Student activists at Harvard Law School have been occupying Wasserstein Hall since Monday. (Lydia Emmanouilidou/WGBH)
Inside Wasserstein Hall, student activists and members of the group Reclaim Harvard Law have propped up signs and laid out their blow-up mattresses.
“I slept here last night,” said second-year law school student Titilayo Rasaki.
Approximately twenty law school students have been occupying the hall since Monday night, as they await for administrators to meet the list of demands they issued in the fall.
School officials say the administration is trying to address the changes students are requesting.
“I keep talking and gathering information to figure out how we can keep making things better, because I know that what they’re talking about is about how to make the law school an even better and even more inclusive place for all students,” said Dean of Students Marcia Sells.
Second-year law school student Titilayo Rasaki says the administration’s response to students’ demands has been “tone-deaf.” (Lydia Emmanouilidou/WGBH)
But Rasaki says the university’s response has been “tone-deaf.”
“It seems like they’re just not internalizing it. They’re just not kind of understanding and responding to it,” said Rasaki.
Among their demands, students are asking the school to change its controversial seal, which features the shield of Harvard Law School benefactor and slaveowner Isaac Royall Jr. Students are calling the space they're occupying “Belinda Hall” in honor of one of Royall’s slaves.
The students say they have no plans to end the occupation.