Boston University community members protested against BU’s administration by placing pride and other flags in windows across campus after the University removed several over spring break and later insisted that enforcement of its signage policy does not explicitly target politically sensitive signs.

Carrie Bennett and Courtney Pina Miller, co-chairs of the College of Arts and Sciences Writing Program’s diversity, equity, inclusion and justice committee, hung up six pride flags in the windows of the CAS Writing Center, located in the Yawkey Center for Student Services, on March 26. 

“We met with our committee … to talk about what had transpired on campus,” Miller said. “We wanted to install very large flags in response to what we see as a limit on free expression, and what seems to us as a threat to LGBTQ folks on campus.”

An installation also went up on March 26 at Wheelock’s Earl Center for Learning & Innovation at 55 Pilgrim Road, which consists of five large signs, each reading “there might have been a flag here.” 

“Our hope is that with this public provocation people will deeply consider the issues swirling around representation, academic freedom, freedom of speech, human rights, diversity, dignity, social justice, and more,” Earl Center Director Beth Warren and Earl Center Manager Lynn Brown, wrote in a statement to The Daily Free Press. 

As of Tuesday, neither the CAS Writing Center, Miller said, nor the Earl Center, Warren and Brown wrote, have received any notice of removal from BU officials.

Rachel Lapal Cavallario, vice president of BU Public Relations, wrote in a statement to The Daily Free Press that “the suggestion that the University is singling out the Pride flag with this policy is untrue.” 

She re-asserted BU’s commitment to support the LGBTQIA+ community, writing that “this policy, focused on time, place and manner restrictions, does not change that commitment.”

In the weeks since spring break, staff members have begun to take action to combat the administration’s commitment to its current signage policy.

Susanne Sreedhar, director of the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality program, recently proposed a project involving coordination with the University to create a new pride flag permitted to be displayed under BU signage laws. Sreedhar plans to meet this week with “people who actually might be decision makers.” 

“Ideally, not only would we have that, but there would be some formal committee or formal process by which faculty, staff [and] students could get BU authorization for what they want to display in their windows,” Sreedhar said.

A petition was released after the flag removals demanding a “revised posting policy, applicable to students, faculty, and staff, that permits the display of signs, banners, flags, or posters … regardless of whether any such item may be visible from outside of the space in which it appears.” As of Wednesday, the petition has over 1900 signatures.

Terrier Courage, a group founded by Assistant Professor at the Chobanian and Avedisian School of Medicine Jennifer Snyder-Cappione, created the petition. Snyder-Cappione started working on Terrier Courage a few months ago because she said she felt the need for “a group where … everyone at BU is equally important,” and that “our actions have to reflect our values.”

“You can’t tell us that we’re speaking for the University by hanging a sign in the window. It’s just unacceptable,” Snyder-Cappione said.

On Thursday, Terrier Courage will hold a rally at noon outside 1 Silber Way, after which the group will officially present the petition to a member of the president’s cabinet. 

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a First Amendment legal advocacy group, sent a letter to President Gilliam on Tuesday, calling for her to “immediately cease ordering faculty to remove flags from their office windows.”

In the letter, Graham Piro, a legal fellow for FIRE, wrote that BU’s definition of university speech is “overly broad,” and that flags or signage in the windows of individual offices or dorms do not constitute speech on behalf of the University.

FIRE requested a “substantive” response from Gilliam by April 14, confirming that “BU will cease its removal of faculty expressive flags and commit to enforcing its time, place, and manner policies in a reasonable manner.”

If a response is not received by the requested date, FIRE will “continue to try and engage with BU about this issue,” Piro said. 

FIRE has “consistently argued that private institutions that make free expression promises should abide by those promises,” Piro said.

Following the flag removals, Mary Battenfeld, co-president of the BU chapter of the American Association of University Professors, and AAUP co-president Joseph Harris sent a faculty letter to Gilliam expressing disappointment over BU’s signage policy.

While traveling through campus on Sunday, Battenfeld counted 24 pride flags on display.

AAUP and Wheelock faculty will host a teach-in on April 8 on “The Myth of Institutional Neutrality.” The event will address the “falseness of claiming that institutions can or should be neutral.” 

“They’re not neutral,” Battenfeld said. “They’re not neutral in where they invest money, they’re not neutral when taking down the pride flags when American flags are still up all over campus.”

Elizabeth Bettini, a Wheelock professor whose office was among those targeted during the pride flag removals over spring break, said the “widespread hanging of pride flags is exactly what needs to happen.”

“The University only has limited bandwidth, and the more that are hung up, the less that they are able to keep up with bringing those down,” Bettini said.

The BU Faculty Council has drafted a resolution that “calls for a change in policy,” said Nathan Phillips, a BU Earth and Environment professor whose outward-facing pride flag was removed multiple times. 

“There’s too many pride flags up in too many windows,” Phillips said. “The people have spoken, and I don’t see us going backwards.”