Columbia

Since the explosion of generative AI onto the scene last November, ChatGPT has been making waves across various sectors and industries. 

In the education space, the popular chatbot developed by OpenAI put instructors on high alert, with the New York City Department of Education blocking access to the technology in January of this year — the ban has since been lifted — over concerns of academic plagiarism and negative impacts on student learning. 

Dan Wang, associate professor of business at Columbia Business School, says that while there was little time for educators to adjust to the sudden rise of ChatGPT, encouraging his students to use ChatGPT to do their assignments has been more beneficial than harmful. 

“There was an opportunity, in many ways, to embrace this as a potentially beneficial use case in the classroom, while at the same time learning about its risks and limitations,” he told PYMNTS in an interview, adding that the only requirement is for students to disclose its use when submitting an assignment. 

And surprisingly, the students’ response, despite authorization to use the tool, was below his expectations. “I expected every student to be curious enough to want to embrace these tools but that didn’t actually materialize,” he remarked. “Throughout the semester, only about 40% of students ultimately adopted AI tools in their written assignments at least once.” 

The lesson from that one semester experience, he said, is that there needs to be a systemic change in how policymakers approach the use of AI tools in the classroom. “It has to be built in to justifiably be used as a tool for learning and one that’s creatively and also organically integrated into assignments and classroom exercises in ways that are obvious as well.” 

AI Requires More Student Effort

According to Wang, the use of AI tools like ChatGPT requires iteration and experimentation, exposing students to different perspectives that they would otherwise not have come up with on their own, while enhancing critical thinking and encouraging a more comprehensive understanding of the subject matter. “That’s something that’s not easy to do,” he said. “On average, students who use generative AI tools wind up spending more time on their homework.”

What that means is that educators must think about different standards in evaluating students, considering, for example, the effort when generative AI tools are involved, he added. 

In terms of preparing students for the future, Wang suggested that the education industry should align learning with the emerging skills and knowledge needed in the workforce, while arguing that there will be “greater value” placed on generalists who can synthesize diverse inputs generated by AI tools than functional specialists.

AI Impact on Learning Is Uncertain for Now

When it comes to the concerns among educators around the ethical issues ChatGPT pose to the integrity of academic and student learning, Wang said it would be premature to develop solutions that are systemic in nature without first understanding the real effects on the learning environment. 

“We can’t develop policy and then standardize and implement that policy without a good understanding of how students are using some of these tools,” he argued. 

This is especially important due to the dearth of data regarding how AI impacts learning, he added, and whether the use of tools such as ChatGPT exacerbate or bridge inequalities in student learning outcomes. 

As Wang said, “That’s something that we just have to establish first before coming up with any kind of solution to mitigate the potential harms of generative AI in learning environments.” 

Finally, for colleagues in academia who are still on the fence about the use of AI in the classroom, he said embracing these tools is not only necessary but also an opportunity to test its limits through their own lived experiences. 

“Unless we have evidence that guides us, a lot of our reasoning just rests on assumption. And so, in many ways, it’s an opportunity for instructors, educators, researchers to either confirm or disconfirm the skepticism that might put them on the fence about these types of technologies,” Wang said. 

See More In: AI, AI learning, artificial intelligence, ChatGPT, Columbia Business School, Dan Wang, digital transformation, Education, Featured News, generative AI, News, OpenAI, PYMNTS News, pymnts tv, video

Originally Appeared Here

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIIZ)

The Columbia City Council passed an ordinance that makes Columbia a Safe Haven for the LGBTQ community after dozens of people spoke in favor at Monday night’s council meeting.

The ordinance passed by a vote of 6-1 with Ward 5 Councilman Don Waterman as the lone member of the council to vote “no.”

The ordinance declares Columbia a safe haven for free speech and expression, to express their support for the LGBTQ community.

“It’s really unfortunate that we even have to consider this,” Ward 1 councilman Nick Knoth said during the meeting.

The Council chambers were packed at the start of the meeting to the point Mayor Barbara Buffaloe had to ask a handful of people to step outside the council chambers, so the meeting wouldn’t break the fire code. Once public comments began, the line of people who wanted to speak stretched from the podium to the back of the room.

Several people had to watch the meeting from the lobby of City Hall while others watched from the conference rooms. Public comments began around 7:50 p.m. and did not conclude until after 10:30 p.m.

“We literally heard from every ward in Columbia,” Ward 3 Councilman Roy Lovelady said during the meeting.

The majority of the comments were in support of the ordinance, which included testimonies from several transgender students from the University of Missouri who shared experiences of being bullied and felt that the ordinance would make them feel safer while living in Missouri.

“The queer community is already a minority community in the united states so having our voices heard, that recognition, that safety that makes us feel protected is really important. It’s essential,” Anthony Plogger, the cofounder of NClusion+, told ABC 17 News before the meeting.

However, there was some pushback from several people who thought the ordinance would take away their fight to express their religious views while others argued that the ordinance was a lack of common sense.

Waterman argued while that the intentions of the ordinance are good it will not stop people members of the LGBTQ+ community from getting bullied.

“For an ordinance, I do not see a need for it,” Waterman said during the meeting.

