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long summers compared to peer schools. However, while winter break lengths have varied during the past two decades, summers have gradually gotten shorter at Penn.

According to Philip Gehrman, a professor of psychiatry at the Perelman School of Medicine, there are other ways for students to decompress besides having more days off from school.

“To me, what would be most effective is if students were able to balance times of stress and work with times of relaxation every week, instead of saving up that stress for those days

CHART BY LILIAN LIU

off,” Gehrman said. “Learning to build that destressing time into your daily schedule is most important to reducing overall stress.”

According to Gehrman, poor mental health at Penn cannot be attributed to the length of the breaks, but rather the culture of the university.

“This is a very intense, stressful culture. I think students put a lot of high expectations on themselves,” Gehrman said. “The University would have to see what we can do as an institution to change that, and I don’t know exactly what that would be.”

English professor Emily Steiner is a noted medievalist whose research focuses on English literature of the 14th and 15th centuries. She received the Mary F. Lindback Teaching Award in 2016, the same award that Wax received in 2015. Steiner did not respond to a request for comment.

Sigal Ben-Porath

Sigal Ben-Porath has been a professor at Penn’s Graduate School of Education since 2004. Ben-Porath is also the former chair of Penn’s Committee on Open Expression and the author of the 2017 book "Free Speech on Campus." Her recent book is titled “Cancel Wars: How Universities Can Foster Free Speech, Promote Inclusion, and Renew Democracy.”

"When some members of the campus community are effectively barred from speaking, when they avoid speaking their minds for fear of humiliation or ridicule, or when they do not feel that they belong or that they are appreciated, free speech is limited just as much as it can be limited by censorship," Ben-Porath wrote in "Free Speech on Campus."

Ben-Porath declined the DP’s request for comment. Camille Z. Charles Camille Z. Charles is the Walter H. and Leonore C. Annenberg professor in the Social Sciences. She holds

WAX, from FRONT PAGE

comment because of University policy’s stipulation that all parties involved with sanctions proceedings maintain confidentiality.

Over a year into these proceedings, the DP broke down Wax’s 43-page grievance, the implications of this decision, and where the process stands today.

Wax’s grievance may delay University’s disciplinary proceedings

In her formal grievance, Wax framed her case as an attack on her academic freedom, contrasting with Ruger’s portrayal of the University’s pursuit of a major sanction against her. After Wax’s repeated inflammatory statements reached a new level of controversy in January 2022, Ruger charged Wax with violating multiple behavioral standards for University faculty, citing student and faculty accounts of the conduct that he believes warrants disciplinary action.

“Academic freedom for a tenured scholar is, and always has been, premised on a faculty member remaining fit to perform the minimal requirements of the job,” Ruger wrote in a June report to the Faculty Senate. “However, Wax’s conduct demonstrates a ‘flagrant disregard of the standards, rules, or mission of the University.’”

In the report, Ruger requested that the Faculty Senate convene a hearing board to conduct a full review of Wax’s conduct and impose a major sanction, as is in line with the University’s policy for punishing tenured faculty members. The leaked documents show that the Hearing Board has now been appointed and is composed of five of Wax’s tenured faculty peers. The board can ultimately determine that Wax’s conduct warrants a major sanction, with the potential penalty of Wax being fired.

Wax’s grievance filing against Ruger may delay the Hearing Board’s progress toward voting on whether to impose a sanction. When a grievance is filed, it is evaluated by the Faculty Grievance Commission and SCAFR, two arms of Penn’s Faculty Senate, which serves as the representative body for full-time faculty. The Faculty Senate can approve University policy changes under its purview and direct focus toward issues raised by members of its Senate Executive Committee.

Wax alleges Penn officials have misrepresented her conduct

In addition to the 43-page grievance filing, the DP also obtained a 52-page memorandum that reiterates many of the same arguments Wax’s lawyer made in a similar memo from August. The latest memo alleges that Ruger declined Wax’s request to postpone the disciplinary proceedings while she was treated for cancer during the fall. It also claims that Ruger responded to the August memo in November, in which he declined to postings in the Department of Sociology and the GSE, and is the director of Penn’s Center for Africana Studies.

