some professors canceled classes, the Office of Student Engagement encouraged students to use Sharples Commons as a “safe space to land,” and the department of political science promoted its pre-scheduled panel discussion set for Wednesday afternoon, “Election Night 2024: What Just Happened and What’s to Come.”
As Blaze News reported this week, Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy established “self-care suites” following Trump’s decisive 2024 election victory. Georgetown University attempted to soothe liberal students by offering them milk and cookies, hot cocoa, Legos, and coloring books.
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