Latest news with #BowdoinStudentsforJusticeinPalestine
Yahoo
25-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Suspensions lifted against Bowdoin College students after pro-Palestine encampment
Feb. 24—Bowdoin College has lifted suspensions against eight students who were disciplined for their involvement in a pro-Palestine encampment. "Suspensions lifted!!" an Instagram post from the Bowdoin Students for Justice in Palestine read. "Thanks to all who mobilized, this is proof of our collective strength." A spokesperson for the college did not immediately confirm Monday that the suspensions have been lifted. The student organization also did not respond to messages asking about the disciplinary results. Olivia Kenney, a Bowdoin senior who helped organize the protest, heard over the weekend that her suspension had been lifted, leaving her on probation. The same happened to seven others who joined administrators on a video call Sunday, she said. Kenney, 22, credited the college's decision — which she called unsurprising — to an outpouring of support from fellow students and others across the state following news of the suspensions. "Bowdoin's reaction was very harsh," she said. "It remains unclear to me exactly which policies we violated. And it seems to me that many voices in the Bowdoin community spoke up around the issue of Bowdoin's repression of speech around Palestine." Some of the students who were suspended live in campus housing and had to scramble to find last-minute accommodations, she said. Kenney said she moved back into her dorm Monday. The group organized the protest earlier this month as a response to Bowdoin's lack of action on the Bowdoin Solidarity Referendum, which passed by a wide margin last spring and called on the college to take an institutional stand against the Israeli government and not make future investments in arms manufacturers. The referendum came eight months after Israel invaded Gaza in response to a Hamas attack in October 2023 in which 1,200 Israelis were killed and 240 civilians were taken hostage. The war in Gaza has resulted in the deaths of more than 2,000 Israelis and 46,000 Palestinians, and is currently in a fragile ceasefire. To protest the college's lack of action, about 50 students set up an encampment inside the student center building. The encampment remained standing for five days. College administrators issued disciplinary warnings to students several times over the course of the protest, including in suspension letters given to eight students Monday morning. The protest ultimately ended on Feb. 10 when organizers and the administration reached an understanding and student protesters exited the encampment that evening. However, eight of those students were still suspended and about 50 were facing some sort of disciplinary process. It was not clear Monday what final discipline those other students may have been given. Staff Writer Daniel Kool contributed to this story. Copy the Story Link
Yahoo
19-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
'Being the students Bowdoin wants us to be': Organizers reflect on Palestine encampment
Feb. 18—A five-day pro-Palestine encampment at Bowdoin College in Brunswick concluded when student organizers reached an "understanding" with the administration. Bowdoin Students for Justice in Palestine didn't get exactly what they wanted: for the college to take action on a popular student referendum calling on the school to condemn Israel's actions in Gaza and not make future investments in weapons manufacturers. But organizers say administrators did suggest they would go easy on students in disciplinary proceedings (a spokesperson for Bowdoin has not responded to emails asking to confirm this). Eight students were suspended when the protest ended Feb. 10 after the administration had increasingly warned that the protest was disruptive to normal activities and that the students broke community guidelines. Since then, many organizers, faculty and alumni have agreed that the students who engaged in the protest used the values Bowdoin gave them to speak out for a cause they care about — even amid worries about retaliation from the new presidential administration. And on Tuesday at 4:30 p.m., students organized a walkout in a show of support for the eight students still facing suspension. 'THE COMMON GOOD' Olivia Kenney, 22, a senior from Upstate New York studying religion and Arabic, said she chose Bowdoin because of its advertised values, including a commitment to "The Common Good." That's the idea, presented in 1802 by Bowdoin President Joseph McKeen, that graduates are obligated to use their knowledge for the benefit of society. Kenney is one of eight students indefinitely suspended from campus. She cannot attend classes or access her dorm. "It is the courses I have taken at Bowdoin which have given me the political and moral grounding that has revealed to me the hypocrisy of the college," Kenney said. "And those are the same classes that I am barred from attending now." Asher Nathaniel Feiles, a 19-year-old biology student from Los Angeles who is also suspended, cited another seminal Bowdoin document as a guiding value of protestors: the 1906 poem "The Offer of the College." "To gain a standard for the appreciation of others' work, and the criticism of your own," Feiles read from the poem. "Being able to admit that something is wrong and then work to change that, I think, is the core value of a Bowdoin student. And I think that our actions in the camp did. I think we were being students that Bowdoin wants us to be, even if they didn't react that