The city says the ordinance still ensures the city is following state law, but makes enforcement of the state law the lowest priority so that law enforcement can focus on other issues. Buffaloe also pointed out during the meeting that the ordinance does not grant any additional rights to one group over another.

The ordinance establishes policies for the enforcement of laws and participation with other jurisdictions that seek the prosecution or imposition of administrative penalties on individuals and organizations providing, seeking, receiving, or assisting another individual seeking or receiving gender-affirming care.

The city also cited increasing violence in schools and hate crimes, a point that was echoed by many in support of the ordinance during the meeting.

“In July 2022 in Camden, Ohio, a young transgender man named Noah Ruiz was beaten by three cisgender men after using a woman’s restroom. The owner of the faculty had instructed him to use the woman’s room because he was assigned female at birth. Do you think his attackers let up when he explained he had a vagina? No, they called him homophobic slurs as they beat him,” a transgender man who got up to address the council, explained during public comments.

Gov. Mike Parson signed a bill banning gender-affirming care for transgender minors, and some adults in June. The new laws were enacted in August, Senate Bill 49. which bans access to gender-affirming care, such as puberty blockers and hormones to children, who are younger than 18 years old. The bill also prohibits Missouri’s Medicaid program, MO HealthNet, from providing payment for gender transition surgery and puberty blockers.

The city wrote in a council memo that the ordinance comes after multiple healthcare institutions across the country, including in Missouri, have scaled back or are considering calling back gender-affirming healthcare services in response to legal challenges brought on by the new laws.

“The City Council affirms that being LGBTQ is not a disorder, disease, illness, deficiency or shortcoming and commits to finding ways to improve social outcomes for LGBTQ Columbians,” according to the Ordinance.

University of Missouri’s Young Democratic Socialists of America held a meeting on Sunday where they prepared speeches and created posters for Monday night’s meeting.

The organization is advocating for the approval of two bills aimed at easing Missouri’s regulations concerning restroom protocols and restrictions on drug usage during gender transition.

“I’m hoping that they vote in both the ordinance as it’s drafted right now. But there’s also two additional amendments that are potentially up,” said Paul Harper, Coordinator at the Parents for Parents group.

Members emphasized that the City Council has been cooperative throughout the process, but they are ready for any outcome.

Roll cart ordinance

The City Council also unanimously passed an amended ordinance about the storage of roll carts on days that trash is not collected. The new trash pickup system is expected to begin on March 4.

Council members previously brought up concerns that its ordinance for the new roll carts was not specific enough.

The new ordinance includes, according to the council agenda:

“Section 22-158(b) (11) Except on the scheduled day of collection, it shall be unlawful to place or store refuse and recycling or refuse and recycling roll carts at any location on the premises which is not immediately adjacent to the residential structure.”

The city amended the ordinance on Monday night to include detached structures, such as garages.

The city held an in-person meeting to receive input from residents and gathered feedback from its beheard website.

According to the council agenda, 14 residents online approved of an ordinance requiring roll carts to be stored next to a house, while 13 were not in favor of a new ordinance. At the in-person meeting in December, 26 people attended, four were in favor of a new ordinance, while one was not, the agenda states.

Originally Appeared Here

Ira M. Millstein SEAS ’47, LAW ’49, the oldest and longest-serving partner at Weil, Gotshal & Manges, a prominent civic leader in New York City, and an ardent supporter of Columbia Law School, where he taught and established the Ira M. Millstein Center for Global Markets and Corporate Ownership, died on March 13, 2024. He was 97.

Dubbed a “boardroom sage” by The Wall Street Journal and a “governance guru” by Bloomberg News, Millstein was an authority on antitrust law and an outspoken champion of corporate governance reform, helping to transform the relationship between boards and shareholders. Over his distinguished career, he counseled the boards of companies and nonprofit organizations including Bethlehem Steel, General Motors, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, The Walt Disney Co., and Westinghouse. He also served as chairman of the antitrust sections of both the American Bar Association and the New York State Bar Association.

As an engaged member of the Columbia Law School community, Millstein served on the Dean’s Council and with his son, Jim Millstein ’82, endowed the Millstein Public Service Fellowship, which provides funding for recent graduates who secure positions with the federal government in the area of financial regulation. He and his son were the first father-son duo to receive the Law School’s highest honor, the Medal for Excellence, in 2014 and 2020 respectively.

“Looking back at law school, it made me,” he said in an interview with the Columbia Center for Oral History. “And it’s one of the reasons why I’m still loyal to it and support it. I would not be here if it were not for that school.”

Millstein was also a generous mentor. “Ira was always willing to share advice with our students on how to get the most out of their legal education and their time at Columbia,” said Gillian Lester, Dean and Lucy G. Moses Professor of Law. “Ira will be remembered for his kindness, his dedication to pro bono and social justice causes, and his civic leadership in New York City, including as a life trustee of the Central Park Conservancy and his stewardship of the September 11 Memorial and Museum. He leaves behind a legacy that will continue to inspire and guide future generations of leaders.”

