Robert Birgeneau protest materials

At the Class of 2014's commencement ceremony, William Bowen, former president of Princeton University, used his time as a commencement speaker to chastise Haverford students, drawing mixed feelings from the commencement audience. Bowen spoke out against a list of demands that over 40 Haverford students and three faculty members signed and sent to Robert Birgeneau, who was supposed to speak at the ceremony. The letter to Birgeneau, former chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley, detailed the Haverford community's disagreement with how Birgeneau handled a protest at UC Berkeley. The 2011 protest resulted in police using force against nonviolent protestors. The students and faculty members who signed the letter asked Birgeneau to meet 9 demands before speaking at their graduation, some including taking full responsibility for the events of the protest, paying reparations to the victims, and writing a letter to Haverford students explaining what he has learned from the incident. Birgeneau declined these demands and withdrew as a commencement speaker. In Bowen's commencement speech, he called the actions of the Haverford protestors "immature" and "arrogant." Though Bowen received a standing ovation at the ceremony, many students and faculty members were angered by his speech.