Columbia University Offers Optional Multicultural Graduation Ceremonies

On March 6, a senior researcher at Britain’s Center for Social Justice tweeted a link to a description of Columbia University’s multicultural graduation ceremonies: “Racially and sexually segregated graduation ceremonies,” she wrote. “One of the 'best' universities in the world. 2021. If you want to know what going backwards looks like, this is it.”

The student-run conservative news site, The College Fix picked up on the story, reporting that Columbia offers “segregated” ceremonies for LGBTQIA, Native American, Asian, Black, Latinx, and first generation or low income students. Users of several social media platforms noticed the headline and began calling the additional graduation ceremonies unconstitutional. Major news sources such as Fox News circulated the story to a wider audience.