For educators grappling with student protests, here’s how to play a supporting role
From mentoring to monitoring to joining in, there is much faculty can do to foster constructive outcomes and help young people confront the injustices of the world they are inheriting.
Lee Smithey May 17, 2024
As tent encampments have sprung up on college and university campuses — including my own at Swarthmore College — some, but not all, administrators have called in armed police to arrest student protestors. To date, police have arrested more than 2,800 students across the U.S. In some cases, law enforcement officers have forcefully arrested faculty members as well. Predictably, the repression has backfired, fueled solidarity among educators and led to the establishment of even more encampments from coast to coast (141 campuses in the U.S. at last count).
If you are an educator, you may have spent recent weeks grappling with your position with respect to student nonviolent resistance. You’re not alone, and in this moment, perhaps it is helpful to identify ways teachers and staff at schools, colleges and universities have supported students engaged in nonviolent civil resistance. Below, I will share a range of options, progressing from familiar faculty roles to those with greater proximity to student nonviolent action.
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