Before she left for spring break, Nicole Leon, CC ’20, picked up her cap and gown. It would be one of her last experiences on campus. Just two days later, University President Lee Bollinger announced that all classes would be moved online for the rest of the semester in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Further emails announced that all students who could leave must do so. Finally, on March 20, Bollinger announced that Commencement would be canceled.

The scheduled Commencement ceremony for the class of 2020 will be canceled for the foreseeable future, University President Lee Bollinger announced in an email to University affiliates on Friday afternoon. While graduates will receive their degrees on May 20, there will be no formal congregation to celebrate students walking the stage.

In the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak, all classes will be moved to a pass/fail grading system and classes will be canceled for the three days following spring break, according to an email from University President Lee Bollinger sent to University affiliates on March 20. Students will not be able to opt out or uncover their grades at the end of the semester.

A 14-year-old suspect was arrested in relation to the death of Barnard first-year Tess Majors last night at 10:30 p.m., according to a press briefing by the New York Police Department and Manhattan District Attorney’s Office following an indictment by a grand jury. Authorities say they are confident he was the one who stabbed and killed Majors.

Several acts of vandalism have been reported on the 16th floor of East Campus, according to an email sent by Residential Life to the building’s residents.

Columbia will be creating a new school dedicated to climate change—with the ability to grant degrees, hire its own faculty, and admit its own body of students—following a 104-page report by a team of administrators and faculty, the University announced on Jan. 30.

Columbia is the only Ivy League institution with an undergraduate school dedicated to fostering a community of “nontraditional” students from diverse backgrounds who have delayed their educational experience for a year or more. Named the School of General Studies, it promotes “experience and maturity” as prime features of the school’s community.

Starting fall 2020, students entering the School of General Studies with under 30 credits will be required to take Literature Humanities and Contemporary Civilization if they have not already fulfilled their literature/humanities and social science requirements. According to administrators, the effort comes as part of a broader move to slowly integrate General Studies students into the Core Curriculum.

The Lawfare Project, a New York-based think tank and litigation fund for Jewish and pro-Israel communities, has filed a federal complaint against Columbia alleging that the University has failed to address the “culture of discrimination” against Jewish students on campus.

For Aaron Stout, GS ’21 and a veteran, Columbia offered a unique opportunity through the School of General Studies to integrate and interact with the larger undergraduate student body both socially and academically, something other universities often do not offer for students in continuing education programs.