One of his most visible legacies is the Millstein Center (initially established at Yale University, in 2005), which moved to Columbia Law School in 2012. The center remains at the forefront of corporate governance scholarship and practice, publishing research and convening conferences that address an array of contemporary issues faced by corporations and the capital markets. 

In 2020, Millstein was a guest on the Law School’s limited podcast series, Beyond Unprecedented: The Post-Pandemic Economy, a co-production of the Millstein Center and the Law School. At age 94, he discussed the history of “shareholder primacy,” the source of the pressure on public companies to boost stock prices, and the role he believed government should play in redirecting corporate priorities with host and Millstein Center Faculty Co-director Eric Talley, Isidor and Seville Sulzbacher Professor of Law. 

A Native New Yorker

Born to Harvey and Birdie Millstein in New York City on November 8, 1926, Millstein grew up on West End Avenue. He attended P.S. 165 and graduated from Bronx High School of Science in 1943 when he was 16. After earning a B.S. in industrial engineering from Columbia University’s School of Engineering and Applied Science (now named for the Fu Foundation), he worked briefly as an engineer in a factory. In an interview with students at Bronx High School of Science when he was inducted into its Hall of Fame, Millstein said he didn’t “have the head” for engineering. So he sought advice from the assistant dean at Columbia Law School, who had taught a law course at the engineering school; the dean encouraged Millstein to switch careers and helped him get admitted to the Law School. 

While he was a law student, Millstein was a faculty assistant to Professor Milton Handler, an antitrust expert; he described the position as transformative. “If I look at myself getting out of law school and compare myself getting into law school, it’s two different people,” Millstein said in the interview with the Columbia Center for Oral History. “I had matured. I had self-confidence. I had survived Milton Handler.”

He had also developed an abiding interest in antitrust law, which appealed to his appreciation for structure that he had acquired in engineering school. “I’ve always thought of everything in terms of structure,” he explained in the Bronx Science interview. “When I get into a problem, the first thing I think about it is: How is this structured? … What do I have to accomplish? How do I get there? … [Antitrust] has to do with organization: how companies are organized, what they’re supposed to do, what are the restraints on what they do. It was comparable to engineering.”

Antitrust and Corporate Governance Expert

Millstein’s first job after law school was in the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. “In those days, my chances of becoming an antitrust lawyer in private practice were nil because there were no Jewish law firms who were practicing antitrust,” he said in his oral history interview. 

Living and working in Washington was a turning point. “Until then, I was basically homegrown. I didn’t have much in the way of experience outside of my own family, close friends, and students,” he said. “I was exposed to the other 99.9% of the world. It was a good place to begin.”

In 1951, he went to work at Weil, Gotshal & Manges in New York, where he eventually focused his practice on antitrust law. When President Ronald Reagan pushed for deregulation and antitrust laws were less frequently enforced, Millstein shifted the focus of his practice to corporate governance.

In 1981, Millstein was part of a team that authored “The Statement of Corporate Responsibility” for the Business Roundtable, an association of corporate CEOs, which said it was a board’s duty to be responsible for the social consequences of a corporation’s actions. “That was my entrance into corporate governance,” he said. “When I started the Institutional Investor Project at Columbia [in the late 1980s at the Law School’s Center for Law and Economic Studies] and all the other undertakings, it was really to help push the subject along.”

In 2010, Millstein teamed up with Professor Harvey J. Goldschmid CC ’62, LAW ’65 to lead a popular Columbia Law School seminar on corporate governance. (The two also worked together on the Systemic Risk Council, an independent nonpartisan volunteer group established to monitor and encourage financial regulatory reform.)

“I cannot talk more highly of a lawyer becoming a part-time academic and passing on not only the law in which he or she might have become expert but, more importantly, passing on the experience of practicing law,” he told The American Lawyer in 2021. “Moreover, the interaction with young students is broadening for you. … I cannot overstate the necessity of staying current through this interaction.” Over the years, Millstein also taught at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, New York University School of Law, and Yale School of Management.

Millstein’s opinions on corporate governance were deeply influential. He shared his philosophy and lessons learned in scholarly articles and several books, including The Recurrent Crisis in Corporate Governance (written with Paul MacAvoy) and The Activist Director: Lessons From the Boardroom and the Future of the Corporation, which John C. Bogle, the founder and former chief executive of The Vanguard Group, called “a powerful and articulate book” in which Millstein “aims to drive a stake into director passivity.”

A Power Player

Millstein took great pride in his role helping in the judicial confirmation process for his longtime friend Ruth Bader Ginsburg ’59 (whose husband, Martin Ginsburg, was a fellow partner at Weil). When she was nominated in 1980 to be a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Millstein arranged for Ginsburg to have lunch with Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch, an acquaintance of his who held sway on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Twenty-three years later, Hatch asked Millstein to testify before the Senate at Ginsburg’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing. Millstein not only spoke of Ginsburg’s integrity and non-ideological scholarship, but he also lectured the senators on the ingrained gender bias and inequity in the legal profession and American society.