Charles is known for conducting the National Longitudinal Survey of Freshman, designed to test “several competing theories of minority underperformance in college” — a frequent topic of Wax’s controversial commentary.

Charles declined the DP’s request for comment.

Beth Simmons

Beth Simmons is a political scientist who serves on the faculty of Penn Carey Law, fulfilling a University stipulation that one member of the Hearing Board is a faculty member at Wax's school. Before coming to Penn in 2016, she presided over the International Studies Association and directed Harvard’s Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Simmons declined to comment.

The Faculty Senate

The Faculty Senate has two divisions: the Senate Executive Committee and a set of standing committees which investigate matters important to the administration. Separate from these committees, Ruger requested that the Faculty Senate impose a “major sanction” against Wax and requested that the Faculty Senate convene a hearing board to conduct a full review of Wax’s conduct.

Wax's lawyer’s latest memo to the Faculty Senate alleges that Ruger declined Wax's request to postpone the disciplinary proceedings this fall while she was battling cancer.

Vivian Gadsden

Child Development professor Vivian S. Gadsden is the chair of the Faculty Senate. Her research focuses on cultural and social factors that affect learning and literacy, intergenerational and cross-cultural learning.

Gadsden received Ruger’s 12-page report on June 23 listing the conduct that he believed merited major sanctions. She serves in a presidial role in the proceedings. She also elected the five Hearing Board members.

Faculty Grievance Commission

The Faculty Grievance Commission consists of a panel of three members who are in charge of evaluating grievances and initiating the appropriate follow-up procedure. The commission will evaluate the merits of the grievance filed by Wax.

Sarah Hope Kagan

Penn School of Nursing professor Sarah Hope Kagan is the chair of the Faculty Grievance Commission. Her research focuses on understanding the patient’s point of view in order to provide enhanced care and improve clinical knowledge. Kagan declined a request to comment.

Senate Committee on Academic Freedom and Responsibility

The Senate Committee on Academic Freedom and Responsibility is made up of nine faculty members and one of the tri-chairs of the Faculty Senate. SCAFR works with Penn's 12 schools to decide what to do if someone claims there has been a violation of academic freedom. They can make related investigations, reports, and recommendations on any of these related matters.

In her grievance filing, Wax requested that her case be evaluated by the Faculty Grievance Commission and SCAFR, which handles matters that the commission determines are related to academic freedom.

Raina Merchant provide data or information to substantiate his charges against Wax. Finally, the memo asks that the charges against Wax be “dismissed outright.”

Medical School professor Raina Merchant is the SCAFR chair. Her areas of expertise are disease prevention and health promotion, health care disparities, racism, and the connection between digital health and social media.

In the memo, Wax’s lawyer asks that the hearing board hold a preliminary hearing in which the board would deliberate Wax’s requests from August as well as Ruger’s response in November. Wax’s lawyer wrote in the memo that the hearing must occur before Wax can decide whether to participate in further hearings related to the charges — which, the memo argues, are flawed and based on a misrepresentation of the facts.

On the whole, the memo reiterated many of Wax’s previous counterarguments to Ruger’s charges. For instance, the memo alleges that Penn Carey Law consented to Wax’s request for permission for white supremacist Jared Taylor to speak in her conservative law class, and that the school reimbursed the lunch at White Dog Café where Taylor spoke with students. Taylor did not respond to a request for comment.

How Wax got here

Wax, a self-described “race realist,” has a welldocumented history of stirring national controversy by making racist, xenophobic, and homophobic remarks on podcasts and national television. Ruger argues that Wax’s public remarks and behavior at the law school have harmed students. In one instance, Wax allegedly told 2012 Penn Carey Law graduate Lauren O’GarroMoore, who is Black, that she had only become a double Ivy “because of affirmative action,” O’Garro-Moore told the DP in September. She was named as a witness of Wax’s conduct in Ruger’s June report to the Faculty Senate.

