Statement from Sarah Scalese, SAVP for Communications, Regarding Recent Events

To be clear: A meeting for 4 p.m. today was never agreed to, scheduled or confirmed. We do, however, hope to continue dialogue with our students, which is why we participated in a two-and-a-half-hour meeting last night with the student protestors to establish parameters that would productively guide our continued engagement. Unfortunately, we were unable to reach agreement around terms.

As Dean of Students Marianne Thomson shared (in writing at 10:30 p.m. on Tuesday), the University is eager to participate in continued conversations. She made it very clear that the University will not proceed with a meeting until everyone agrees to terms that would ensure a substantive and respectful dialogue. As no terms were agreed to, no meeting was scheduled.

In an effort to bring everybody back together to reinitiate dialogue, Vice President for the Student Experience Rob Hradsky sent two emails today (one just before noon and the other shortly after) requesting the protestors participate in a meeting this afternoon at 3 p.m. in Crouse-Hinds Hall with external facilitators from Interfaith Works of Central New York. Three student protestors and one faculty advisor participated in this conversation for roughly 45 minutes.

The University remains hopeful that we can come together with student protestors in good faith. To this end, we have reached out to invite our students to a meeting tomorrow at 11 a.m.