B’nai Brith Canada has launched its Canadian Campus Climate Report Card, an institutional accountability initiative designed to evaluate the state of Jewish life and the climate for Jewish students on university campuses as the new academic year gets underway.
The initiative is part of B’nai Brith’s broader Project Accountability, which operates on the principle that academic institutions must be held accountable for the environments they foster and for how effectively they respond when students face antisemitism, harassment, or discrimination.
The initial launch features a pilot assessment covering four universities where students have reported particularly hostile social climates: York University, the University of Toronto, Queen’s University, and McGill University.
Unlike traditional incident trackers that catalog instances of antisemitism, the report cards evaluate 28 criteria across three core categories: administrative policies and actions, campus conduct and climate, and Jewish life on campus.
The methodology combines student surveys with a qualitative review of university policies, anti-hate measures, course offerings, and the availability of kosher dining and Jewish services. Each criterion is weighted equally across the categories.
Initial findings from the pilot program highlight that while all four institutions demonstrated strong traditional Jewish life indicators, such as active student groups, chaplaincy support, and religious services, the campus climate and administrative response metrics yielded widespread red scores.
Administrators received poor marks for their handling of antisemitic incidents
At McGill University, York University, and the University of Toronto, administrators received failing or critical marks regarding their handling of harassment, event disruptions, and transparency in reporting antisemitic incidents.
“The goal isn’t simply to hand out grades,” said B’nai Brith Canada’s CEO Simon Wolle in a press release on Wednesday. “It is to give students, parents and the community a clearer picture of what is happening on campus. We want to recognize where universities are getting it right, identify where they’re falling short, and help universities do better.”
Wolle added, “Our Report Cards must serve as an impetus for Canadian institutions to revise their policies, where they fall short, and improve programming if it is insufficient to meet the needs of Jewish students.”
B’nai Brith intends for the report cards to serve as an ongoing benchmark to push Canadian tertiary institutions to tighten their policies and enforce anti-hate codes.