Princeton University to keep President Wilson’s name on campus buildings

Princeton University will keep President Woodrow Wilson’s name on campus buildings despite student complaints about racism, with officials saying that “contextualisation is imperative” to the Ivy League school’s history.

The New Jersey school’s board of trustees said it would not remove Wilson’s name and image from its public spaces and from its Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

Wilson, the 28th US president from 1913 to 1921, was a leader of the Progressive Movement but also supported racial segregation, which was part of public policy at the time, particularly in southern states. Wilson served as Princeton University’s president from 1902 to 1910.