Brandeis University President Ronald Liebowitz announced today that he will resign on November 1. The surprise decision comes in the wake of a recent vote of no-confidence vote against Liebowitz by the Brandeis faculty.
The no-confidence motion passed by a narrow margin, with 159 faculty voting in favor, 149 voting against, and 26 abstaining. According to Jeffrey Lenowitz, chair of Brandeis Faculty Senate, 76.4% of eligible voters participated.
“There were ten more votes in favor than against,” Lenowitz said in a statement quoted by Boston.com. “This reveals what our multiple faculty conversations and debates on it made clear: while faculty are united in their care for Brandeis and their great desire for it to flourish, they are divided on this motion.”
The no-confidence motion was first introduced at a special faculty meeting last May, according to the Justice, the Brandeis student newspaper, but it was not voted on until this month. It reads: “The Faculty note with grave concern a consistent pattern of damaging errors of judgment and poor leadership by President Liebowitz. The results this year include badly handled budget shortfalls, failures of fundraising, excessive responses to student protests, indifference to faculty motions, and the recent damaging staff layoffs. The faculty have no confidence in the President’s leadership and we call upon the Board of Trustees to act.”
Brandeis was one of many campuses that saw anti-Israel protesters over the Hamas terror attack against Israel last year, and Liebowitz drew the ire of many faculty for taking a hard-line stance against the protesters. With his departure, he becomes the latest example of university presidents forced from office in part because of their handling of campus strife over the war between Hamas and Israel.
In his letter to the Brandeis community, Liebowitz wrote that he was resigning “with mixed emotions because this is an exceptional institution, which carries great meaning, especially at this time, due to the reason for its founding. At the same time, this is a valuable moment for me and for Jessica to build on our experiences to create new pathways for innovation and reform in higher education, and I resign knowing that the university will be in good hands.”
“The entire Board of Trustees thanks President Liebowitz for his commitment, dedication, and significant accomplishments during this tenure,” said Brandeis Board of Trustees Chair Lisa Kranc, in a statement. “Ron has faithfully championed Brandeis’ core and founding principles. While many have chosen to stay silent, Ron has had the moral courage to be a leading voice in recognizing that we cannot cower from any form of hatred, especially antisemitism.”
Kranc’s message also included the announcement that Arthur E. Levine, Ph.D., a Brandeis graduate and the former president of Branford College and the Teachers College at Columbia University, will begin on November 1 as interim president.
Liebowitz’s decision to resign is consistent with a trend revealed in other instances of no-confidence votes against college presidents. While such votes carry no legal authority to remove a president from office, the majority of presidents who are the targets of such votes leave their positions within a year of the action.
One frequently cited study published in the Journal of Research on the College President, analyzed press accounts of no-confidence votes over a two-year period. Institutions identified as having such a vote conducted by an official faculty group regarding their president or chancellor were studied further to identify whether there was a campus leadership change within six months of it. Votes meeting this definition were identified at 57 unique institutions.
Of the 57 cases studied, the campus leader was removed from office in 32 instances, or 56% of the time, within six months of the actual vote. The authors found that two-thirds (21) of the 32 departures were non-voluntary on the part of the president.
In addition, a 2022 analysis by The Chronicle of Higher Education found that of 235 no-confidence votes between 1989 and 2022, 51% of the presidents on the receiving end had left office within a year, even though their departures were seldom publicly linked to the vote.