Protests aren’t going to change the financial outlook of this school. This is all they know how to do. Do you think any passengers protested on the deck of the Titanic?
Inside Higher Ed reports:
Alumni Try to Stomp on the BrakesProtests were planned for today as Hampshire College prepares to put layoffs in place on the heels of its controversial decision to stop admitting additional students for the upcoming fall semester.Alumni, staff, faculty, students and parents of students planned an on-campus protest to voice dissatisfaction with both the layoffs and what they see as a flawed decision by Hampshire’s leaders to seek a partnership with another institution, organizers said. They also planned to pressure the Massachusetts attorney general’s office to investigate Hampshire trustees’ decision not to admit a full entering class.Their plans come as a diffuse opposition movement has been coalescing in the weeks since Hampshire — a private liberal arts college in Amherst, Mass., known as a great experiment in self-directed education — announced in mid-January it was seeking a partnership in the face of intense enrollment and financial challenges. About two weeks later, Hampshire’s leaders announced a decision not to admit a traditional class of new students in the fall. Instead, the college will only enroll new students who had already been admitted under early decision or who had been admitted and deferred enrolling for a year.Alumni are also attempting to raise millions of dollars they think can keep Hampshire operating as an independent institution. And those linked to Hampshire aren’t the only ones trying to find money to fight off a decision they don’t like about a private liberal arts college’s future. A group is attempting to enlist donors to keep Green Mountain College in Vermont from acting on plans announced last month to close at the end of the current semester.
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