Content warning: This article discusses incidents of Islamophobia, gender-based violence, voyeurism, and mentions of Nazism. 

June 30, 2025 will be Meric Gertler’s last day as president of U of T — marking the end of nearly 12 years of leadership. 

On September 16, The Varsity sat down with Gertler to discuss a year marked by student protests against the university’s investments, mourning for victims of Israeli bombings in Gaza, at least eight reported voyeurism incidents at New College, and budget challenges tied to the ongoing domestic tuition freeze and rising costs.

The Varsity: U of T now ranks as a top public university, but at the same time, a lot of people on campus seem more discontented with the university administration than ever. Why do you think that disconnect between the public rankings and U of T community viewpoints exists and what can the administration do to heal those rifts?

Meric Gertler: I actually don’t accept your premise that more people are unhappy with the administration than ever. Universities are places that, by definition, attract people from a variety of different backgrounds who are passionate about the disciplines that they’re studying and about the world around them. And that world is more challenging and stressful these days. I think what we’re seeing is people in our community expressing that anxiety in a variety of ways. 

I also believe that the pandemic has had an impact on people’s well being, and on their ability — or lack thereof — to interact with one another in a civil and respectful way. 

TV: Some have criticized U of T for addressing issues, from Islamophobia to fossil fuel divestment, through processes like task forces and working groups that can take years. How could U of T speed up some of those processes, and do you think it should?

MG: What I have learned through experience is that if you try to rush these consultative exercises and go a little too quickly, you’re likely to run into bigger problems where people will feel like they haven’t had adequate opportunity to be heard. 

Yes, they can take time, but I think what one has to remain focused on is the quality of the recommendations that come out of the process, and the extent to which the community is willing to embrace those recommendations. You’ll never achieve complete unanimity or consensus but in my experience, as long as people regard the process as being sufficiently open and [feel they have had] an opportunity to weigh in fairly, they’ll be okay with the results and recommendations implemented.

TV: I do want to speak about the steps from these groups’ recommendations to implementation. In 2014, you appointed an advisory committee to look into whether U of T should divest its financial holdings from fossil fuels. In 2016, you rejected that committee’s recommendation that U of T divest, but you reversed course six years later in 2021. Can you walk us through how divestment decisions are made at the presidential level?

MG: I would describe that process a little bit differently. That advisory committee deliberated extensively, sought extensive consultation, and wrote a very thoughtful document which made the case for why university action in this space was quite important and urgent. They did recommend a specific form of divestment — it was not wholesale divestment, and it had a number of specific tests associated with it. 

I was aligned with the spirit of their recommendations that the university take some action, but I didn’t actually think that their recommendations would move us far enough, fast enough. We calculated that, had the university simply divested from investments it held directly or indirectly in fossil fuel companies, it might have reduced the carbon footprint of our portfolio by about 13 per cent. Instead, we embraced a different approach where we applied an Environmental, Social, and Governance framework to all of our investments.

In a few years, University of Toronto Assets Management (UTAM) was able to reduce the carbon footprint of our portfolio by 39 per cent: three times larger than what would have happened had we simply divested from fossil fuels with the passage of time. 

Simultaneously, third-party fund managers began coming forward and offering new investment vehicles that were similar to their existing funds but eliminating fossil fuel investments. By 2021, when we were doing our annual assessment of our progress, we thought that the time was right to implement a divestment strategy.

TV: Speaking of UTAM, the university has come under fire from some groups for a lack of transparency. Earlier in the year, Chief Financial Officer Trevor Rodgers told us that U of T is open to engaging with its investment managers to increase transparency, but we haven’t really seen any action since then. We have [also] noticed that there’s been a lack of transparency specifically for the student press, where The Varsity was not invited and barred from attending a press conference that you held during the encampment. What steps can the university take to increase transparency, both for students generally and specifically for the student press? 

MG: Transparency is important, and we are committed to increasing it. 

Currently, UTAM reports the names of the third-party managers it works with [but] doesn’t identify the funds or their contents. The barriers are that the contents of those funds change frequently and that, when UTAM signs on with these third-party fund managers, they sign investment agreements that usually have confidentiality clauses in them. 

