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University of Chicago president Paul Alivisatos pledged a commitment “to working urgently” with scholars and city, state and federal elected officials and agencies “to address the serious problem of violence in our city” after a recent graduate was killed during a robbery in a residential neighborhood near campus Tuesday.
The university said the alumnus, Shaoxiong “Dennis” Zheng, came to Chicago from Hong Kong and graduated last summer with a master’s degree in statistics.
Another international student at Chicago, Yiran Fan, was killed during a mass shooting in the city in January. The university posthumously awarded a Ph.D. to Fan, who came from China and was studying financial economics.
“The violence afflicting Chicago is on the same scale as a public health crisis and demands a commensurate response,” Alivisatos said in a video message Wednesday. “The city is formalizing, with the university’s involvement, a number of short- and longer-term public safety strategies specifically for Hyde Park and surrounding communities. We will share specifics soon.”
