As Baruch College Campus High School, what happens just an avenue away, at the College impacts our school’s community as well. After a recent resurgence of antisemitism in the media, we are starting to see it just down the block, at the very school our name is taken from. Recently, a student at Baruch College faced suspension after spewing anti-Semitic vitriol in a class group chat.

In a math class WhatsApp group chat, intended to be used solely for collaboration and peer help, a student wrote, ‘Death to Israel,’ ‘Heil Hitler,’ There is no Jew,’ and ‘This is the Shoah.’ ‘Shoah’ is the Hebrew word used to describe the Holocaust. The student’s slurs were intermixed with ‘Lol’ and various “humourous” emojis, implying a dangerous lack of remorse and understanding.

In this case, the college administration and faculty took immediate action to protect their Jewish community and suspended the student. But, as a college named after a Jewish person serving a 2,000-person Hillel community, students are protesting that more action be taken. The university president has put out a statement providing essential resources to students and faculty detailing that the university has launched “Faiths, Conflicts, and Coalitions”, a series initiated by the Office of the Provost. And still, many Jewish people believe this is not enough. On an Instagram post, a user commented, “…This shows how terrible things are in general in society and in general in this College… The rest of the Jewish students say they are afraid because now the rest of the racist-minded students may become more aggressive!! Who will protect them?”

Students at Baruch High School have their own opinion on what should be done. Simcha Sepler, a senior at Baruch High School, said, “I think that it’s important to hold people accountable, but I think in addition to typical punishments, it’s important to take a restorative justice approach. I think there should be an educational component to the consequences