way." Kenney described the encampment and protest as a last-resort approach. About 70% of students voted to pass the Bowdoin Solidarity Referendum last spring with four demands, including an institutional statement, and calls for trustees to disclose investments in arms manufacturers and not make investments in specific weapons makers moving forward. The referendum came eight months after the start of Israel's war in Gaza in October 2023 that has resulted in the deaths of more than 2,000 Israelis and 46,000 Palestinians, and is currently in a fragile ceasefire. In response, Bowdoin President Safa Zaki said the college would not make an institutional statement about Gaza and suggested that the board of trustees could hear from students about potential divestment options. Feiles said they got involved in SJP in response to the bombing of schools and hospitals in Gaza. "I've always been of the mind that if a group says that it represents you, and then acts in a way that is not representative of you, you have not just a right but a responsibility to question them and criticize them on that," said Feiles, who is Jewish and whose family is from Israel. "The only way to love a place and be able to support it is by questioning the wrongdoings. I think that's also true of Bowdoin." Students launched the encampment about nine months after the referendum passed, coinciding with a trustee meeting and recent comments from President Donald Trump about plans to "take over" Gaza. By the end of the first night, college security were collecting student ID numbers and threatening disciplinary action, according to reporting from Bowdoin's student newspaper, the Bowdoin Orient. College officials declined to be interviewed for this story. In a statement following the protest, a spokesperson said "the demonstration repeatedly violated policies within Bowdoin's Code of Community Standards," although they did not point to specifics. The letters of suspension cited a college policy on "Temporary Administrative Measures," which allows the dean for student affairs to implement suspensions if they believe that the "continued presence of a student is contrary to the best interests of the campus environment, or if the suspected behavior of a student seriously jeopardizes the safety and/or welfare of the campus environment." Kenney doesn't believe the protestors broke any rules with their initial action; she said Smith Union is a building with 24/7 access and an open flow of students and outside community members. It was college security staff who locked the doors, making the building inaccessible to other students, she said, and the goalposts seemed to change as the college became more set on discipline. COMMUNITY SUPPORT A group called Bowdoin Alumni for Justice In Palestine is supporting student protestors by withholding donations from the college and boycotting college events, like reunions. The group also circulated a petition which invokes the college's history of protest actions around the Vietnam War and divestment from Apartheid South Africa, and the values of "The Common Good." The petition had over 550 signatures as of Tuesday. Many signatories are recent alums, although signers date back as early as the class of 1965. Cecily Upton graduated from Bowdoin in 2003, and said her education plays a major role in her own way of thinking about justice around the world. "This phrase, 'the Common Good,' is a huge part of being a student at Bowdoin," Upton said. "And that phrase, I think, in light of what's happened recently, felt ignored by the administration. What the student activists were engaging with on campus was, in my mind, such a beautiful and very poignant and very real example of working for the common good." Upton said she has a high regard for the college and has found it to be a thoughtful institution when it comes to politics, inclusion and identity. But she was saddened by the school's response to student protestors. "It's a challenging situation for sure, but to see that when the rubber hits the road, those values were not necessarily at the forefront of decision making when it came to the administration, felt bad," she said. More than 80 Bowdoin faculty members signed on to a letter last year in support of the referendum, and in a statement Friday, three professors defended the encampment on behalf of the group Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine. The statement backs students for acting in "principled conviction," rejects the administration's assertions that protestors broke community guidelines and calls for disciplinary amnesty for those students. "We reject the notion that the students created an environment that was "intimidating," "hostile" or "unsafe." These are unfounded allegations," they wrote and again called on the college to take action on the referendum. FEDERAL PRESSURE Bowdoin students billed their encampment as the first of the new Trump era. The president issued dozens of executive orders in his first weeks in office, including one that targets campus protestors. The order asks colleges to monitor and report on non-citizen student protestors, and threatens to deport pro-Palestine student protestors with foreign visas. "To all the resident aliens who joined in the pro-jihadist protests, we put you on notice: come 2025, we will find you, and we will deport you," a White House statement on the order reads. "I will also quickly cancel the student visas of all Hamas sympathizers on college campuses, which have been infested with radicalism like never before." Many private college presidents faced intense scrutiny during