Students gathered outside the Hannah Administration Building on Monday to protest the reopening of Berkey Hall, one of the sites of the February mass shooting that killed three and injured five at Michigan State University. Monday, Jan. 8 marked the first day classes have been held in the building since the shooting, which occurred nearly one year ago.
“Our time. Our place. Healing at our pace,” chanted the crowd of students.
Journalism sophomore Cassidy Howard, who organized the protest, had a class in Berkey this morning. She said if given the option, she would “drop it in an absolute heartbeat.”
Howard said she sees the reopening of Berkey as negligent of students still recovering from the trauma of the shooting. However, she said, providing online options for classes being held in the hall would be a good compromise so students aren’t forced to enter Berkey if they don’t want to.
“It's helpful to have those options when you're in a setting where classrooms make you anxious,” Howard said.
The Associated Students of MSU, or ASMSU, have also pushed for hybrid and online options dating back to November.
That proposal, however, has been denied by the school. MSU spokesperson Mark Bullion confirmed Monday that the university will not be implementing any hybrid options for classes held in Berkey.
Howard said she has personally dealt with anxiety while in the classroom as a result of trauma brought on by the shooting.
“I was in a classroom at the Communication Arts and Sciences Building and had a complete breakdown trying to figure out what would break the window in front of me if somebody were to come in through the door,” she said.
International relations sophomore Lyra Opalikhin said she was concerned about the lack of accommodations for students who have to attend classes in Berkey.
“The conditions that they're opening the building under, I think, are not conducive to students being able to learn,” Opalikhin said. “There are barely any options given to students who have classes in that building and don’t want to go.”
Opalikhin said the university has the capability to implement asynchronous options, citing the university’s reliance on that modality during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Support dogs and counseling services, it’s not enough,” Opalikhin said. “It needs to be more to ensure that, you know, all students' needs are catered to.”
Some students called decorations currently adorning the inside of Berkey Hall distasteful, including one taped to the entrance that depicts a whale smiling with the caption, "whalecome back."
Public policy freshman Nina Blum said the decorations were “elementary-level” and “thoughtless.”
Mechanical engineering sophomore Lucas Trainor said he suspects the university’s motives in reopening Berkey were largely financial.
“You’re paying taxes on an unopened building and a building that’s not being used,” Trainor said. “It’s too expensive to keep the building closed.”
According to the university, the decision to reopen Berkey Hall was spurred by a large majority of community members who said they wanted the building open.
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“Following thoughtful conversations last spring involving students, faculty, staff and trauma experts, the overwhelming majority expressed a desire to reopen Berkey Hall using a phased approach,” the university said in a statement to The State News on Dec. 15. “We know the healing process is not linear and that each person will heal at their own pace and in their own way.”
Social relations and policy junior Saylor Reinders is a part of Students Demand Action MSU, an organization working to end gun violence. During the Board of Trustees meeting on Dec. 15, Reinders presented the results of a survey she conducted to gauge students' feelings about Berkey Hall reopening.
The survey found that 97.6% of respondents said they were not consulted by the university about the reopening, she said.
Of the 592 respondents to the survey, Reinders said, 77.2% said they did not think Berkey should reopen for classes for the spring semester, 10.1% said they were not sure and 4.7% said it should reopen for classes.
Social relations and policy junior Rani Asava said she was protesting to provide “moral support” for those who don’t feel comfortable going into Berkey.
“When it comes to grief, I understand how hard it is to ask for what you need,” Asava said. “And how easy it is to be invalidated.”
Asava said she believes the university has a duty to respond to students’ demands.
“The administration shouldn't be thinking when we make demands about how we can cope with this grief, that it’s us working against them,” Asava said. “It’s us asking for help because they claim they have our best interests … we should be looked at as though we’re students and not burdens.”
