As debate continues over whether or not Sheherezade “Sherry” Jaafari,  former press aide to Bashar al-Assad, should have been granted admission to SIPA, some of our own weigh in. David Fine, CC ’13, interviewed Columbia professors, students, and alumni in a piece published on Tablet. Interviewees include Elazar Barkan, the director of Columbia’s Institute for the […]

A lot has been written about Sheherezade “Sherry” Jaafari, who’s scheduled to start classes at SIPA this fall. In an email to a J-school professor, ABC journalist Barbara Walters said she “is brilliant, beautiful, [and] speaks five languages.” On the other hand, Haya Dweidary, the only Syrian student in SIPA’s class of 2012, told the […]