News Archive

Who will turn out to vote on November 8? Rodolfo de la Garza, Eaton Professor of Administrative Law and Municipal Science and Professor of International and Public Affairs, has insight into a key block of voters: Latinos. De la Garza directs Columbia’s Project on Immigration, Ethnicity, and Race and is vice-president of the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute at the University of Southern California. He’s currently studying the states in which Latino voters may have the biggest impact in the upcoming election.

Politicians have been talking about the need for tax reform for decades and this year’s presidential campaign is no exception. Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump both say changes are needed, but it should come as no surprise that their proposals are very different.

Sharyn O’Halloran, the George Blumenthal Professor of Political Economics and Professor of International and Public Affairs, has been focusing on the role of money in politics this year, in particular the presidential elections. “This is going to be a very tight race, it’s going to be a race about money, where money matters, and the candidates are going to have to speak not only to unnatural parts of their different constituencies, but they’re going to have to pick up the moderates within the electorate.

O’Halloran, a political scientist and economist who writes extensively about issues…

The last seven years have seen a slew of state laws enacted that require voters to have government-issued identification to combat in-person voter fraud.  That, in turn, has set up a series of challenges to those laws, many of which have been scaled back or overturned by federal courts. Richard Briffault, the Joseph P. Chamberlain Professor of Legislation at Columbia Law School, discusses the laws and the challenges to them—and their effect on this year’s presidential election.

Q. What role will voter ID laws have in this election?

A. They probably won’t play a big role in…

With the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, race has become a defining issue in this election year, and mobilizing the African American vote will be the key to winning the presidency, says Fred Harris, a professor of Political Science and director of the Center on African American Politics and Society.

Harris, whose scholarship has ranged widely over politics, race and religion, wrote the 2012 book The Price of the Ticket: Barack Obama and the Rise and Fall of Black Politics, and his commentaries have appeared in The Washington Post, The New York Times and the London Review of Books. In…

Gregory Wawro specializes in explaining the intricacies of politics and government. As a professor of political science, he studies Congress, campaign finance, political economy and judicial politics. He has written an award-winning book on the use of the Senate filibuster and the effects of legislative rule changes.

As he looks at the 2016 election, he sees a number of unprecedented developments. This is a year when Republicans should have had a much easier time regaining the presidency, as it is rare for a party that holds the White House for two terms to keep it for a third.

If Clinton…

Columbia University produced a return of -0.9 percent on its endowment portfolio for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2016. This reflects the normal one-quarter lag in private equity and real asset valuations.

The total value of the Columbia’s endowment as of June 30 was $9 billion. The University’s trailing 5- and 10-year returns are 7.4 percent and 8.1 percent, respectively. For long-term returns, Columbia remains a leader in its peer group.

“This was a year when most leading endowments had negative or only very modest returns,” said University President Lee C. Bollinger. “For…

Columbia oceanographer and paleoclimatologist Peter B. de Menocal, was appointed Dean of Science in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. He was also named as Thomas Alva Edison/Con Edison Professor, a newly established chair funded by Con Edison.

Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger today announced that Peter Holland has been named chief executive officer of Columbia University Investment Management Company (IMC). Mr. Holland, who has been IMC’s chief investment officer since 2003, will succeed Narv Narvekar, the outgoing CEO of IMC, who was today named president and chief executive officer of Harvard Management Company. Holland will transition to his new role effective October 3, 2016.

“We are extremely fortunate that Peter Holland will continue and further expand his leadership that has been essential to the University’s…

In an effort to encourage Hispanics to hit the polls in November, HBO Latino filmed a one-hour special Habla y Vota on the impact of voting in the Latino community. The special includes a segment on Frances Negrón-Muntaner, professor of English and Comparative Literature, who studies a variety of issues affecting Latinos. Filmed in English with Spanish subtitles, it will air across HBO’s channels through Election Day.

In the 2016 election candidates rarely agree on anything—except their opposition to free trade. But economists find that repealing trade is unlikely to restore the manufacturing jobs that have been lost. Learn more and watch video of Amit Khandelwal, director of the Jerome A. Chazen Institute for Global Business at Columbia Business School, discussing international trade.

Emily Ramshaw, the editor-in-chief of The Texas Tribune, a digital news organization, has been elected to the Pulitzer Prize Board, Columbia University announced today.

“The narrative of slavery is a real reminder to America of how much enslaved labor is woven into the fabric of the nation. The mission of the museum is to make African American history understood as American history,” says Architecture Professor Mabel Wilson, whose new book is the official Smithsonian Institution history of its 19th museum, which opens on Washington, D.C.’s National Mall on Sept. 24.

Kellie Jones, associate professor of Art History and Archaeology, and Sarah Stillman, director of the Global Migration Program at Columbia Journalism School, are among those named 2016 Fellows of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

In a discovery that could have profound implications for future energy policy, Columbia scientists have demonstrated it is possible to manufacture solar cells that are far more efficient than existing silicon energy cells by using a new kind of material, a development that could help reduce fossil fuel consumption.

The team, led by Xiaoyang Zhu, a professor of Chemistry at Columbia University, focused its efforts on a new class of solar cell ingredients known as Hybrid Organic Inorganic Perovskites (HOIPs). Their results, reported in the prestigious journal Science, also explain why these new…