Important messages for the university community

The University has long demonstrated its commitment to proactively addressing racism and discrimination through initiatives such as the tri-campus EDI Working Groups and Task Force, and the Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian Discrimination Working Group (MAP DWG), which is currently preparing its Final Report. 
As part of ongoing efforts, including MAP DWG, the University is seeking input on a draft web resource to help our community better recognize and respond to anti-Muslim, anti-Arab, and anti-Palestinian discrimination on our campuses. We anticipate that the insights and recommendations of the MAP DWG Final Report will enhance this institutional educational resource.

The University recognizes the need to approach the experiences of Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian communities with respect for their distinct and unique identities while acknowledging areas of interconnectedness. The initial draft web resource was developed in consultation with University community experts and brings together existing legal and policy frameworks at the University. It is intended to make our teaching, learning, and working environments more inclusive. The draft web resource contains no new policies and respects our institution’s fundamental values of academic freedom and free expression. 

We encourage all members of the U of T community to provide feedback and insights at www.consultations.utoronto.ca. This consultation will be open until February 20, 2026.

Dear University of Toronto community,

I hope that the new academic year is off to an inspiring and fulfilling start. Today, I want to share an update about changes ahead across our three campuses.

Following discussions with academic and administrative leaders, the University is moving forward with plans to ensure that we have a critical mass of administrative staff present on our campuses five days per week (Monday to Friday), while honouring our institutional commitment to considering alternative work arrangements. At the heart of this decision is our commitment to an academic community where students, faculty, librarians and staff learn, work, debate, and solve problems face to face. This in-person experience is the foundation of our vibrant campus life.

Being present with and for one another matters. In our Statement of Institutional Purpose, we emphasize our dedication to “fostering an academic community in which the learning and scholarship of every member may flourish.” Since I first joined U of T as an undergraduate student, then as a professor, Dean, and now President, I have gained immeasurably from that community. At each stage I have been informed and inspired by the interactions that fuel teaching, learning, research, professional and career development, as well as personal growth.

Nurturing a dynamic community of more than 100,000 students and learners requires a critical mass of people on campus. It means that students, faculty, librarians and staff have access to in-person services when they need them, that more of the spontaneous and multi-disciplinary “collisions” that spark ideas can take place, and that a visible tri-campus presence can thrive.

We know this change may be challenging for some staff. Campuses and divisions will initiate this shift beginning in January 2026, or sooner in some cases, with the understanding that it may take several months or more to realize. As always, our HR and operations colleagues will provide guidance and support on plans and space to help make this transition as smooth as possible.

Thank you for your dedication, flexibility, and all you do for U of T. I look forward to the energy and momentum we will create together as we increase our in-person staff presence across our three campuses.

Warm regards,

Melanie A. Woodin
President, University of Toronto

For supports and resources, please visit the People Strategy, Equity & Culture website: Administrative Staff Presence Across Our Campuses

We are aware of recent scams targeting University of Toronto students through email, particularly requesting tuition or deposit payments. The university never asks students for payment through e-transfer.

• If you’re unsure whether an email that appears to come from the University of Toronto is legitimate, start by checking the Information Security Phish Bowl to see if it’s a known scam.
• Students should check ACORN to see if you have an outstanding balance on your account. 
• Report suspicious messages with the “U of T Report Phishing” feature through your email, or forward it to report.phishing@utoronto.ca.
• If you have already sent money, contact your bank immediately and report the incident to the Toronto Police Service at www.tps.ca/fraud or 416-808-2222.

U of T offers extensive educational resources and programming to support the online safety of students, faculty, staff and librarians, which includes reporting mechanisms, guidance and examples for members of our community to identify and report phishing, fraud and other security incidents.

The Jackman Humanities Building will be closed for the remainder of today, Sept. 11, 2025, and tomorrow, Sept. 12. Staff, faculty members and students working and studying in the building are asked to leave and work from home or elsewhere for these two days; classes are being cancelled, relocated or moved online.

The university has made this decision out of an abundance of caution following online comments. The building will be closed until Monday and Campus Safety is on location. 

From: Anna Kennedy, Chair of the Governing Council

At a special meeting this morning, the Governing Council approved the appointment of Melanie Woodin as the 17th President of the University of Toronto for a five-year term, effective July 1, 2025. Her appointment follows an extensive international search initiated in March of last year. Professor Woodin will succeed Professor Meric S. Gertler, who has served as President since November 2013.

