Pay Equity Case in NYC: Chichilnisky vs. Columbia University

Now is your chance to make a difference for Pay Equity

You are needed to help Graciela Chichilnisky win her AAUW Legal Advocacy Fund(LAF) supported case against Columbia University for breach of settlement agreement, retaliation, sex discrimination, and pay inequity. Read the material below and you will be committed to her cause.

Please plan to come to be with her in court. Trial location dates and times are below. Her trial starts June 16. Give any time you can. Let me know when you can come and we will set up a schedule of days to insure AAUW members and friends will be there supporting her.

Join AAUW-LAF Litigant Graciela Chichilnisky in Court

Be There to Let Her and the Judge Know You Support Her Gender Discrimination Suit

Economics and Mathematics Professor Graciela Chichilnisky’s suit against Columbia University for gender discrimination will held in the Supreme Court of the State of New York, Judge Carol Edmead. The firm Proscauer and Rose will represent Columbia. Robert Felix represents Graciela.The building is at 60 Centre Street, Part 35, Room 438, on the fourth floor starting June 16 and scheduled for 6/18, 6/19, 6/25, 6/26, 6/27, 6/30, 7/2, 7/3 so far. There will be no trial dates 7/7-11, 2008, Times are 9am or 10am through 3:15pm. Come for whatever time you can, your presence is important, even if you don’t have all day to spend in the courtroom. We need to be there. AAUW members’ presence will be noticed (we’ll wear stickers) by Graciella and the court to serve as a reminder of our support and of the importance of such struggles for all women’s equality.

Dr. Graciela Chichilnisky, an extraordinarily gifted scholar, is UNESCO Professor of Economics and Mathematics at Columbia. She is the architect of the Kyoto protocols, which have been adopted world-wide. Her research on the global environment, including her concept of Basic Needs as a strategy for sustainable development (adopted by 150 countries in the U.N. Earth Summit), has been recognized world-wide as yielding enormous benefits to mankind. Not only is she a distinguished role model in two fields that typically have not welcomed women, her leadership in these fields has been outstanding. Her vitae and accomplishments are too extensive to be easily summarized here: please see her website, www.chichilnisky.com,

Professor Chichilnisky’s troubles at Columbia intensified when she filed a class action suit in 1991 on behalf of all women faculty, claiming unequal pay and promotions based on gender. Columbia settled with Professor Chichilnisky, but not the class, in 1995 and shortly thereafter released a report on salary equity and raised the salaries of four other female professors. Columbia soon began breaching the settlement and retaliating, asking UNESCO to terminate the UNESCO Chair and dismantling Prof. Chichilnisky’s research program, Program on Information and Resources (PIR): it froze $2 million in funds that she had raised; raided PIR’s office and dismantled PIR’s computers, causing the loss of crucial records and research; and eliminated PIR’s office space. In 2001 Chichilnisky initiated the present suit. In 2003 Columbia fired its own attorney and terminated settlement talks when negotiations were almost complete. For more information about her experience visit www.sexandtheivyleague.com .

If you are interested in learning about the glass ceiling in academia, how and why such a distinguished academic was so badly treated by her institution, why Columbia refused several million dollars of money for her research, why gender discrimination persists even among highly educated people, etc. this case should prove enlightening.