UMass Students Protest Against CIA

Students at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst protested CIA on-campus recruitment at a meeting of the university's Board of Trustees this week, but the trustees postponed making final decisions on the long running issue until their next meeting in March.

About 50 students, many of whom were members of the Stop CIA Recruitment Organizing Committee, participated in this most recent protest against the university's regulations allowing CIA recruiters to recruit graduating UMass. students.

No arrests were made, and there was no physical violence, but the students had a "couple of little run-ins with [the Trustees]," said David B. Bassi, one of the protesters.

Last November, more than 70 protesters were arrested in two separate demonstrations, including 1960s radical Abbie Hoffman and Amy Carter, daughter of former President Jimmy Carter.

The CIA recruitment issue was not on the scheduled agenda at the Wednesday meeting of the Board of Trustees, but the protesting students "were given advance approval for our presentation," Bassi said.

Chairman of the Board of Trustees Andrew C. Knowles eventually allowed five students 45 minutes to advocate their case against CIA recruitment. But the student protesters "demanded to be heard further," said D. Leo Monahan, public relations official for the Board of Trustees. "The meeting couldn't get on to new business," he said.

The Board of Trustees finally agreed to discuss the issue at a later date and promised to come to some kind of decision on the matter at a subsequent meeting in April or March, according to Monahan.

But some students were not satisfied with this delay. Bassi said that "a number of members of our group decided this wasn't adequate." He said that the administrators were handling the situation like the 1972 protests against military recruitment when "they just waited it out until it became a non issue."

"We will not accept anything less than favorable recommendation of our proposal," Bassi said.