Professor Woodin has been Dean of the university’s Faculty of Arts and Science, Canada’s largest and most comprehensive faculty, since 2019. A Professor in the Department of Cell & Systems Biology, she is the author or co-author of over 50 academic papers, books and chapters. Her research focuses on understanding how the brain functions by studying neuronal circuits and the mechanisms underlying learning and memory.

She joined the University of Toronto in 2004 as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Zoology following postdoctoral study at the University of California, Berkeley. In 2017, she was promoted to full professor in the Department of Cell & Systems Biology. She holds a BSc in Biology and a MSc in Zoology from the University of Toronto and a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Calgary. Prior to becoming Dean in 2019, Professor Woodin served as the Vice-Dean, Interdivisional Partnerships and the Associate Dean, Undergraduate Issues and Academic Planning. From 2014-15 she was the Associate Chair, Undergraduate in the Department of Cell and Systems Biology and from 2015-17 she was the Director, Human Biology Program.

A highly accomplished scientist, she has received research funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Society of Canada, among others. In 2019, she was named as one of five researchers at U of T and its affiliated hospitals to receive a New Ideas Award for her work using gene therapy to delay the onset of symptoms in neurodegenerative disease. She is the President of the Canadian Association for Neuroscience and serves on the Board of Directors at the Vector Institute.

Professor Woodin is a highly respected, experienced academic administrator. She combines a deep understanding of the complexity of the University of Toronto and its partnerships with a passionate commitment to its world-class research and teaching mission. She brings an unwavering belief in the transformative impacts of universities, in general, and the University of Toronto in particular. With her extensive experience and proven track record of success, Professor Woodin is exceptionally well-suited to lead the university into its third century.

In closing, I would like to express my gratitude to the members of the Presidential Search Committee for the substantial investment of their time and for the invaluable knowledge and judgment they brought to this critical process. In addition, I would also like to thank all members of the university community and beyond for your thoughtful input that guided the work of the Committee.

Please see the U of T News story at: https://www.utoronto.ca/news/university-toronto-names-its-17th-president.

Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian community members continue to be impacted by experiences of discrimination, racism and Islamophobia.* It is our collective responsibility to proactively identify and address institutional barriers as well as further initiatives that enhance inclusive environments for Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian community members.

To that end, the University of Toronto is establishing the Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian Discrimination Working Group (MAP DWG), which will review programming, activities, processes, and practices in place at the institution and make recommendations to support the university’s response to experiences of anti-Muslim, anti-Arab, and anti-Palestinian discrimination. The Working Group will be chaired by Professor Anver M. Emon, Director of the Institute of Islamic Studies (IIS) and Canada Research Chair in Islamic Law & History. Professor Emon is a leading scholar of Islamic law and history and teaches in the Faculty of Law and Department of History in the Faculty of Arts & Science. He lectures in constitutional law, statutory interpretation, Islamic law and history, and comparative legal traditions. In recent years, his research has included a focus on Islamophobia. In addition to examining CRA audits of charities and editing Systemic Islamophobia in Canada: A Research Agenda, he inaugurated the Structural Islamophobia Research Lab at the IIS. His work in this area led to a federal appointment to the Advisory Committee on the Charitable Sector, where he led working groups adopting a whole-of-government approach to charities regulation.

MAP DWG has a mandate to engage in consultations with the university community, commencing in Winter 2025, and to deliver a final report with recommendations to senior leadership, supported by the Assistant Director, Faith & Anti-Racism, and the Executive Director, Equity, Diversity & Inclusion. In the coming months, additional opportunities to share feedback with the Working Group will be made available to students, faculty, staff, librarians and other members of the U of T community.

MAP DWG will build on the previous efforts of the Institutional Advisory Table on Islamophobia (2017-19) and the Anti-Islamophobia Working Group (2019-present).

Over the years, the university has increased its efforts to address experiences of Islamophobia on campus with intentional tri-campus educational programming for the community to foster greater understanding, dialogue, and inclusion. Building on this programming, as part of the Faith & Anti-Racism Inclusion Strategy, the Institutional Equity Office is engaged in consultations for the development of tri-campus e-modules, including topics such as Islamophobia, Anti-Palestinian Discrimination, and Faith, Race and Human Rights.

More information about the Working Group, including a call for nominations for additional members, will be shared in the coming weeks. Please visit the Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian Discrimination Working Group for updates and if you have any immediate questions, email psec.equity@utoronto.ca.

