CV NEWS FEED // Emerson College announced that its projected enrollment for the upcoming semester has fallen “significantly below” expectations, and layoffs are reportedly imminent.
The news comes less than two months after massive pro-Palestine protests broke out on the private liberal arts college’s Boston campus, resulting in the arrests of over a hundred students. The college later posted bail for the students and refused to discipline them.
“The size of our projected incoming first-year class for Fall 2024 is significantly below what we had hoped,” stated a letter from the Office of Emerson College President Jay M. Bernhardt to the college’s faculty and staff.
“We attribute this reduction to multiple factors,” the letter continued,
including national enrollment trends away from smaller private institutions, an enrollment deposit delay in response to the new FAFSA rollout, student protests targeting our yield events and campus tours, and negative press and social media generated from the demonstrations and arrests.
Dr. Steve McGuire, Fellow in Campus Freedom for American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA), shared the letter on X (formerly Twitter) Wednesday.
In addition, McGuire wrote that “the school is planning to lay off staff, including possibly faculty.”
CBS News reported Wednesday that Emerson “was one of several Boston-area colleges that saw pro-Palestinian protests inspired by student protesters at Columbia University.”
“Protesters set up tents in a public alley next to Boylston Street in April,” CBS added:
They said they wouldn’t leave until Emerson called for a ceasefire in Gaza and divested from companies and institutions doing business with Israel
On April 25, Boston police in riot gear broke up the protests, arresting 108 at the camp. Four officers were injured during the arrests. Police said protesters were violating city ordinances by camping out in the alley, which is not solely owned by Emerson.
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On May 7, McGuire wrote on X that the college “posted bail for its arrested students, asked that charges not be pressed, committed to not disciplining them, and offered summer housing until their legal issues are resolved.”
After this, McGuire noted that Bernhardt sent an apology message and announced he was “setting up a bias response team.”
“We know that the events of that night were, and are emotionally overwhelming for our entire community, especially for the students present at the protest and the staff and faculty who were on the site to provide support,” Bernhardt wrote in the message.
He went on to state: “[A]s it relates to common ground, we identified specific demands from the protestors [sic] where our priorities largely aligned, including (1) fully committing to work in equity, access, and social justice.”
Gregg Re, an attorney with The Daily Wire, replied to McGuire on X Wednesday, posting a picture of an encampment built by the Emerson student protesters. “Imagine going on a campus tour and seeing this,” Re wrote.
McGuire appeared to agree and replied with a minute-long video first posted to X on April 25 showing a violent encounter between the Emerson protesters and law enforcement.
