DePaul students protest in support of professor fired for Gaza assignment

Students brought a petition with nearly 1,500 signatures asking for adjunct professor Anne D’Aquino to be hired back. An appeals board decided that DePaul University violated her academic freedom by firing her. This means they did something wrong by letting her go. The students and professors are upset about this. They want her to be able to teach again. Professor D’Aquino was fired because of a student assignment about the war in Gaza. She wanted her students to learn about the effects of war on people's bodies. She used information from a report by the UN Human Rights Council. This report said that there might be a genocide happening in Gaza. The professor thought it was important for her students to know about this. The American Association of University Professors wrote a letter to DePaul University asking for Professor D’Aquino to be rehired. They said that the university did not follow the right steps when they fired her. This means they did not give her a fair chance to explain herself. DePaul has not said anything about this letter yet. Professor D’Aquino hopes to be able to finish teaching her students this quarter. She wants to see their final projects and say goodbye to them. The university has not said when they will decide if she can come back. CBS 2 tried to ask the university about this, but they did not respond.