Jamshed Bharucha, the president of the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art since 2011, has resigned in the latest development in a battle over the historically tuition-free school's move to charge tuition of students who matriculated in fall 2014.

Peter Cooper, who founded the school in 1859, said that education should be "as free as air and water." Shortly after Bharucha took office, he announced that the school had been running at a significant budget deficit for years and that charging tuition would have to be "on the table" as an option to bridge the gap.