Occupy the Ivies: An Overview
Here’s a rundown of the Occupy Wall Street movement around the Ivy League campuses, ranked in order of excitement:
Columbia – Hundreds (thousands?) of Columbia students have been to the protest at some point over the last few weeks; the catchphrase around campus is “have you gone yet?” A large walkout took place last Wednesday. Some students arrested earlier. University President and over 300 professors declare support for Occupy Wall Street; Jeffrey Sachs leads a pack of students downtown to join protests and avoid watching the football team get ransacked by Penn at Homecoming.
Harvard - Scores of Harvard students join Occupy Boston, five arrested. Harvard doesn’t get much appreciation, though: a Boston Herald op-ed slams student protestors for their $50,000 tuitions and lovely, neo-Georgean dorms with – gasp – private bathrooms! Also, labor unions protest Harvard as a ‘tool of corporations’.
Brown - Econ, history, poli sci, and sociology professors hold an Occupy Providence Teach-In inside a lecture hall packed with “several hundred people.” Meanwhile, Occupy College Hill begins meeting 3x a week on Brown’s Main Green, and even has their own wiki page. Not so disorganized, after all!
Yale – Students will Occupy New Haven this weekend; counter-protest group led by the Yale College Republicans announces it will “Occupy Occupy New Haven“. Awww snap!
Cornell - Some Cornellians trek to New York City and join protests, others Occupy Cornell on Friday (minutes from the protest here). One op-ed’er tells protesters to “stop protesting and study for LSATs.” Not sure how that one’s gonna work out.
Penn – Occupy Philly receives statement of support from 87 faculty. Penn students travel to protests in Philidelphia (includes a glorious quote by a Wharton sophomore who supports the movement anonymously, saying his sentiments are “not consistent with the general sentiments of Wharton”).”Occupy Wharton” Facebook group is a dud.
Dartmouth – Protesters standing around on a patch of grass apparently want to cure AIDS, stop climate change, and elect Ron Paul.
Princeton – Little online evidence that anybody at Princeton gives a damn, other than one student op-ed calling protesters throwing his support behind the movement after being pleasantly impressed by the ”jobless potheads” and “banjo-strumming hippies”.
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