* For the purposes of this report and Working Group, Islamophobia and anti-Muslim discrimination will be used synonymously.

Over the years, the university has engaged in several initiatives to proactively address forms of systemic racism and discrimination. These include the convening of the Anti-Black Racism Taskforce and the Anti-Asian Racism Working Group. In addition, the Institutional Equity Office develops and coordinates a range of educational programming on topics such as faith and anti-racism, sexual and gender diversity, and accessibility.

The university has developed a draft Guide to Law and Policy regarding Antisemitism and Anti-Israeli Discrimination at the University of Toronto to help our community better recognize and respond to antisemitism and anti-Israeli discrimination on our campuses, and to make our teaching, learning, and working environments more inclusive. The draft guide brings together existing legal and policy frameworks at the university. It contains no new policies and respects the university’s fundamental values of academic freedom and free expression.

We are now seeking community input on the draft guide. We encourage all members of the U of T community to provide feedback and insights at www.consultations.utoronto.ca. This consultation will be open until January 31, 2025.

Trevor Young, Provost & Vice-President
Kelly Hannah-Moffat, Vice-President, PSEC

In recent days, the university’s commitment to fighting antisemitism has been called into question.

Let me be clear: the University of Toronto stands resolutely against antisemitism, as it does against all forms of hate and discrimination. We have consistently and repeatedly condemned antisemitism and have taken strong steps to combat this pernicious form of hate, including enhancing our policies, training, and enforcement.

Furthermore, we acknowledge and deplore the upsurge of antisemitism in our society, our city, and at our university. As I shared in my address to delegates attending the Conference on Historical and Contemporary Antisemitism, hosted by the Anne Tanenbaum Centre for Jewish Studies at U of T in September, this remains an urgent matter of global concern.

For our part, we are working to clarify what constitutes antisemitism on our campuses so that we may recognize it and respond to it more effectively. This definition will be an important element of our plan to strengthen our capacity to respond to complaints of hate and discrimination. The goal is to make our system clearer, faster, more effective and more accountable.

We will also review our existing Statement on Prohibited Discrimination and Discriminatory Harassment and ensure U of T’s compliance with Bill 166 (the Strengthening Accountability and Student Supports Act, 2024).

Embracing a core recommendation from the final report of the university’s 2021 Antisemitism Working Group, our Institutional Equity Office has redefined its mandate and scope explicitly to include antisemitism. It is also augmenting its capacity to counter antisemitism. And it is developing new training modules for managers across the University, to strengthen their ability to respond appropriately to antisemitic language and actions.

We also recognize that antisemitism is insidious and takes many forms. As such, we must rely on the recognition by everyone in our community that we have a shared responsibility to create an environment for teaching, learning, and research that is free from all forms of harassment, discrimination and hate, including antisemitism. This means comporting ourselves in ways that are informed by empathy, understanding and respect for our fellow students, faculty and staff.

To that end, we have initiated a community-wide process to enhance the capacity of our students, faculty and staff to ‘disagree well’ – to be able to discuss and debate difficult, politically charged issues across positions of difference. In doing so, we aim to restore a culture of civil discourse on our campuses. As a leading academic institution whose mission is the advancement of knowledge and the education of responsible citizens, nothing is more fundamental.

Finally, we will continue to counter this deeply troubling form of racism and discrimination through our core mission of scholarship and teaching, which enhances deeper understanding of difficult questions, accommodates debate over contentious issues, and promotes the search for solutions.

I and the rest of the leadership of the university are fully committed to addressing this challenge, to help avoid further hurt and to move our community forward.

Sincerely,
Meric S. Gertler

The University of Toronto reaffirms that only Canadian students are eligible for and enrolled in government-funded MD spaces in our medical academies.  

Any assertion to the contrary is simply incorrect. We remain committed to providing opportunities first and foremost for medical students from Ontario and, secondarily, the rest of Canada, and we support driving better health outcomes for all Ontarians.

The University of Toronto's MD Program has 1,113 students: approximately 88.7 per cent of students are from Ontario, approximately 11.3 per cent are from the rest of Canada, and approximately 0.17 per cent are international students.

The challenging times being experienced locally and globally may have profound impacts on members of our community. The Institutional Equity Office, in partnership with community partners across the tri-campus, offers programs, supports and resources to support U of T community members navigating work and learning environments at times of global strife and crisis. You can find these resources at EDI in a Global Context.