There’s no compass to navigate these troubled waters of university unrest.

At Columbia and Yale, college officials forcibly dismantled pro-Palestinian encampments and arrested dozens. But the encampments already are back up.

Pro-Palestinian students and faculty say universities haven’t done enough to protect them, while pro-Israel students say they are the ones who actually have been subject to harassment and ridicule. About 900 people have been arrested nationwide at campus demonstrations, including one arrest at the University of Pennsylvania.

There’s donor and alumni pressure, congressional scrutiny, round-the-clock media coverage, lawsuits, and concerns about how it’s all disrupting education and campus life. The University of Southern California in Los Angeles canceled commencement because of safety concerns.

Enter the college president, who is charged with charting a path through the nearly impossible situation, with roots in a region continents away. It’s the hardest public-facing challenge that school leaders have confronted in recent years, experts say.

“College presidents, right now, the pressures they are under are very significant,” said Sigal Ben-Porath, a presidential professor in at the Penn’s Graduate School of Education. “Whatever you choose, there is going to be a justified, well-grounded argument for the opposite side. Whatever you choose, there is a remainder.”

‘An impossible demand’

Ben-Porath, the author of the book Free Speech on Campus, sees the controversy over the pro-Palestinian encampment at Penn through a unique perspective. She is a native of Israel, with family still living there. She once chaired the university’s Open Expression committee, which governs regulations around student protest, as well as the hearing board that recommended sanctions against law professor Amy Wax. Her world has been steeped in issues of free speech and academic freedom.

“What is at stake is really compelling, significant values that we as higher education institutions stand for,” said Ben-Porath, who has been at Penn for about 20 years. “The protection of open expression and free inquiry is one of them. The cultivation of civic engagement is another … The ability of all of our students to participate in learning activities without threat and harassment and hatred towards them …

“These are the values college presidents are looking to balance, and they really are very, very difficult to balance at this moment … Presidents have to basically choose who they stand with and it’s really an impossible demand.”

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