the last school year over their reaction to pro-Palestine protestors, and were called in front of Congress and pressed by conservative lawmakers who said they needed to do more to combat antisemitism. Three Ivy League presidents resigned over the issue. A Bowdoin spokesperson did not respond to an interview request to discuss whether the order affected the college's reaction to the protest. Kenney, the Bowdoin senior, characterized the college's response as "pre-anticipatory obedience" to the Trump administration. "I do believe that the college is concerned about how the Trump administration will react to colleges that have demonstrated any form of sympathy to Palestine protestors, but what they're doing, really, is ceding to fascism before the true consequences of fascism have even descended upon them." The Bowdoin encampment ended around 6 p.m. last Monday night. As students rallied outside, Kenney said administrators had a more thoughtful conversation with the encamped students, which made them feel like productive talks might be on the horizon. That included a visit from Zaki to the encampment, according to Feiles. Eight students remain suspended, but Kenney said about 50 are facing some sort of disciplinary process, and the college still hasn't made any commitments to the referendum. But Kenney said many things about the protest, including non-student community turnout, still felt like a success. "There was this collective realization of what we all need to be willing to do to work toward the world that we all claim to stand for," she said. "And this was shown not only by Bowdoin students, but by many members of the Maine community." Copy the Story Link
Yahoo
11-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Bowdoin students conclude pro-Palestine protest, call action an 'immense success'
Feb. 10—A pro-Palestine encampment at Bowdoin College has ended after organizers reached "an understanding to conclude the encampment" with administrators. The students still inside the building exited during a rally Monday evening. The protest, which began last Thursday, was organized by Bowdoin Students for Justice in Palestine, which announced the event last week as a response to the college's lack of action on a student referendum. The Bowdoin Solidarity Referendum, which passed by a wide margin last spring, called on the college to take an institutional stand against the Israeli government and not make future investments in arms manufacturers. Student protesters set up an encampment inside a student center building Thursday evening. College administrators issued disciplinary warnings to encamped students several times over the course of the protest, including in suspension letters given to eight students Monday morning. Organizer Olivia Kenney left the building Monday night, and said that while the college still isn't making commitments to act on the referendum, students consider the protest a victory. "We concluded this action feeling that it has been an immense success, given that we have successfully proven that advocating for Palestinian liberation on a college campus through mass action can contribute to a national context of discussion," Kenney said. Kenney said conversations Monday evening resulted in an understanding between students, organizers and administrators that the encamped students' good-faith discussions would be taken into consideration during their disciplinary processes, which are ongoing. "The encampment in Smith Union has ended, with all students leaving voluntarily," Bowdoin Director of Communications Doug Cook said in an emailed statement Monday night. "The demonstration repeatedly violated policies within Bowdoin's Code of Community Standards and the participating students have entered the College's disciplinary process." Cook did not offer specifics on the "understanding" described by students. "Bowdoin is a place where free speech and academic freedom are highly valued and encouraged, and all are expected to abide by our policies," he said. "We are committed to fostering open dialogues on difficult issues in a manner that is founded on mutual respect and support." THE ENCAMPMENT BEGINS The protest began Thursday when a group of about 50 students set up tents inside the Smith Union. Some of them remained inside the building through the weekend, even as college administrators issued disciplinary warnings. The protesters said they would stay as long as it took for the college's administration to divest from weapons manufacturing and to take action on other demands from the referendum. "We are encamping Smith Union because we demand better from an institution that claims to care about the common good," organizers said Friday. The protest was also a response to President Donald Trump's comments during a press conference last week, where he said the U.S. would "take over the Gaza Strip." The protest continued throughout the weekend, with community members and students from other colleges gathering outside the building to support the encampment inside, according to reporting from the student newspaper, the Bowdoin Orient. Administrators began collecting student ID numbers late Friday night and started issuing notices of disciplinary hearings. On Monday, the college began issuing temporary suspension letters to students. In a photo of one letter posted to Bowdoin SJP's Instagram, Senior Vice President and Dean for Student Affairs Jim Hoppe informed the student, whose name was redacted, that they were being placed on immediate temporary suspension for staying in Smith Union past 8:30 a.m. Monday. Students were told