Outside of the law, Millstein played an active role in the civic life of New York City. “As you become more successful your obligation to the community which fostered your success is obvious,” he told The American Lawyer. During New York City’s fiscal crisis in 1975, he served as pro bono counsel to Mayor Abraham Beame and helped prevent the city from having to declare bankruptcy. “I don’t know where private practice ends and public service begins,” he told The New York Times in 2005.

Millstein was a life trustee of the Central Park Conservancy and served as its third chairman, from 1991 to 1999. He was chairman emeritus of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and of the American Red Cross of the Greater New York Region.

He served on numerous task forces and committees, including the U.S.-Russia Capital Markets Forum Working Group on Investor Protection, the New York State Commission on Public Authority Reform, and the National Commission on Consumer Finance, which he chaired. His long list of honors includes the New York Law Journal’s Lifetime Achievement Award, the Benjamin Botwinick Prize for Ethical Practice in the Professions from the Columbia Business School, the National Law Journal’s 2006 list of the 100 Most Influential Lawyers in America, and the rank of Chevalier of the National Order of Merit from the French government.

In 2002, Millstein was tapped by John C. Whitehead, a former co-chairman of Goldman Sachs, to serve as pro bono counsel to the board of directors of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, which was formed in the wake of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, to oversee the revitalization and rebuilding of the areas surrounding the site of the World Trade Center. The group was instrumental in creating the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, which honored Millstein with its Lifetime Achievement Award in 2022.

On the occasion of his 70th anniversary practicing at Weil, he shared some of his wisdom for the next generation of lawyers. “The advice I would give younger attorneys is never stop learning,” he said. “Life is just one change after another, and staying current through teaching, representing the community, and doing a hell of a good job with your clients is not just what your career is about, but the capacity to successfully meet the challenge of change.”

In addition to his son, Jim, Millstein is survived by his daughter, Elizabeth Millstein Tremain, five grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.

Originally Appeared Here

UPCOMING EVENT …

Held on April 3, the Womack Conference will be hosted by the University of Missouri’s Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute

PUBLISHED ON March 14, 2024

“The outlook for Missouri agriculture is higher production in 2024 because of a rebound in yields, lower grain and oilseed prices more than offsetting a slight decline in input prices, and lower government payments,” said Ben Brown, senior research associate with FAPRI and conference organizer. (Photo: Zoe Schaeffer, Unsplash)

COLUMBIA, Mo. — The 2024 Abner W. Womack Missouri Agriculture Outlook Conference is set for Wednesday, April 3, at the University of Missouri Bradford Research Farm near Columbia, Missouri.

Former U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt will be the keynote luncheon speaker.

Each year at the conference, the University of Missouri’s Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute (FAPRI-MU) unveils its baseline outlooks for ag production, farm prices and consumption for the next ten years. Those outlooks inform Congress on agricultural policy.

Abner Womack is the cofounder of FAPRI-MU, which is celebrating its 40th year in 2024. This is the 10th annual conference bearing Womack’s name.

“The outlook for Missouri agriculture is higher production in 2024 because of a rebound in yields, lower grain and oilseed prices more than offsetting a slight decline in input prices, and lower government payments,” said Ben Brown, senior research associate with FAPRI and conference organizer.

Brown said Missouri livestock producers should see improved profitability this year compared to 2023 because of higher prices and lower feed costs.

“However, drought conditions liquidated herd sizes leaving fewer market-ready animals,” he said.

Preparing farmers for the future

As a leader in agricultural research, including market conditions and policy, the College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources is helping Missouri’s farmers achieve success. FAPRI is committed to providing the information and analysis needed by policy makers as they make important decisions affecting everyone with a stake in agriculture.

In addition to the keynote address, the conference includes a U.S. commodity panel featuring the American Soybean Association, the National Cotton Council of America and American Farm Bureau, and a panel of policy experts from the U.S. House and Senate Agriculture committees, the International Food Policy & Research Institute, and the American Sugar Alliance.

An international panel covering global issues relevant to U.S. agriculture features FAPRI’s partners from around the world, including the University of Nevada Reno, which partners with FAPRI on international crop and livestock models; the Bureau for Food Agricultural Policy, South Africa; and Teagasc (the Irish Agriculture and Food Development Authority).

Joe Outlaw and Bart Fischer, co-directors of the Agricultural and Food Policy Center at Texas A&M, will provide a farm finance update.

Free registration is available on FAPRI’s website and is required if eating lunch. Registration and networking begin at 8 a.m. The conference runs to 3:30 p.m. at 4968 Rangeline Rd, Columbia, MO, 65201.

— University of Missouri

Originally Appeared Here

Balevic brings more than three decades aviation leadership
and engineering experience to new role

AURORA, Ore., March 12, 2024–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Columbia Helicopters (“Columbia” or the “Company”) announced today that David Balevic has been appointed President & CEO, effective immediately. Balevic will succeed Michael Tremlett, who is departing the company to pursue other opportunities.

Columbia Helicopters is a global leader in the heavy and super heavy-lift helicopter sector, with a more than 60-year track record of innovation, technological firsts, and industry milestones. The Company manufactures, provides sustainment services for, and operates the Model 234, CH-47D Chinook, and Model 107-II tandem-rotor helicopters. The Company’s principal customers include the U.S. military, foreign allied militaries, U.S. and foreign civil protection agencies, and a broad range of commercial customers.

