Students Occupy Yardfest

As Yardfest started, 12 individuals wearing hockey masks and carrying picket signs appeared on the steps of Douglas Hall. They made their way to the Yard while chanting, "Wake up. Save the Mecca!" When the group reached the bottom of the stairs, the foremost student shouted, "There is no Prestige in a dying legacy. The time for change is now! We, the concerned students, faculty, and staff, are taking our power back!"

This was the guerilla theater, or flash mob, that occurred at 12 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 21 during Yardfest, and was part of the campus movement called "Save the Mecca."

Although D.C. law prohibits any group from demonstrating in masks and hoods, captain Mae Johnson decided not to arrest the small protest, as they were not behaving violently or disturbing the peace.

After a few minutes of chanting, the protesters split up and passed out flyers and spoke with students and alumni. Within an hour, many people held small pink pieces of paper explaining the concerns and resolutions of the "Save the Mecca" movement.

Save the Mecca is a group of faculty and students who are protesting an attack on the social sciences via the renewal plan. The group started on Oct. 17 through a campus discussion, where students and faculty asked, "Are the social sciences under attack?" During the discussion, this question was answered with a resounding yes.

The 12 students and faculty represented the movement's Action Group, which will be staging a variety of demonstrations and education campaigns to get the group's message out. The other two facets of the movement are the Vision Group, which identifies the major issues that need to be resolved, and the Power Money Group, which strives for financial transparency and efficient money management at the university.

"You can't imagine how it feels to put in six plus years and find out that your program got cut," said Mila Turner, a first-year Ph.D. student in sociology. Turner had been completing a year of independent study when the decision to cut the anthropology department was made, and she returned this year shocked at the changes.

Janetta Freeman, a senior anthropology major, said that the major focus of the movement is to create an aggressive consciousness in the student body. "The point is not to completely change the system…it's to show students and faculty members [they] have the power to effect change," she said.

Freeman participated in the Jena-6 and Occupy Wall Street protests and shared her experience with the Action Group. Tactics like guerrilla theater was modeled after the peaceful revolution methods of Che Guevara, South American rebel and major force in the Cuban Revolution. Current tactics include a Facebook page entitled Wake Up Howard University.

Save the Mecca represents more than the students. The faculty is creating their own movement to address the issues of late pay, poor working conditions, the faculty Phased Retirement Program (PRP), and the research grant process. They have decided to have a Day of Solidarity on Oct. 24, beginning with a meeting at the flagpole at 9 a.m. There will also be a faculty meeting at 1p.m. in Blackburn.

Last semester, when the cuts began, sociology and anthropology students and faculty attempted to take a civil approach to rebutting the renewal decisions. However, to anthropology professor Dr. Eleanor King, the decision had been set in stone before the department had a chance to rebut. She noted that the program evaluation process for accreditation took two years, while the renewal process required only one month.

"It does not signal to me a sincere effort to evaluate the university," she said.

A defining feature of the movement is that it does not just include students from the social sciences. Roschelle Spencer, a senior biology major, described his experiences dealing with the financial aid office, which has been struggling under massive employee cuts. "We're affected by everything the administration does," he explained.

During Spencer's freshman year, a biology professor advised students not to get politically active on campus and to stay in their own lane. However, as faculty has become increasingly dissatisfied with their working conditions, Spencer has noticed a change of heart in the same professor. As a senior, Spencer decided that he is ready to ignore that advice given to him.

Some students did not join the protest on the Yard in fear of being "black-listed," or losing the support they need to graduate on time, while others had a overall negative reaction to the idea.

"The people who are offended by us being at homecoming aren't wrong," Freeman said. "They're uncomfortable, and that's justified. They're just not ready to join yet."

Updated October 25, 2011