URGENT: Let Harvard Student Protesters Graduate!
URGENT: Let Harvard Student Protesters Graduate!
Dear Harvard Alumni for Palestine,
On May 17th, we learned of the horrific news that over 35 students have been placed under severe academic sanctions by the Harvard College Administrative Board due to their affiliation with the Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine (HOOP)’s Liberated Zone. As a result of this decision, at least fourteen Harvard College students eligible for graduation will not be receiving their degrees this week. Multiple students in this group had received prestigious postgraduate fellowships and scholarships on the basis of their moral and academic integrity, including two Rhodes scholars and one Harvard-UK scholar, and are now being prevented from graduating for exercising that very same integrity. The deadline for graduating seniors to have their degrees conferred is TOMORROW, MONDAY MAY 20th, AT 4PM EST.
This action is completely unwarranted and unjustified, breaks with precedent from previous student movements that enacted nonviolent civil disobedience, reverses President Alan Garber’s promise to the students upon decampment, and is a clear case of the Palestine exception to free speech. The students facing these severe disciplinary actions are leaders in the Palestine solidarity movement on campus and are clearly being targeted for their opposition to apartheid and genocide.
It is clear that Harvard College and its administrative leadership, including Dean of Harvard College Rakesh Khurana and Dean of Student Services Mike Burke, are attempting to make an example out of College students and graduating seniors, many of them with postgraduate fellowships and full-time job offers that will now be at risk.
The Palestine exception to free speech is in full force. We must act NOW!
Based on asks from the students to apply immediate pressure on Harvard administration to reverse its draconian and unwarranted disciplinary actions, we are asking our community to take the following actions:
[30 SECONDS] Email President Garber, the Provost, the Dean of FAS, and Brian K. Lee of the HAA to pressure them into reversing the decisions.
The above link contains an email template that can be sent immediately.
Make sure to fill in the placeholders for the following fields: [Name], [College/University], [alumnus/alumna/alum], [School and year of graduation].
Feel free to customize the email template with your own language, as well as include additional recipients based on your College House affiliation, identity affinity group affiliation, or other.
[30 SECONDS] Send an email to faculty to urge them to support students prevented from graduating.
The above link contains an email template that can be customized to send to faculty.
Make sure to fill in the placeholders for the following fields: [Name], Professor [X]
Feel free to customize the email template with your own language.
[BOSTON-AREA ALUMS] Show up to the emergency rally hosted today, Sunday, May 19th, 2pm, outside the Johnston gate.
Flood Dean Khurana!
Dean Khurana is the chair of the committee responsible for disciplining the students!
We all know how precious Khurana’s instagram account is to him. Let’s flood his instagram comments with questions about the 35 sanctioned students!
Let’s flood his phone line as well with questions about the students! 617-496-7700 AND 617-495-4137
Fill out the student support form!
While students, faculty and alumni are working overtime to ensure that seniors can graduate and students are not suspended, we are also attuned to the great need that will come out of these disciplinary sanctions if upheld. As of now, 14 seniors cannot graduate, and 4 non-seniors are forced to withdraw.
We need your support to connect these students to long term employment and housing in the event it is needed. If you can provide employment or housing, please fill out the form at: https://bit.ly/harv24support
The University is threatened by the clear physical and symbolic disruptions caused by the Liberated Zone and the broader student movement, as Zionism loses its ideological hold in the United States.
These sanctions are directly contrary to the deal reached between President Garber and the encampment on various grounds.
It was powerful and wealthy alumni who mobilized to doxx and harass the brave students protesting genocide, while the University stood idly by. Now, it is our moral and urgent duty as alumni to ensure that the University holds its end of the deal reached with the students.
We thank you in joining us in taking action to apply pressure on Harvard to reverse its unwarranted and severe sanctions.
In Solidarity,
Harvard Alumni for Palestine