Student Advocacy Info. – Self-Government Association

RESOURCE HUB FOR BRYN MAWR’S HISTORY OF STUDENT RESISTANCE & PUBLIC ARCHIVES ON BMC STRIKE & Liberation movements

Photo of hand with the following writing "I shouldn't have to question if I belong here" "I will not be silenced" — Bryn Mawr student advocates for their belonging and voice when: “in September, two Bryn Mawr students hung up a Confederate flag in a public area of the Radnor Hall dormitory and used neon duct tape to symbolize the Mason-Dixon line on the carpet.”

STUDENT ORGANIZING

THE BRYN MAWR STRIKE COLLECTIVE

screen capture of bryn mawr strike collective website — Students* organized the Bryn Mawr Strike Collective in 2020 “to dismantle systemic oppression in the Bryn Mawr community”

STILL ACTIVE: THE BLACK STUDENT LIBERATORY COALITION

screen capture of bryn mawr black student liberatory coalition instagram and event flyers — BMC BSLC publish the labor, challenges, and successes that went into striking alongside continuing active work in events for black recognition and community on campus

hot links

Student-Organizing in practice

Bryn Mawr Strike Collective linktr.ee

2020 STRIKE

here find recordings and documents relevant to the organization and archiving of the 2020 strike

town hall meeting recording — recording of the 11/13/20 town hall meeting

Town Hall Chat Transcript Here

Demand Lists

Final Strike Collective Demands

recording of a taylor hall sit-in, posted 11/11/20

Various Demand Doc Versions

Meeting Notes

Notes from various meetings from 11/5/20-11/19/20

sit in recording 11/6 — recording of the 11/6/20 sit-in

President Cassidy Emails to All-Campus

Emails from Bryn Mawr’s president in 2020 concerning the Strike, from 11/3/20-11/16/20

…and to conclude the strike, the Bryn Mawr Strike Collective released “On Normalcy” as a document to (among much more):

Acknowledge “BIPOC laborers on this campus throughout the history of the College, from students to faculty and staff”
Challenge our conceptions of “normal” in “Thoughts from an Afropessimist”
Archive the reasons for and achievements of organized dissent

On Normalcy

On February 22, 2024

the SGA Institutional Memory Committee and The Impact Center collaborated on a Teach-in on the 2020 Strike. This Teach-in had an audience of around 70 students and staff, and was available on Zoom. No transcript could be retrieved from this Teach-in. More information can be found about this Teach-in from this piece by the Bi-Co News.

Around 70 staff and students, freshmen through seniors (who were present for the 2020 Strike in their freshman year), fill Dalton 300 to attend the Teach-in to learn from archivists and witnesses (students and professor) of the Strike.

Joi Dallas, Assistant Dean for Intercultural Engagement at the Impact Center, speaks to attendees over Zoom and in Dalton about intersectionality during the 2020 Strike.

Interested in Bryn Mawr Teach-ins?
Learn more here

2024 PEOPLE’S COLLEGE FOR THE LIBERATION OF PALESTINE (PCLP)

On April 15th, 2024

the ’24 SGA President ended her term with an announcement concerning the voting results of the Spring 2024 Plenary. With over 60% of the student body casting their ballots,

Resolution #11: Calling for an Immediate and Permanent Ceasefire in Gaza (89.7 / 4 / 6.3)
Resolution #12: The Development of an SGA Ethical Spending Committee (77.4 / 9.3 / 13.3)

the above resolutions passed YES. Because this decision depicted an overwhelmingly large population of the college concerned for the humanitarian catastrophe in Palestine, we feel the need to archive this year-long movement at Bryn Mawr to represent the voice and power of the people.

Day 3 of the PCLP encampment. Tents decorated by cardboard protest signs were placed on Merion Green by students to occupy space on Bryn Mawr campus.

On April 27th, 2024

Bryn Mawr students officially established a People’s College for the Liberation of Palestine on Merion Green. The encampment continued for twenty days until May 15^th with essentially no concessions from administration. The actions of these student protestors were opposed strongly by administration, and many faced a Dean’s Panel for contributing. An archive was created by organizers as the protest was ongoing. To protect student privacy, this archive will remain locked until five years after the protest ended, May 15^th 2029. After that point, SGA will be able to vote to make versions of the content in the archive without identifiable information available to those affiliated with Bryn Mawr, ie with faces blurred. Should this vote pass, the full archive will become available ten years after that. If the vote does not pass, it can be reassessed in future. Regardless, the uncensored version of the archive will not become available until the anonymous version has been available for ten years. The restrictions on this archive are meant to protect the safety of student protestors, especially for international or undocumented students, who might be affected by the nonconsensual sharing of this archive.

BI-CO News: Palestine

The Bi-Co News, a primary source of student coverage on the PCLP, is an excellent source to monitor the on-going student resistance movement at Bryn Mawr and Haverford. Earliest mentions of Pro-Palestine protesting can be found on November 7, 2023, and over 50 (and counting) pieces have been written to document the PCLP (and earlier actions on campus) since.

COMMUNITY-MADE ARCHIVES

Educational Resource: Interactive Timeline

Access additional resources for citations included in the timeline

CONTINUING ADVOCACY

Template Resources

email templates

response & sign up forms

shareable BMC Strike Resources

Working & active orgs for student advocacy

black at bryn mawr

access services committee

black student liberatory coalition

bi-co mutual aid

Student Advocacy Archiving: To be continued

-Further archives on the 2024 People's College for the Liberation of Palestine
-Guide to research BMC Student Resistance
-Further transcribing of 2020 Strike recordings