O’Garro-Moore previously wrote to the DP that, as of Dec. 4, she had not been contacted by anyone to date regarding upcoming hearings or proceedings.

As the disciplinary proceedings have continued, Wax has attacked the process while promising that she will fight the University as it pursues sanctions. In a variety of appearances on conservative talk shows and podcasts, Wax has also attacked Penn Carey Law students for what she sees as persuading Ruger to pursue sanctions against her.

“The students are basically little tyrants,” Wax told podcast host Alex Kaschuta in a Nov. 23 episode of her podcast “Subversive.” “They have learned to be big bullies because the system empowers them, they have a megaphone on the internet and in the media, they can gin up any sort of condemnation you can imagine, and those events and labels and gestures stick, they really do stick.”

Later in the conversation, Wax went on to say that “being racist is an honorific,” describing people who are called racists as people who “notice reality.” She said she encourages her students to adopt this behavior.

“That’s an occasion for praise and admiration,” Wax said. “Being called a reactionary, I tell my students if you’re called a reactionary, you should be proud. There are ways in which we would do well to react and go back to the way things used to be done.”

Once the hearings are over, the Hearing Board deliberates whether the charging party presented sufficient evidence to impose a major sanction. If so, the Board must provide recommendations about the sanctions to the president. Penn President Liz Magill would make the final decision taking into consideration the Hearing Board’s findings but would normally accept the conclusion.

In the case that the Hearing Board recommends termination, they must also provide a date for termination, which cannot be more than one year after the president’s final action.

Grievances: The procedure where faculty can allege mistreatment

Wax’s grievance against Ruger, filed on Jan. 16, is on the grounds of academic freedom and alleges that Ruger has been biased when conducting the proceedings.

According to the handbook, a grievance is “a claim that action has been taken that involves a faculty member’s personnel status or the terms or conditions of employment” that is arbitrary, discriminatory, or not in compliance with University regulations.

The Faculty Grievance Commission, which has three members, serves as the deliberative body for grievances.

Before a grievant like Wax can file a complaint, they must review it with the dean or, in the case of Wax, the Vice Provost for Faculty, since the grievance is against a dean’s actions.

If the Chair of the Commission concludes that the grievance contains issues of academic freedom — like Wax’s grievance asserts — then it is sent to the Senate Committee on Academic Freedom and Responsibility, which must resolve questions of academic freedom before the Commission can proceed.

SCAFR’s policy states that faculty members are free from censorship or discipline, as long as they acknowledge their obligations and that the public may judge their remarks. The professor should indicate if the remarks that SCAFR is evaluating were not made on behalf of the institution and show respect for the public opinion.

Since Wax’s grievance is filed against a dean, SCAFR has full responsibility and jurisdiction on the matter.

RANKINGS, from FRONT PAGE

careers in every sector of the legal profession,” the spokesperson wrote at the time.

In the Jan. 2 letter, U.S. News addressed many of the concerns raised by Penn Carey Law and other law schools. It promised to place more weight on student outcomes, including employment and bar exam passage, and place less weight on dollarper-student numbers and assessments from legal professionals, which schools have long criticized.

Among the announced changes, U.S. News promised to give “full weight” to universityfunded fellowships which funnel students into public service careers like those offered by Penn Carey Law.

The letter also promised to improve the way it considers programs that are designed to eliminate socioeconomic barriers to attendance, like aid and loan programs — addressing a central complaint raised by the boycotting schools, including Penn. U.S. News wrote that it would need “additional time and collaboration to address” these issues.

However, universities still place importance on the rankings, in part because of institutional pressure and the perceived importance of where they stand among other universities.

Penn Carey Law professor Paul Heaton, the academic director of the Quattrone Center, said that rankings do have value in their capacity to allow applicants to compare schools with a common set of definitions and organized data.

“I question the idea that there’s a single ranking system that is the right one, or one that we ought to emphasize for everyone,” Heaton told the DP.