When THE General Body made its way into the Crouse-Hinds Hall lobby on Nov. 3, 2014, it brought with it a 45-page list of grievances and demands.

In most cases, the coalition of student organizations had laid out needs and solutions for addressing the issues on the document, and had included timetables for when it wanted those solutions enacted by.

Over the course of THE General Body’s 18-day sit-in last November, student protesters met with administrators several times to discuss the document. Bea González, a special assistant to Chancellor Kent Syverud and dean of University College, served as the liaison between the protesters and university leadership. When the protest concluded, administrators had agreed to meet some of THE General Body’s demands, discuss others further and acknowledged it wouldn’t change its stance on certain issues.

 

One year later, the administration has largely held up its end of the bargain, addressing each of the nine overarching points in the “needs and solutions” section of the protesters document.

“We embraced the demands of THE General Body out of respect for what they were doing,” González said. “Some of what they wanted was already in play, some of it was helping us refocus the way we were managing things so we were more inclusive.”

González highlighted ways in which the university has become more transparent, emphasizing that there’s intentionality about how the university approaches decisions in a way there may not have been before the protest.

Other issues, including pay for graduate students, divesting from fossil fuels, sexual violence prevention and awareness and others, have also been acted on, many in accordance with what protesters had asked for.

Published on November 5, 2015 at 2:13 am

Contact Justin: jmatting@syr.edu | @jmattingly306