Last spring, EMU was home to a number of protests and demonstrations, held and organized by students in an effort to push the university to call for a ceasefire in the conflict between Israel and Palestine. Students held vigils, walked out of President Susan Schultz Huxman’s campus address, and silently occupied a board meeting. 

What resulted from these efforts was an email from the president’s office on March 19, 2024, saying that EMU urges Congress and President Biden to call for a ceasefire, and to send humanitarian aid. 

In an email from the President’s Office titled “Engaging Difference as a Faith-inspired Community of Learners” sent on Oct. 1, a list of university resources was provided. Of these resources was a new set of EMU Demonstration Guidelines, which were published on Sept. 24, 2024. 

Of these guidelines, one part stood out to a number of students: “Events, including demonstrations, that require a space reservation must be registered ahead of time. This includes events held inside campus facilities or outside on campus grounds.”

Senior Aidan Yoder was one student who took notice of these new guidelines. “As we approached this school year,” Yoder said, “I was aware of other universities who were restricting speech and demonstrations on campus, but I didn’t think that EMU would follow in those restrictive footsteps.” Yoder played a role in organizing last semester’s on-campus demonstrations. For his intercultural experience in the summer of 2023, Yoder also spent time in Palestine and Israel. 

“These new guidelines which require groups to register a demonstration three days in advance create a barrier to students,” said Yoder. “They restrict spontaneous demonstrations or vigils that should be held in a timely response to local or global events. For example, [if] another massacre happens in Gaza and I wanted to hold a demonstration the following day to acknowledge that, I would be breaking the new guidelines to do so.” 

Yoder has been in conversation with several concerned students and faculty regarding these new guidelines, particularly what they signify coming from administration in light of last year’s campus protests. “I think we are concerned about what looks like an effort to limit students’ ability to make meaningful change,” he added.

Jonathan Swartz, the Associate Dean of Students, provided feedback and insight into drafts of the new guidelines. “I think one of the likely misconceptions will be that the guidelines are asking for demonstrations to be approved. This is not the case,” he said, “There is a registration process because spaces on campus need to be reserved, but the registration process is not an approval process.” Swartz said that if there is any concern from those who receive the registration request, they can reach out to the group who is doing the organization. Swartz noted that this outreach is not about approval itself.

“If the receivers of the registration have questions or concerns about safety or about other details they may reach out to the registering group, but that outreach is not about approval,” Swartz added.  

Swartz talked about the protests around the country last year saying “many of us were distressed last spring to witness what could be called “over-response” to student protests and calls to action last spring at colleges and universities across the country.” “Including in some cases the use of police force to stop/move or otherwise respond to student demonstrations or encampments. The images of what was happening across the country were distressing.”

A few weeks after EMU’s demonstrations had happened, larger-scale demonstrations and protests occurred on other college campuses, resulting in police presences, resignations of university presidents, and a multitude of arrests and other occurrences. At the University of Indiana at Bloomington, professors were arrested for criminal trespassing alongside students at an encampment and were banned from campus for one year according to an article on the demonstrations across the country from The Chronicle of Higher Education. At New York University, professors were arrested in an attempt to block police from arresting students. 

According to a different article from The Chronicle of Higher Education, more than 100 colleges across the country engaged in protests in the spring as well.

 Columbia University was one of the first large universities to hold demonstrations and protests. After a congressional hearing, Columbia President Nemat Shafik, who attended the hearing, said she would crack down on the protests. Police were then authorized to clear out the campus’ demonstrations and encampments. According to The Chronicle of Higher Education 100 people were arrested, and around 50 tents were removed. President Shafik said the protestors “violated a long list of rules and policies.” The statement released did not list any of the rules and policies that were violated according to the article.

“Demonstrations and protests necessarily involve challenge, dissent, conflict, and even discomfort,” Swartz said. “While also providing for community building, awareness raising, connection making, and change dreaming,” he said. “How do we encourage what we want to see, while also providing necessary boundaries for all of us?”

In regards to spontaneous demonstrations, Swartz had this to say. “The guidelines are not meant to stop or otherwise deny spontaneous demonstrations,” Swartz said. “Sometimes these are the most necessary kind of demonstrations,” he said. “In the event of a necessary spontaneous demonstration for example an emergent counter demonstration to a campus visitor,  the university would expect that the guidelines would still be followed, but without the necessity of a pre-registration of the demonstration,” said Swartz. “So the expectation would still be that the spontaneous demonstration would maintain the standards listed in the guidelines.”

When talking about EMU’s history of activism he said, “EMU has a long history of activism, especially around anti-war protest, and more recently pro-LGBTQIA+ inclusion and the movement for black lives,” he said. “We want our students and members of the EMU community to find out what they care about. Research it deeply, and organize and act for the change that they want to see.”

“Policies can sometimes feel like a whole lot of ‘don’t do this, and don’t do that,’ Swartz said. “Guidelines are meant to be used, and we won’t have a good sense of how to assess the guidelines unless they are used so let’s use them!”