The Sept. 11 edition of Carleton Today included a pointed announcement to students from Vice President for Student Life and Dean of Students Carolyn Livingston, calling attention to “Carleton’s current student speech and demonstration guidelines.”
Livingston explained via email that the college regularly shares such policies at the start of the academic year alongside reminders about Title IX, hazing and community standards.
“The College circulates current guidelines as we enter a new academic year and welcome new students to our campus,” she wrote. Livingston added that enforcement falls to Assistant Dean and Director of Community Standards Amy Sillanpa, and also that she hopes students hold one another accountable.
According to Livingston, the college looked to “how other colleges and universities addressed protests and encampments, along with activities on campus last year,” she said. She added that federal guidance also influenced the policy.
The guidelines, which are included in the student handbook, state that “support of any cause by demonstration or other orderly means, including picketing and other forms of peaceful protest, is permitted on college premises so long as it does not disrupt the operation of the college.” The guidelines also prohibit occupying buildings after hours and mention that encampments or overnight gatherings may be disbanded at the college’s discretion.
President Alison Byerly said that the guidelines themselves are not new. She pointed to protests on campus two years ago, during which students set up an encampment citing several demands, including a demand for the school to divest from companies connected to the Israeli government. At that time, Byerly said, questions emerged about what actions were permissible.
“We’ve always had a set of existing guidelines that were not particularly well known until we had protests,” she said. “I thought it would be important for students to have a sense of what the college considers the guidelines within which we expect student expression.”
Byerly said that the rules give the college leeway to allow protests that stretch beyond the written limits.
“Our policies would not necessarily allow for encampments,” she added. “But when an encampment went up that spring, we said ‘if you follow certain rules… we’re willing to let it stay for quite a while.’ And it stayed up for a couple of weeks.”
According to Byerly, some expectations, like discouraging masks during demonstrations, come directly from practical concerns.
“We are likely to give you much more latitude if you’re not wearing masks and if we can see who you are,” Byerly said. “It’s just much easier to know you are our students and not posing any danger.”
Some students, however, worry about how the guidelines might be applied. One such student, Gunnar Gregory ’28, called the policy’s ban on “disrupting operations” too vague.
“That wording can be enacted in a more lenient or a more divisive way,” Gregory said. “We need something more directly stated as to what is considered obstruction.”
Gregory added that while rules on masking and encampments didn’t raise “giant red flags,” he worried administrators could enforce them for reputational reasons.
“Sometimes the school might shut things down sooner than they need to because it doesn’t look good,” he said.
Grace Colburn ’26 said the debate around free expression is complicated by the fact that speech can sometimes take harmful forms.
“Free speech is an important right so all students can safely express their views,” Colburn said. “However, it isn’t always innocent.” She recalled attending a Minnesota Twins game where a fan in her section shouted remarks such as “deport all Muslims” and “Islam is not welcome here.”
History professor William North, who has studied campus records, said the framework for protest has remained stable for decades. The current structure dates back to 1993, when provisions scattered across the student handbook were consolidated into one section. “As far as I could tell, the 1993 policy was more a consolidation than a substantive change,” North said.
North said Carleton students have mobilized around issues from apartheid in the 1980s to nuclear disarmament in the 2000s, and more recently in support of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients and in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder.
“Carls have regularly protested both in response to campus policies and in response to wider issues at the national level,” he said.
Byerly said the college’s rules differ from stricter approaches elsewhere.
“Many schools, for example, have designated free speech zones. We don’t,” she said. “In our guidelines, we don’t say you have to be on the Bald Spot or in front of Sayles. We just say if a protest is disruptive, then we may decide it’s not an allowable space.”
North noted that, in his experience, Carleton has largely relied on its own security staff rather than outside law enforcement to manage protests.
“That feels different from some other campuses,” he said.
Gregory agreed that Carleton may be less restrictive than some colleges but said vagueness still leaves room for interpretation.
“I’ve heard of other schools being very strict, calling the police the moment someone has a sign up,” he said. “I don’t think Carleton does that, but the language here is broad enough that it could go either way.”
According to Byerly, the college’s goal is clarity rather than limitation.
“Our goal is not in any way to prevent protests,” Byerly said. “Protests are a natural part of college life. I think students at Carleton tend to feel very strongly about important issues and we expect that and respect that.”