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Brandeis faculty vote no confidence in university president
Coming at a turbulent point for the Waltham-based university, the faculty's motion passed by a margin of only 10 votes.
Brandeis University faculty members have voted “no confidence” in President Ronald Liebowitz, citing “a consistent pattern of damaging errors of judgment and poor leadership.”
The motion passed by a slim margin, with 159 votes in favor, 149 against, and 26 abstentions, according to professor Jeffrey Lenowitz, who chairs the university’s Faculty Senate. He said 76.4% of eligible voters participated.
“There were ten more votes in favor than against,” Lenowitz said in a statement to 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.”
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The faculty will discuss next steps and the implications of the results at its next meeting, he informed faculty members in an email Monday.
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The no-confidence vote follows several months of turbulence for the Waltham university, which like many Boston-area campuses saw a spike in protests following the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war.
A campus rally in support of Palestinians in Gaza ended with multiple arrests in November 2023, the same month Brandeis made the controversial move to defund its chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine. The university made headlines again this spring for allegations of “toxic” coaching on the women’s basketball team and for announcing plans to eliminate 60 staff positions amid mounting financial pressure.
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Brandeis has also taken a hit in the U.S. News & World Report college rankings under Liebowitz’s leadership, sliding 16 spots last year and dropping another three places in the 2025 list, released Tuesday. The university is now ranked 63rd nationally.
According to Brandeis student newspaper The Justice, a motion for a vote of no confidence proposed at a May 30 Faculty Senate meeting read, in part: “The Faculty note with grave concern a consistent pattern of damaging errors of judgment and poor leadership by President Liebowitz.”
Calling for action from the university’s trustees, the motion reportedly went on to note “badly handled budget shortfalls, failures of fundraising, excessive responses to student protests, indifference to faculty motions, and the recent damaging staff layoffs.” The discussion continued during a Sept. 13 meeting, with more than a dozen faculty members passionately speaking for and against the motion, according to The Justice.
Brandeis spokesperson Julie Jette confirmed the results of the faculty vote Monday in an email to Boston.com.
“As it is within faculty purview, including at Brandeis, such symbolic and non-binding votes have become more common at colleges and universities over the past decade,” Jette added.
Indeed, Liebowitz’s struggle to keep the peace with faculty members is hardly a unique story among colleges and universities around the U.S. According to The Chronicle of Higher Education, this past spring brought a “flurry” of no-confidence votes in college leaders, often prompted by their handling of pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
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A 2017 article in the Journal of Research on the College President explained that no-confidence votes are “largely symbolic actions by groups of faculty members who are declaring, by conducting such a vote, that they believe passionately that a change is needed and that the formal system of institutional checks-and-balances does not or will not provide restitution in a way that they believe will accurately reflect their perceptions.”
Liebowitz previously butted heads with the university’s trustees in 2021, accusing them of trying to force him out over misguided disapproval of his fundraising record, The Boston Globe reported at the time. The trustees inked a five-year contract extension with Liebowitz soon after, and then-Board of Trustees Chair Meyer Koplow publicly praised the college leader in an April 2021 news release.
“From day one, Ron has been a leader who is committed to driving Brandeis forward in a way that both reinforces our historic values and prepares our graduates for successful futures in a dynamic, global environment,” Koplow said at the time. “The board has always recognized that Ron has fostered a strong academic culture and created a detailed plan for an agile and dynamic university of the future.”
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