Having said that, the school has begun a conversation with third-party fund managers through UTAM to explore ways in which it could reveal more about the investments that it holds. We’re also looking at what other Canadian universities are doing, particularly those that have an investment approach that is similar to ours. You can expect to see more developments in that space within this current academic year. 

With regard to The Varsity and student media, our goal certainly is to achieve a reasonable level of transparency as much as possible, and I regret if there have been any incursions on that in the past.

TV: In our 2023 interview with you, you said you had high hopes about the Blue Ribbon Panel’s report. Has the report that they came out with and the province’s reaction to it lived up to your hopes? 

MG: We thought the report was terrific. Alan Harrison — the Chair [of the Blue Ribbon Panel] — and the other members of the panel did great work in clearly setting out how successive provincial governments have systematically under-invested in public higher education in this province. The panel also demonstrated that the Ford government’s decision in 2019 to cut tuition fees for domestic students by 10 per cent and to keep them frozen ever since has had a hugely damaging effect on universities and colleges across the province. Their recommendations, not surprisingly, were targeted at addressing both of those issues: increasing the grant and unfreezing tuition fees. 

The government’s response, quite honestly, was very disappointing. On the one hand, we are very pleased to see that Minister Jill Dunlop, the then-minister of colleges and universities, was able to persuade her cabinet colleagues on the importance of the first base increases to funding in many years. While it’s a welcome start, it’s not going to have a huge impact on our finances. We were also disappointed that they continued the tuition freeze for at least three more years. 

We have high hopes for the Strategic Mandate Agreement, which is a process where every university and college in Ontario negotiates a contract with the ministry that articulates the distinctive strengths of each institution and how the government will support each university in achieving those strengths, including hopefully additional funding.

TV: Switching gears a bit — this year, we had a string of voyeurism incidents at New College, and we’ve also seen a lot of allegations of gender-based violence in Greek life spaces around the university. What changes need to take place at the university to limit gender-based violence?

MG: We are doing everything we can to encourage a culture of consent: we have increased the funding and staffing of the Sexual Violence Prevention & Support Centre; we rolled out a new series of educational tools; and we continue to evaluate and assess our practices.

In the cases of voyeurism at New College, our goal has been to communicate as clearly and as quickly as possible to all members of our community so they’re aware of the risk and then to take appropriate action. We also apprehended individuals associated with the cases of voyeurism.

We can pass the best policies in the country, but ultimately it comes down to creating the right culture and making sure that people understand what their obligations and responsibilities are as members of a community.

TV: In January, the university removed Imam Omar Patel as a chaplain at UTSC for allegedly comparing the Israeli government to Nazi Germany in an Instagram post. However, the university appears to have taken no action against Professor Ramy Elitzur, who compared Jewish students taking part in the [O4P] encampment to Jewish people who collaborated with Nazis during a Governing Council meeting. Why was Imam Patel not afforded the same freedom of speech afforded to other members of our university community?

MG: The matter pertaining to Imam Patel remains a personnel matter, and hence I am constrained from speaking publicly about the details of that particular case. I have heard from students both at UTSC and UTSG about the importance of that kind of chaplaincy, and our colleagues at UTSC have taken as many steps as possible to make sure that students are supported in the same way. 

With regard to the faculty member that you mentioned, I will say that the university walks a very fine line between upholding the academic freedom of our faculty and librarians and the freedom of expression that all members of our community enjoy, which can include the right to say things that are controversial and even troubling or disturbing — so long as they are not deemed to be hateful or breach laws or university policy. 

We have had a lot of examples over the past year where members of our community have said things that are upsetting to other members of our community, although they have stopped short of crossing that line, in our view, into unlawful speech or acts. Just because you have the right to say something doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to say. 

TV: Do you have any advice for your successor?

MG: This is a wonderful place. On the one hand, we’re routinely ranked among the very best universities in the world. At the same time, we’re huge and we’re accessible — we provide more financial support to students than any other institution in Ontario and most others in Canada. 

My point is that it’s so rare to find that combination of world-class excellence and openness, accessibility, and diversity. So, my advice to my successor is to recognize and appreciate that very special space that we occupy and, second, to do everything possible to maintain that really unusual and unique status.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.