Graduate students voted 417–291 last month to support a call for the University to DIVEST from “corporations that maintain the infrastructure of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, facilitate Israel’s and Egypt’s collective punishment of Palestinian civilians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, or facilitate state repression against Palestinians by Israeli, Egyptian, and Palestinian Authority security forces.” About 28 percent of graduate students voted in the opinion poll, which was conducted by the Graduate Student Government.
GSG officials said the poll does not represent the graduate student body as a whole, but was designed to “present the positions of some students on campus.” A referendum on a similar divestment question was defeated by undergraduates a month earlier.
The Daily Princetonian published a lengthy examination May 3 of four foundations created to allow CHARITABLE DONATIONS to the eating clubs. The story, by former Prince editor-in-chief Marcelo Rochabrun ’15, concluded that alumni donors since 2008 have received tax deductions for $20 million in donations, most of which supported non-educational projects and “none of which qualify as educational donations under IRS guidelines.” The story can be found online: http://bit.ly/1A0gwW7.
In a statement to PAW, Sandy Harrison ’74, chairman of the Princeton Prospect Foundation (PPF), the largest of the four foundations, said the Prince’s reporting was “non-objective and legally flawed” and failed to recognize the major role that the eating clubs play in the “overall educational and cultural fabric” of the University, “notwithstanding their social function.” He said that PPF “adheres at all times in good faith” to a 1998 agreement with the IRS as to which expenses can be considered educationally related and the extent to which PPF can support them.