Balevic brings more than 35 years of leadership experience across the aviation industry to Columbia. He previously spent eight years at CHC Helicopter, where he served as the Senior Vice President for Engineering & Operations before being promoted to President & CEO in August 2019. During his tenure, Balevic oversaw all aspects of the business, including aircraft flight operations, supply chain, and the global MRO services. Additionally, Balevic has over two decades of experience at GE in their Aircraft Engine, Power, and Oil & Gas business units.

“On behalf of the board we are excited to welcome David to Columbia Helicopters, and look forward to working with him as we drive continued growth across our three core businesses: Global Aerial Operations, MRO, and Aircraft Solutions,” said Kirk Konert, Member of the Columbia Helicopters Board. “Dave has the ideal combination of aviation experience and leadership expertise needed to lead the Company to its next phase of growth. We would also like to thank Michael for his contributions to our success and wish him well in the next stage of his career.”

Story continues

“It is an honor to be given the opportunity to lead Columbia Helicopters and to continue to build upon its longstanding reputation for safety, quality, and customer satisfaction,” said David Balevic. “Given aviation industry tailwinds and our strategic advantages, the future for the organization looks bright and I am eager to get started working with the outstanding team we have in place.”

ABOUT COLUMBIA HELICOPTERS

Columbia Helicopters is a global leader in heavy-lift helicopter operations and a trusted expert in maintenance, repair, and overhaul services. Backed by over 60 years of experience, Columbia operates internationally, often conducting operations in remote, austere conditions, providing safe and reliable aircraft and qualified personnel that meet demanding global transport requirements. Columbia leverages its position as the OEM for the Model 234 Chinook and 107-II Vertol, and is an FAA Type Certificate holder of the CH-47D Chinook, to provide responsive modifications, lifecycle support, and MRO services trusted worldwide by a diverse customer base. For more information, please visit www.colheli.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240312011553/en/

Contacts

Media:
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Matthew Conroy
(646) 502-3563
aeroequity@stantonprm.com

Originally Appeared Here

Jewish billionaire and philanthropist, Henry Swieca, has resigned from his seat on the board of Columbia’s prestigious Business School. 

In an October 30th letter obtained by the Sun, Mr. Swieca said, “The entire Columbia administration has failed to take a strong stance condemning Hamas” and that there are “blatantly anti-Jewish student groups and professors allowed to operate with complete impunity.” 

“I am compelled to disassociate myself from Columbia Business School and any other institution affiliated with Columbia University,” Mr. Swieca concluded.  

Mr. Swieca runs a family office invested in public securities, real estate, private equity, and venture capital, Talpion Fund Management. He was previously the founder and chief investment officer of a hedge fund, Highbridge Capital Management, which was later sold to JPMorgan Chase. His net worth, according to Forbes, is estimated to be $1.9 billion dollars.

The financier’s name has since been removed from the long list of board members on the Columbia Business School website as of Wednesday. The board still has a large number of prominent Jewish members.

Mr. Swieca’s resignation comes amid several incidents involving anti-Israel activism at the Ivy League university. On October 26, Columbia’s undergraduate student newspaper reported that several hundred members of the Columbia community walked out to encourage the University to disaffiliate from Israel. Participants chanted, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” On Tuesday night, Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib was censured by the House for her embrace of the slogan, which she called “aspirational.”

It was this chant in particular, Mr. Swieca wrote in his letter, that was a major impetus for his own disaffiliation from the university. “Statements from the University are meaningless when pro-Hamas students march on campus yelling slogans calling for the complete destruction of Israel– that’s exactly what is meant by ‘from the (Jordan) river to the (Mediterranean) sea,” the billionaire stated. “Any other minority group on campus would never have to face anything close to this level of intimidation and hatred.”  

In addition to the anti-Israel walkout, Columbia has been in an unflattering spotlight due to several other incidents in the wake of Hamas’s October 7 terror attacks on Israel. A petition with more than 70,000 signatures called on a Middle Eastern Studies Professor, Joseph Massad, to be removed after referring to the October 7 attacks as a “resistance offensive” to “Israeli settler-colonialism and racism toward the Palestinians.” In another incident, a 19-year-old Columbia student, Maxwell Friedman, was arrested for assaulting a pro-Israel student on campus who was filmed vandalizing posters of kidnapped Israelis. 

Mr. Swieca’s resignation follows Columbia Business School alumnus and hedge fund billionaire Leon Cooperman stopping his donations. Mr. Cooperman, who has donated a total of $50 million dollars to the school, said its  students had “sh-t for brains” in an interview with Fox Business News.  

Originally Appeared Here

Metro

By Doree Lewak

Published
March 9, 2024, 3:53 p.m. ET

An Israeli-born Columbia University professor who gained notoriety for ripping the school’s failure to address rampant antisemitism on campus revealed this week he’s under investigation by the embattled Ivy — a probe he said is a “clear act of retaliation and an attempt to silence me.”

