Haverford 2020 Student Strike collection

On October 29, 2020, a group of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, people of color) students at Haverford organized a strike “in response to the continued racism and anti-Blackness perpetrated by the Haverford College administration.” (FAQs For Concerned Parents, ca. November 3, 2020). The strike was precipitated by an email from President Wendy Raymond and Dean Joyce Bylander discouraging students from attending protests in Philadelphia following the killing of Walter Wallace Jr. by the Philadelphia Police. However, strike organizers stated that the email was only one incident in the “long tradition of anti-Blackness and the erasure of marginalized voices that have come to characterize the experiences of students of color at Haverford” (Letter to President Raymond and Dean Bylander, October 29, 2020), including what students saw as an inadequate response to an open letter from Black Students Refusing Further Inaction in June 2020. Organized by Black Students Refusing Further Inaction (BSRFI), Women of Color (WOC) House, the Black Students League (BSL), and other student of color-led groups, the strike lasted fourteen days, ending on November 11, 2020. During that time, participating students struck from classes, on-campus jobs, and school-sponsored activities. Strike organizers issued a set of demands to the College administration requiring institutional commitments to dismantling racist and white supremacist structures--accompanied by budgets and concrete timelines--before they would consider ending the strike.