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Steven Salaita, Whose Revoked Job Offer Inflamed Higher Ed, Says He’s Leaving Academe

Steven G. Salaita, the long-embattled professor known for a rescinded job offer and an ensuing fracas at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, says he’s leaving the profession.

In a Facebook post dated Saturday, Mr. Salaita announced that despite looking for employment on four continents, he had failed to find an academic job.

“A number of colleagues have attempted to recruit me, but their efforts always get shut down by management,” he wrote in the post, which has been shared by m…

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U. of Southern California Says It Will Fire Puliafito

The University of Southern California, reacting to reports of “egregious behavior” by Carmen A. Puliafito, a former dean of the medical school, told the faculty on Friday that the university would begin steps to strip him of tenure and dismiss him from the faculty, the Los Angeles Times reports.

The newspaper reported earlier this week that Dr. Puliafito, who stepped down as dean last year, had led a secret life of illicit drug use and partying with other drug users and prostitutes. He has since…

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Groups Call on Civil-Rights Official to Reject ‘90 Percent’ Statement on Campus-Rape Cases

More than 50 groups have signed a letter demanding that Candice E. Jackson, acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the U.S. Department of Education, reject a statement she made this month in a New York Times interview. Ms. Jackson told the newspaper that “90 percent” of campus sexual-assault accusations resulted from an accuser’s regret over a sexual encounter. Ms. Jackson has since apologized, calling the remarks “flippant.”

In the letter the National Women’s Law Center, joined by other…

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Adjunct at BYU-Idaho Says She Lost Her Job for Facebook Post Supporting Homosexuality

An adjunct professor at Brigham Young University-Idaho says she lost her job over a Facebook post in which she asserted that “homosexuality and transgenderism are not sins,” The Washington Post reported.

Brett A. Crandall, a spokesman for the private institution affiliated with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, confirmed that the university had severed its relationship with Ruthie Robertson, the adjunct. He didn’t answer further questions and pointed to the university’s offici…

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Texas A&M Removes Provost Over Conflicts of Interest

After an internal investigation found conflicts of interest between the provost and her spouse, Texas A&M University at College Station removed the provost and named an interim, The Eagle, a local newspaper, reported on Wednesday.

The office of the provost, Karan L. Watson, who last August announced her intent to step down after seven years in office, was responsible for paying Nancy Watson, her spouse, more than $114,000 during her time in the position. Nancy Watson, who owns a consulting ser…

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U. of Central Florida Student Says He Was Suspended for Viral Tweet of Ex’s Apology

A University of Central Florida student who tweeted his ex-girlfriend’s apology letter after a breakup, which he graded in red ink like a school paper, has been suspended, reported WFTV 9, a local ABC affiliate.

Nick Lutz posted the letter months ago, and it has been retweeted more than 121,000 times and liked more than 337,000 times. But Mr. Lutz and his lawyer, Jacob Stuart Jr., told WFTV 9 that even though the ex-girlfriend is not a UCF student, Mr. Lutz was placed on two semesters of suspens…

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Former Medical Dean at U. of Southern California Was a Drug User, Newspaper Reports

Updated (7/17/2017, 4:17 p.m.) with news on Dr. Puliafito’s work at the USC Roski Eye Institute.

The dean of the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California was with a woman when she overdosed in a Pasadena hotel room last year, the Los Angeles Times reports.

For more, see this Chronicle article.

That instance was one of many drug-fueled episodes chronicled in the Times report about Carmen A. Puliafito, a renowned eye surgeon who stepped down from his position at the univers…

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Key Democrat Calls for DeVos to Remove Top Civil-Rights Official

Updated (7/17/2017, 6:53 p.m.) with statement from Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.

The top Democrat on the Senate education committee, Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, is calling for Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to remove Candice E. Jackson as the top civil-rights official in the Education Department after her “callous” comments on campus sexual assault.

“In the three months she has been acting head of the Office for Civil Rights, Candice Jackson’s words and actions have made it clear wh…

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Iran Sentences Princeton Ph.D. Student to 10 Years in Prison

A doctoral candidate in history at Princeton University who was doing research in Iran has been sentenced to 10 years in prison on charges of spying for the United States, The New York Times reported on Sunday.

The student, Xiyue Wang, a 37-year-old U.S. citizen, disappeared months ago on a field trip to Iran. His arrest and conviction were only now officially made known by the Iranian judiciary.

A spokesman for Princeton said the university had already been aware of the arrest and had been work…

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After Professors’ Criticism, Group Updates List of Google-Funded Scholars

A group that created a list of scholars who’d received money from Google has updated the database in response to critics, including professors who said they didn’t belong on the list. In some cases the Campaign for Accountability, the creator of the dataset, defended putting professors on its list; in others, it clarified why scholars had been included; and in others, it removed academics from the list altogether.

“There’s no single way to do this, and we’re necessarily limited by the info…

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