Shai Davidai, an assistant professor at Columbia Business School, wrote Friday to his nearly 35,000 “X” followers that the university opened a probe into his “advocacy for the Jewish and Israeli students, faculty, and staff at the university.”

“To say that civil rights are being violated does not begin to capture what Jews and Israelis are forced to endure on campus right now,” he wrote.

Shai Davidai, an assistant professor at Columbia Business School, wrote Friday to his nearly 35,000 “X” followers that the university opened a probe into his “advocacy for the Jewish and Israeli students, faculty, and staff at the university.” Stefano Giovannini

Davidai — who considers himself “the most vocal faculty member in the United States and maybe the world” against antisemitism — declined to share details of the investigation, launched last month by Columbia’s Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action Office.

“I abhor Islamophobia – and prejudice of any kind,” he told The Post, adding that he supports the rights of Palestinians.

“My problem is with Hamas and support for Hamas. I guess the university somehow thinks that supporting terrorism a protected class. That could be the only explanation for this investigation.”

Aside from his livelihood, Davidai — who has worked at Columbia for five years — claimed what’s at stake is “professors’ ability to call out bad behavior by universities.”

“If they go after me, I can’t even imagine all of the other [faculty] who have done much less and are being silenced by their institution,” he said, adding that other colleagues confided that “it might not be worth it to go public” against their school’s policies.

The beleaguered Ivy is under investigation by Congress and the US Department of Education, and is facing two lawsuits, brought by close to 20 Jewish students, for violations of their civil rights.

“Columbia is an especially bad example of antisemitism on campus that the administration has refused to act on for years,” said Gerard Filitti, a lawyer with The Lawfare Project, a pro-Jewish human and civil rights organization.

Davidai’s investigation was launched last month by Columbia’s Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action Office. TNS

Davidai worked at Columbia for five years. Stefano Giovannini

Filitti blasted the “double standard” at the school that he said existed “long before Oct 7, when students and faculty have complained about antisemitism on campus and feeling unsafe, intimidated, harassed and bullied by pro-Hamas and pro-Palestinian protestors on campus, including professors.”

“We do not comment on personnel matters. As a general matter, if the university receives a formal complaint, it will review and consider the complaint under established processes,” a Columbia spokesman said.

Davidai’s lawyer, Mark W. Lerner, partner at Kasowitz Benson Torres, told The Post: “Despite unrelenting pro-Hamas and anti-Semitic demonstrations placing Jewish students at risk, both prior to and since October 7, 2023, Columbia‘s baseless investigation of professor Davidai for demanding that Columbia enforce its policies to protect those students is a flagrant act of discriminatory and unlawful retaliation aimed at silencing him. It will not succeed.”

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Originally Appeared Here

Donald Trump has won Missouri’s Republican caucuses, one of three events Saturday that will award delegates for the GOP presidential nomination.

The former president, who is especially strong in caucuses, was adding to his delegate lead in Republican caucuses in Missouri as well as at a party convention in Michigan. Idaho was scheduled to hold its caucuses later Saturday. Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, meanwhile, is still seeking her first win.

There are no Democratic contests on Saturday.

The next contest is the GOP caucus Sunday in the District of Columbia. Two days later is Super Tuesday, when 16 states and American Samoa will hold primaries on what will be the largest day of voting of the year outside of the November election. Trump is on track to lock up the nomination days later.

Michigan

Michigan Republicans at their convention in Grand Rapids on Saturday began allocating 39 of the state’s 55 GOP presidential delegates. But a significant portion of the party’s grassroots force was skipping the gathering because of the lingering effects of a monthslong dispute over the party’s leadership.

Trump handily won Michigan’s primary this past Tuesday with 68% of the vote compared with Haley’s 27%.

Michigan Republicans were forced to split their delegate allocation into two parts after Democrats, who control the state government, moved Michigan into the early primary states, violating the national Republican Party’s rules.

Missouri

The Missouri Republican Party held its presidential caucuses on Saturday, offering state voters their only chance to weigh in on who should represent the party on the November presidential ballot.

Voters lined up outside a church in Columbia, home to the University of Missouri, before the doors opened.

“I don’t know what my role here will be, besides standing in a corner for Trump,” Columbia resident Carmen Christal said, adding that she’s “just looking forward to the experience of it.”

This year will be the first test of the new system, which is almost entirely run by volunteers on the Republican side.

The caucuses were organized after GOP Gov. Mike Parson signed a 2022 law that, among other things, canceled the planned March 12 presidential primary.

Lawmakers have failed to reinstate the primary despite calls to do so by both state Republican and Democratic party leaders. Democrats will hold a party-run primary on March 23.

Trump prevailed twice under Missouri’s old presidential primary system.

Idaho

Last year, Idaho lawmakers passed cost-cutting legislation that was intended to move all the state’s primaries to the same date in May — but the bill inadvertently eliminated the presidential primaries entirely. The Republican-led legislature considered holding a special session to reinstate the presidential primaries but failed to agree on a proposal in time, leaving both parties with presidential caucuses as the only option. The GOP presidential caucuses will be on Saturday, while the Democratic caucuses aren’t until May 23.

