By Reagan Reese

The Department of Education Office of Civil Rights (OCR) found during an investigation that the University of Vermont (UVM) failed to address student’s reports of anti-semitism harassment including cyberbullying by other students and a teaching assistant,  according to a Monday press release.

The investigation was resolved on Monday after the university agreed to issue an anti-discrimination policy, create a Bias Response Team and revise its policies used to address reports of antisemitic harassment, according to a Department of Education press release. The OCR opened an investigation into the institution after the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law filed a complaint in 2021 on behalf of students at the university alleging that the school was not responsive to any anti-semitic complaints that led to a hostile environment on campus.

“As part of our commitment to continual review and improvement, UVM is updating our equal opportunity and antiharassment policies and procedures to make abundantly clear that discrimination and harassment based on shared ancestry, including antisemitism, violate university policy,” the university said in a press release. “We are developing specific policy improvements to share in the coming weeks, and we pledge to continue holding ourselves to a standard that ensures our response to reports of hateful conduct related to antisemitism will be timely and effective, and addressed in the same manner we address other forms of discrimination and harassment.”

The complaint that led to the investigation alleged that students threw rocks at the university’s Hillel dormitory space and when a resident asked them to stop, they were asked if they were Jewish.

A teaching assistant encouraged students to “cyber bully and ostracize” any Jewish students, while also threatening to deduct points from Jewish students’ grades if “Zionism is integral to their Jewish identity,” according to the complaint. Students reported the teaching assistant to the university who also discussed vandalizing the Israeli flag online.

The university was also made aware that Jewish students were also excluded from several groups including the campus book club, “UVM Revolutionary Socialist Union,” which posted that “Jewish Zionists” were not allowed to join the club, the complaint stated. Jewish students were also allegedly barred from an online forum called “ShareYourStoryUVM,” which was created by “UVM Empowering Survivors,” a widely known support group for students on campus to share their stories of sexual abuse anonymously.

“First, the university’s Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity (AAEO) Office declined to investigate any of the complaints, even though they notified the university regarding serious allegations of harassment,” the Department of Education said in a press release. “Second, responsive steps the university did take were delayed; were not designed to rectify concerns communicated to the university, including regarding the existence of a hostile environment; and may have discouraged students and staff from raising further concerns with the university or with participating in the OCR investigation.”

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