By: Fern Sidman

A sweeping new assessment of Jewish campus life in the United States has laid bare a national academic environment increasingly defined by hostility, intimidation, and an alarming degree of institutional apathy. According to a 2025 nationwide study detailed by The New York Post in a report on Monday, nearly four out of ten Jewish college students report that they have hidden their identity on campus for fear of harassment, social ostracism, or outright violence. Even more jarring: 62% said they have personally been blamed for Israel’s military operations in Gaza, revealing a culture in which Jewish students are routinely held collectively responsible for geopolitical events far beyond their control.

The findings are part of watchdog group StopAntisemitism’s annual 2025 “report cards,” which evaluate 90 college and university administrations on their efforts—or marked lack thereof—to combat the explosion of antisemitism that followed the Hamas massacre of October 7, 2023. Fourteen institutions, including elite universities long considered bastions of progressive thought and moral leadership, received failing grades. These assessments paint a portrait of higher education where ideological fervor has eclipsed basic protections, and where Jewish students increasingly feel abandoned by administrators who once vowed to defend them.

“Antisemitism on American college campuses is systemic and tolerated, and in many cases enabled by the very institutions tasked with protecting our American kids,” StopAntisemitism founder Liora Rez told The New York Post, summarizing what many Jewish families have suspected for over a year: the problem is not merely episodic but deeply embedded.

StopAntisemitism’s report reveals an environment in which harassment has become so normalized that Jewish students increasingly turn inward, crafting strategies to remain invisible. Thirty-nine percent say they have concealed their Jewish identity—removing mezuzahs, hiding Stars of David, avoiding Jewish campus organizations, or using initials rather than full names on dormitory doors.

The New York Post report noted that 58% of respondents said they have personally experienced antisemitism on campus, yet a mere 12% believed their institutions adequately addressed the incidents.

One student quoted anonymously in the study described the campus as “a minefield of performative activism, where being Jewish automatically marks you as suspect.” Another told The Post that “Jewish students get interrogated simply for existing,” adding that the line between anti-Israel activism and open antisemitism has “almost completely collapsed.”

Further, 65% of students said there were physical spaces on campus where they felt unwelcome or unsafe, largely due to anti-Israel demonstrations that The New York Post report said have “run amok,” often turning into intimidation zones around libraries, dining halls, and academic buildings.

Two of New York City’s flagship institutions—Columbia University and The New School—received failing grades, a damning indictment for universities often celebrated for intellectual sophistication and moral leadership.

At Columbia—once home to the most visible and volatile anti-Israel encampments in the nation—The Post reported “repeated antisemitic incidents including vandalism, hate-filled emails, and disruptions glorifying extremist violence.” Federal investigators have since found that the university exhibited “deliberate indifference” toward Jewish students’ safety, warning that continued negligence could jeopardize hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding.

At The New School, the report cataloged a pattern of anti-Jewish hostility that administrators consistently minimized or ignored. Like Columbia, The New School has endured months of radicalized protests, disruptions of Jewish events, and incidents in which visibly Jewish students were chased, harassed, or yelled at without meaningful intervention.

These failures, StopAntisemitism argues, are not aberrations but symptoms of a deeper ideological shift in academia—one that privileges performative activism over authentic pluralism, and political orthodoxy over student welfare.

Prestigious Ivy League institutions—Harvard, Yale, the University of Pennsylvania, and Brown—also earned failing grades.

Harvard’s decline is particularly remarkable. As The New York Post report recounted, the university has spent the past year embroiled in battles with the Trump administration over federal funding, after congressional hearings exposed its inability—or unwillingness—to discipline faculty members, student groups, or teaching assistants who openly trafficked in antisemitic rhetoric.

While Harvard announced new initiatives for 2025, StopAntisemitism concluded that the campus climate “remains tense, and accountability uncertain,” a phrase that captures the broader national anxieties of Jewish students who no longer trust the institutions they once idealized.

MIT, Northwestern University, and UC Berkeley—three institutions frequently praised for innovation and intellectual rigor—also received failing grades. According to the information provided in The New York Post report, these campuses have become “ground zero for antisemitism in American higher education,” where harassment, intimidation, and even violence are tolerated under the guise of political expression.

Rez’s assessment was blunt: “These institutions pride themselves on being moral and intellectually elite, yet they repeatedly fail to protect Jewish students.”

Despite widespread failure, the report did identify pockets of progress. Dartmouth College received the highest grade among the Ivy League schools—earning a B, with administrators widely praised for clear protocols, decisive responses to incidents, and a sustained commitment to student safety.

Only 15 schools nationwide received an A, including Baylor, Clemson, Elon, and Colorado State University. These campuses share a common thread: administrators who moved quickly and transparently to condemn hate speech, enforce disciplinary consequences, and articulate unambiguous standards of conduct.

StopAntisemitism argued that these models must become the norm, not the exception.

Cornell University, which received an F last year following a series of chilling threats against its Jewish community, improved to a C. StopAntisemitism credited Cornell with “affirming its commitment to inclusivity,” though some students continue to report inconsistent enforcement.

Vassar College, historically criticized for entrenched anti-Israel activism, rose from a D to a B, with students reporting increased security and more robust administrative engagement.

New York University earned a C, as Jewish students told The Post that although administrators had taken steps to address antisemitism, “much more remains to be done.”

The broader implications of the StopAntisemitism report go far beyond individual campuses. As The New York Post report noted, the findings reveal a systemic failure of leadership across higher education.

Jewish students—long considered one of the most active, civically engaged demographics on campus—are now withdrawing from visibility, participation, and even classroom discussion for fear of being targeted.

Only 62% of Jewish students said they would recommend their schools to others. That figure, StopAntisemitism warns, may signal a long-term exodus of Jewish presence from American academia, reversing generations of vibrant Jewish intellectual and cultural life.

The group’s recommendations are clear: universities must adopt transparent anti-hate policies, enforce them consistently, and swiftly condemn acts of intimidation and discrimination. Institutions must also stop excusing antisemitism under the guise of “anti-Zionism” or “political speech.”

Rez emphasized that, despite the grim findings, there are bright spots that demonstrate what genuine institutional courage can accomplish.

“These schools don’t wait for national headlines or external pressures to act,” she told The New York Post. “They set clear standards, enforce them consistently and fairly, and make it known that antisemitism is not tolerated on their campus.”

Leadership, the report suggests, is not merely a matter of policy but of principle.

StopAntisemitism’s 2025 report represents more than a diagnostic assessment—it is a moral indictment. It exposes a higher-education ecosystem where Jewish students are increasingly forced into the shadows, where campus activism has mutated into sanctioned intolerance, and where the institutions entrusted with cultivating the next generation of American thinkers have fallen tragically short.

As The New York Post report noted, Jewish students are sounding the alarm not because they are fragile, but because the environment has become genuinely dangerous—physically, politically, and psychologically.

Whether university presidents will treat this report as a catalyst for change or merely another media cycle remains uncertain. But for the students living this reality, the stakes could not be higher.