The last GOP caucuses in Idaho were in 2012, when about 40,000 of the state’s nearly 200,000 registered Republican voters showed up to select their preferred candidate.

For this year, all Republican voters who want to participate will have to attend in person. They will vote after hearing short speeches by the candidates or their representatives.

If one candidate gets more than 50% of the statewide votes, that candidate will win all the Idaho delegates. If none of the candidates gets more than 50% of the votes, then each candidate with at least 15% of the total votes will get a proportionate number of delegates.

The Idaho GOP will announce the results once all the votes are counted statewide.

Trump placed a distant second in the 2016 Idaho primary behind Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas.

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KANSAS CITY (AP) — Former President Donald Trump continued his march toward the GOP nomination on Saturday, winning caucuses in Idaho and Missouri and sweeping the delegate haul at a party convention in Michigan.

Trump earned every delegate at stake on Saturday, bringing his count to 244 compared to 24 for former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley. A candidate needs to secure 1,215 delegates to clinch the Republican nomination.

The next event on the Republican calendar is Sunday in the District of Columbia. Two days later is Super Tuesday, when 16 states will hold primaries on what will be the largest day of voting of the year outside of the November election. Trump is on track to lock up the nomination days later.

The steep odds facing Haley were on display in Columbia, Missouri, where Republicans gathered at a church to caucus.

Seth Christensen stood on stage and called on them to vote for Haley. He wasn’t well received.

Another caucusgoer shouted out from the audience: “Are you a Republican?”

An organizer quieted the crowd and Christensen finished his speech. Haley went on to win just 37 of the 263 Republicans in attendance in Boone County.

Here’s a look at Saturday’s contests:

MISSOURI

Voters lined up outside a church in Columbia, home to the University of Missouri, before the doors opened for the caucuses. Once they got inside, they heard appeals from supporters of the candidates.

“Every 100 days, we’re spending $1 trillion, with money going all over the world. Illegals are running across the border,” Tom Mendenall, an elector for Trump in 2016 and 2020, said to the crowd. He later added: “You know where Donald Trump stands on a lot of these issues.”

Christensen, a 31-year-old from Columbia who came to the caucus with his wife and three children age 7, 5, and 2, then urged Republicans to go in a new direction.

“I don’t need to hear about Mr. Trump’s dalliances with people of unsavory character, nor do my children,” Christensen said to the room. “And if we put that man in the office, that’s what we’re going to hear about all the time. And I’m through with it.”

Supporters quickly moved to one side of the room or the other, depending on whether they favored Trump or Haley. There was little discussion between caucusgoers after they chose a side.

This year was the first test of the new system, which is almost entirely run by volunteers on the Republican side.

The caucuses were organized after GOP Gov. Mike Parson signed a 2022 law that, among other things, canceled the planned March 12 presidential primary.

Lawmakers failed to reinstate the primary despite calls to do so by both state Republican and Democratic party leaders. Democrats will hold a party-run primary on March 23.

Trump prevailed twice under Missouri’s old presidential primary system.

MICHIGAN

Michigan Republicans at their convention in Grand Rapids began allocating 39 of the state’s 55 GOP presidential delegates. Trump won all 39 delegates allocated.

But a significant portion of the party’s grassroots force was skipping the gathering because of the lingering effects of a monthslong dispute over the party’s leadership.

Trump handily won Michigan’s primary this past Tuesday with 68% of the vote compared with Haley’s 27%.

Michigan Republicans were forced to split their delegate allocation into two parts after Democrats, who control the state government, moved Michigan into the early primary states, violating the national Republican Party’s rules.

IDAHO

Last year, Idaho lawmakers passed cost-cutting legislation that was intended to move all the state’s primaries to the same date in May. But the bill inadvertently eliminated the presidential primaries entirely.

The Republican-led Legislature considered holding a special session to reinstate the presidential primaries but failed to agree on a proposal in time, leaving both parties with presidential caucuses as the only option.

“I think there’s been a lot of confusion because most people don’t realize that our Legislature actually voted in a flawed bill,” said Jessie Bryant, who volunteered at a caucus site near downtown Boise. “So the caucus is really just the best-case scenario to actually get an opportunity to vote for a presidential candidate and nominate them for the GOP.”

One of those voters was John Graves, a fire protection engineer from Boise. He said the caucus was fast and easy, not much different from Idaho’s usual Republican primary. He anticipated the win would go to Trump.

“It’s a very conservative state, so I would think that Trump will probably carry it quite easily,” Graves said. “And I like that.”

The Democratic caucuses aren’t until May 23.

The last GOP caucuses in Idaho were in 2012, when about 40,000 of the state’s nearly 200,000 registered Republican voters showed up to select their preferred candidate.

___

Originally Appeared Here

“A Rust Belt pragmatist dedicated to implementing climate solutions that work.”

Hometown: Chesterland, Ohio

Fun Fact About Yourself:  When I was in middle school, a couple of friends and I lobbied to have the spotted salamander designated as Ohio’s state amphibian in an effort to raise awareness about threatened wetlands.

