from weta studios in Washington home of the pbs newshour on pbs. John: The prevailing image of college protests over the past few weeks have been of escalating tensions, students clashing with police and mass arrests but students and administrators at least six schools from Rhode Island to California, have found common ground and negotiated agreements to close tent encampments. Erin Gretzinger is a reporting fellow at the chronicle of higher education. What do these agreements look like? What have schools agreed to do? >> The schools who have made agreements so far, we have seen distinct stipulations, but common themes in each. At northwestern which made an agreement early last week, we saw several steps towards what students view in the groups as moving toward their major demand of divestment. Fleece them make agreements to have a committee to look at divestment. Northwestern agreed to disclose investments to all internal stakeholders as well as movement on agreements that have been in the works for longer for students who are Muslim, who are from the Middle East, and are of north African descent. We see similar things in agreements at brown who will take a vote on investment this fall. Overall I think the main themes to take away our that these and cap meant have been central for administrators who wanted to focus on de-escalating the situation. That has been the main mantra. Students on the other hand have looked at these as staffed store the broader demand of divestment. John: I was going to ask, how meaningful are the concessions? They are not devasting, they will talk about divesting. >> Absolutely. I think what a lot of higher Ed onlookers have seen is administrations have appeared to take in student demands seriously but have still fallen short of the key purpose of these protest which is divestment. There is some question, I think some pro-palestinian student demonstrators and experts who study student activism are not quite sure how far agreements will go. If they go as far as some student protesters will help. There are some questions of faith -- if this will result in divestment. Similar universities have taken action before. Brown and northwestern have had similar reports and committees studying these issues but nothing has moved in the past. John: Have there been criticisms from other student activists, may be donors and alumni of the schools? >> There has been a sense that while some student groups are declaring victory, some jewish groups, local, campus and national have criticized agreements, particularly at northwestern university. We saw immense backlash with three major jewish glue -- groups calling on the president resign, characterizing it as a betrayal to these students for failing to enforce policy there there's also been a discrimination lawsuit filed against northwestern. You can see the broad spectrum of reactions and it gets to the point of presidents being in hot water in this moment and having to contend with many stakeholders pulling everyone in different directions. John: Given that the administration is in hot water, what was the motivation for students to bail them out and get an agreement? >> It's interesting because I've talked to experts who say students in this regard have a very clear eyed goal of divestment and that puts college administrators in a tricky place . Normally they have a playbook to go into negotiations essentially, whether it is an identity based movement, they can go to student affairs programs, or a matter of student employee relations, they can go to the negotiating table around unionization. But here with clear-cut commands like divestment, there's not a lot of room for compromise in these students' eyes. That's important to consider were so many students have not even chosen to come to the table even when there administrators ask them to. John: At Pomona and Yale, students won't talk. What are their motivation? >> There's a sense that, some have criticized the students saying if you want to meet your ultimate goal, you have to come to the table and come to the table to discuss. The students say until the universities are taking action toward that, they don't see your point in meeting. I think it gets at the broader tension. Experts point out this generation of student activists have grown up in an era full of social justice movements from black lives matter in 2020, March for our lives, climate change. They've been instilled with a lack of trust and public officials that they see as motivating students to not necessarily come to the table or be placated and that some of the major criticism in this moment that these agreements are placating students to basically step back, take down the encampments before ultimate goals are met. John: The schools that want to negotiate, are they in any way pressuring the schools that are not doing that? >> It's a good question. It's hard to say how many schools will fall behind other institutions because different institutions are facing different pressures. For private schools, we've seen an immense amount of donor pressure building since October 7. Public schools have a different obligation. There are eyes on them from the state legislatures. There's different pressures when it comes to strictly abiding by first amendment time, place, manner restrictions. A universal pressure is that it is the end of the semester. It's kind of a double edge sword. It's a busy time, graduation, finals, alumni events that might be pushing schools to want to pursue action. . The chronicle of higher John: You very much. John:the southeast Asian nation