they had to vacate the campus by 5 p.m. Eight students remained in the encampment on Monday, and all eight received suspension notices, according to Bowdoin Students for Justice in Palestine. "Bowdoin has chosen to crack down and repress the principled dissent of students who asked for nothing more than their institution to live up to its stated values. We are enraged by the weaponization of a disciplinary process against members of this community who have exhausted every other means of advocacy," the group said in a statement Monday afternoon. "Bowdoin's decision to scapegoat students for their failure to lead is a show of cowardice." "RALLY WITH US" In response to the 5 p.m. suspension deadline, organizers planned a rally at the same time, inviting students and community members to protest the discipline and continue to press the college on the referendum's demands. More than 100 people gathered in freezing temperatures outside Smith Union, chanting along with student speakers while those encamped inside the building looked down from second story windows. "The more they try to silence us, the louder we will be," the crowd chanted. Around 6 p.m. Kenney announced from inside the building over a megaphone that students had reached an understanding with the administration, and shortly after, the students exited Smith Union to cheers and hugs from their peers outside. "We launched this encampment as a last resort, because we had exhausted all of the processes the college offered us toward the reasonable demands that we presented for removing our complicity in Israel's genocide of the Palestinian people," Kenney said shortly after leaving Smith Union. They described the college administration's reaction to the protest as "bad faith" but said Monday evening, in the "eleventh hour" the college finally had a productive conversation with the organizers. "Unfortunately, it did not result in meeting (the demands of the) Bowdoin Solidarity Referendum. We will not stop, we are not satisfied, we will continue to hold the school accountable for its complicity in genocide," Kenney said. "Although we reached an understanding to conclude this encampment on the understanding that our good-faith discussions will be communicated as a consideration in the disciplinary process." Eisa Rafat, a student organizer who led chants during the rally, said one constant over the five days of protest was community engagement. "When we called on our students, when we called on our community, they came," he said. Rafat said people showed up in snowstorms, at night, and in freezing temperatures. He said Bowdoin can feel far from the parts of the world where action is, but this protest proved that to be untrue, especially when protesters received messages from a university in Palestine, thanking them for their protest. Copy the Story Link
Yahoo
11-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Bowdoin College suspends 8 students in pro-Palestinian encampment
Feb. 10—Bowdoin College has suspended eight students for their involvement in a pro-Palestinian encampment inside the college's student union, according to protest organizers. A spokesperson for the college did not respond to emails Monday asking to confirm the suspensions. The organization planned a rally outside the union at 5 p.m. Monday, the same time the suspensions were said to go into effect. The protest began Thursday when a group of about 50 students set up tents inside the Smith Union. Some of them remained inside the building through the weekend, even as college administrators issued disciplinary warnings. The protest was organized by Bowdoin Students for Justice in Palestine, which announced the event last week as a response to the college's lack of action on a student referendum passed last spring that called on Bowdoin to take an institutional stand against the Israeli government and not make future investments in arms manufacturers. The protesters said they would stay as long as it took for the college's administration to divest from weapons manufacturing and to take action on other demands of the referendum. "We are encamping Smith Union because we demand better from an institution that claims to care about the common good," organizers said Friday. The protest continued throughout the weekend, with community members and students from other colleges gathering outside the building to support the encampment inside, according to reporting from the student newspaper, the Bowdoin Orient. Administrators began collecting student ID numbers late Friday night and started issuing notices of disciplinary hearings. On Monday, the college began issuing temporary suspension letters to students. In a photo of one letter posted to Bowdoin SJP's Instagram, Senior Vice President and Dean for Student Affairs Jim Hoppe informed the student, whose name was redacted, that they were being placed on immediate temporary suspension for staying in Smith Union past 8:30 a.m. Monday. Eight students remained in the encampment as of Monday, and all eight received suspension notices, according to Bowdoin Students for Justice in Palestine. "Bowdoin has chosen to crack down and repress the principled dissent of students who asked for nothing more than their institution to live up to its stated values. We are enraged by the weaponization of a disciplinary process against members of this community who have exhausted every other means of advocacy," the group said in a statement Monday afternoon. "Bowdoin's decision to scapegoat students for their failure to lead is a show of cowardice." This story will be updated. Copy the Story Link