Undergraduate School and Major: I studied at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and earned a bachelor’s in Science, Technology and International Affairs (STIA) with a concentration in Energy and Environment

Most Recent Employer and Job Title: My last role was at Climate Neutral, where I was brought on as the third hire. My most recent role / title was Director and Head of Carbon Measurement.

What makes New York City such a great place to earn an MBA? Besides being my home for the last couple of years, New York was the best place for me to earn an MBA. Given my interest in climate tech – a non-traditional recruiting path – New York offered me a location where I could easily arrange coffee chats (and hopefully internships!) with leading climate tech firms and VCs. Knowing how comprehensive our climate transition will have to be, I understand that it will be critical to have an MBA network at the center of the financial world – professors, classmates, and alumni from whom I can learn to put capital to work to solve the climate crisis. And of course, New York is home to the best (biased?) and the most diverse range of food, art, and culture (I can’t resist a good book talk). I’m really looking forward to sharing everything the city has to offer with my new CBS friends!

Aside from your classmates and location, what was the key part of Columbia Business School’s MBA curriculum programming that led you to choose this business school and why was it so important to you? Maybe unsurprisingly, the Climate Change and Business Program was key to my decision to attend Columbia. It was important to me that the business school has dedicated resources to developing curricula specifically tailored to my interests and to solving such a key global issue. CBS offers many courses dedicated to climate change and business and I’m looking forward to taking advantage of experiential learning and fellowship opportunities focused on climate change.

I see CBS’s dedicated approach to climate change as a feature of its integration with the broader Columbia University system. I’m eager to study alongside graduate students from the Climate School, SIPA, and the Law School – all of which are leaders on climate change education in their own right.

What has been your first impression of the Columbia Business School MBA students and alumni you’ve met so far. Tell us your best CBS story so far. My CBS story begins with my interview. I met with a recent graduate who was encouraging of my goals and took plenty of time to share his CBS experience. I felt (maybe prematurely) welcomed into the community. Then, I was ultimately convinced to join the CBS class after Columbia Connect, an on-campus event for admitted students in the Spring. I met lots of prospective students from non-traditional MBA backgrounds like me and many peers who also want to dedicate their careers to the climate transition.

What course, club or activity excites you the most at Columbia Business School? I mean… CBS literally has a course called “Climate Tech.” I think I have to pick that.

Describe your biggest accomplishment in your career so far: When I joined Climate Neutral, I had to come up to speed on carbon accounting and software development so that I could launch our tool for carbon measurement. Economic I-O, life cycle assessment, Python – it was all new to me. I began pouring over the Greenhouse Gas Protocol, and background on our tool’s databases. I spent hours on the phone with academic experts and combed through myriad PDFs. I listened to the companies we were working with as they told me about how their supply chain data was kept.

As I came up to speed, I also gained an innate understanding of the carbon emissions around me. My mug was no longer a mug. It looked a lot like steel chromium and polypropylene — something like 6.4 kg of carbon dioxide emissions.

Today, I’m lucky enough to be counted as an expert in the field of corporate carbon measurement. Last year, I was invited to speak on 1A, a National Public Radio show broadcast across the US to more than 4.5 million listeners. It has been the accomplishment of my career to be able to teach others what I’ve learned. Spending the hard hours teaching myself carbon measurement, forming an opinion on the practice, has enabled me to succinctly represent complex concepts to volunteers that I’m training, sustainability leaders at companies and my teammates who looked to me to shape out our organizational thought leadership on the subject.

What do you hope to do after graduation? My dream is to be a climate tech entrepreneur. To prepare for my dream job, my plan (for now!) is to pursue two parallel paths at Columbia: product management-focused on climate and climate tech VC.

What other MBA programs did you apply to? Again – because of my interest in climate tech – I focused my MBA search on business schools in Europe and the UK where, because of advanced policy on climate, there is a mature VC and tech landscape. I was admitted to INSEAD, Oxford, Cambridge, and London Business School. I also applied to NYU in New York.

I was deciding between LBS and CBS and chose CBS for a couple of important reasons. First, though I would love to live in London for a couple of years, I would like my long-term career to be in the U.S. and likely in New York. I saw the CBS network as invaluable to building a career in New York. Then, Columbia emerged as the leading business school, in my assessment, for climate change education. The Columbia Climate School and the Climate Change and Business Program were very important to me.

Lastly, my decision became easy when I learned about the semester exchange program with LBS, which I plan to take advantage of during my time at CBS. I can study maybe even intern – but, importantly, explore the London climate tech landscape while being a CBS student.

What advice would you give to help potential applicants gain admission into Columbia Business School’s MBA program? It was ultimately helpful to me to really know why I was going back to get an MBA. I’ve applied to graduate school several times – I think this time it stuck because I had enough time and experience to really understand – in specifics – what I want to do in my career and what exactly I’m going back to school to do and learn. Plus, I finally had the confidence to say out loud (in my apps) that I’m interested in industries – tech, VC – that are historically very male, and not accessible to people with a policy and nonprofit background. So, my advice is to know what you want, to be specific, and to really go for it!

DON’T MISS: MEET COLUMBIA BUSINESS SCHOOL’S MBA CLASS OF 2025

Originally Appeared Here