Talk:President of Columbia University

Requested move 18 June 2021

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) Lennart97 (talk) 19:08, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

List of presidents of Columbia University → President of Columbia University – Article was formerly a bare list, but I think it is more appropriate now to change the title of the article to that of the office, a la the page on the President of Harvard University. alphalfalfa(talk) 19:03, 18 June 2021 (UTC) The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Support per WP:PRECISE, WP:CONCISE and WP:RECOGNIZABLE. Although the list is still the major part of the article, it is only one section of the broader article. Station1 (talk) 05:52, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

Missing link
The first "Charters and Statutes" link on this article leads to a missing page. The correct link for that article at this time is https://secretary.columbia.edu/sites/default/files/content/University%20Statutes_January2022.pdf, but I'm not sure how to update it or the associated citations. Can someone assist? Kinnayrberes (talk) 22:17, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

Notes for Shafik
Per, I'll explain why I removed information about Shafik authorizing arrests. There have been plenty of controversies involving Columbia presidents – for instance, Bollinger's role in the Columbia Unbecoming controversy or Kirk's role in the 1968 protests. The only time controversy is mentioned is when it led to the president's departure (see Kirk and, to some degree, Cooper). I'm not attempting to condone what happened, but I think we should avoid overweighing recent events and keep the list at a high level; details about each president's term are best suited for those individuals' articles. RunningTiger123 (talk) 01:18, 12 June 2024 (UTC)


 * It is an interesting point. I actually looked into Kirk's "retirement" (I assumed until this year he had resigned) and he said he was basically just retiring. So based on that logic we should remove Kirk's affiliation with 1968, which I think we obviously shouldn't.
 * I could see in five years if other stuff happens in her presidency removing it, but right now, April 2024 is Minouch Shafik's Columbia legacy, and frankly her life's legacy, like it or not. It doesn't make sense to include that she was the former President of the LSE, and then oversaw this massive civil disturbance at Columbia which sparked protests on 100+ campuses. Jjazz76 (talk) 01:30, 12 June 2024 (UTC)
 * The general trend for BLPs is to lean towards exclusion (WP:BLP: BLPs must be written conservatively). In this case, that would mean we start from the presumption that the controversy doesn't merit inclusion and wait for time to prove otherwise, especially when it comes to controversy. Also consider WP:BLPBALANCE: Given their potential impact on biography subjects' lives, biographies must be fair to their subjects at all times. If the existing trend is not to mention various controversies, it can come across as unfair to mention this one; it is very difficult to judge if it's fair to mention one controversy but not another without running into WP:DUE issues. The exception, as I noted, would be if it leads to departure, as other reasons for departure (death, other jobs, ...) are included. RunningTiger123 (talk) 01:56, 12 June 2024 (UTC)
 * feel free to include other controversies. This is isn't a page to brag about various Columbia presidents in my opinion. I don't see any issue with making Nicholas Murray Butler feel bad, as long as it is concise. The arrests that Shafik ordered pretty obviously merits inclusion. Just google the name "Minouche Shafik" and you'll find abundant sourcing and discussion on the first page of Google. I'm literally watching a whole Frontline episode that features discussions of it prominently.  Jjazz76 (talk) 04:46, 12 June 2024 (UTC)
 * Of course the first results right now are going to mention it – searches will generally show current news stories near the top. That doesn't mean those results are going to stay near the top long-term. RunningTiger123 (talk) 11:29, 12 June 2024 (UTC)
 * A fair point. I still think it should included. It takes up a pretty sizeable chunk of her own page, which many editors have worked on over the past few months or so. The volume of coverage and duration was pretty widespread. I'm happy to revisit the issue in a year or two, but we'd be doing our readers a disservice by not including it at the moment. I'm happy to hear what others think though. Jjazz76 (talk) 17:47, 12 June 2024 (UTC)