After grand juries in Ferguson, Mo., and New York declined to indict police officers in the deaths of unarmed black men, students at Northwestern University School of Law organized a photo on campus where students and faculty dressed in black and held signs that read “black lives matter.”
Afew hours before a grand jury announced that it would not indict Ferguson, Mo., police officer Darren Wilson in the death of Michael Brown, Loyola University Chicago School of Law student Mike Montgomery was studying for final exams.
Montgomery — a second-year student and the president of Loyola’s Black Law Students Association — was in a campus computer lab with a third-year student. They were there to study but fell deep into discussion about the upcoming grand jury decision.
Montgomery was picking the brain of the older student. What did he think would happen? How often do grand juries fail to indict?
The bar for indictment was low, the student told Montgomery.
“When the decision came out, we were both shocked,” Montgomery said.
That was Nov. 24. Finals at Loyola began Dec. 8. Montgomery felt stretched in two directions. He wasn’t the only one.
Across the state and the country, law students — particularly those of color — are balancing the responsibility of finals with the desire to help the movements at their respective schools and elsewhere following separate grand jury decisions to not indict Wilson and, on Dec. 3, New York Police Department officer Daniel Pantaleo in the death of Eric Garner.
Many have also found the emotional stress an additional burden on normal study habits.
“It’s kind of difficult to focus so much on exams when there are so many things going on around you nationally,” said Ruby Garrett, the BLSA president at the University of Chicago Law School.
Garrett has been meeting with other students “every other day” about the protests and related issues and has been pulling all-nighters to make sure “I’m not falling through the cracks when it comes to my studying.”
The grand jury’s decisions have taken a toll. Garrett and other Illinois minority law students view each additional death of an unarmed person of color by police as another reminder that they, or one they love, could be next.
“There’s this unsettling realization that the next time an unarmed black man is shot, that could be my brother,” Garrett said. “That could be my father.”
On the East Coast, students at Columbia Law School, Harvard Law School and Georgetown University Law Center sent formal requests to administration to have tests postponed.
Columbia’s interim dean, Robert E. Scott, announced on Dec. 7 in an e-mail that the school would honor that request.
While no such requests have been made at Illinois schools, several BLSA students across the state understood the reason behind them.
“As someone who has experienced blatant racism, like being called a ‘n-----’ on this campus, to having law students tell me that I only got to where I am because I’m black, these issues are stressful, and you immediately feel connected to them and affected by them,” said Joyce Otuwa, a 3L who is the past president of the University of Illinois’ BLSA.
“I completely understand the students of Columbia’s needs to postpone finals so that they can demonstrate and process.”
Following the decision to not indict Pantaleo, Otuwa was one of many students statewide who began coordinating responses.
At Northwestern University School of Law, with final exams starting Dec. 8, students wanted to find an appropriate way to immediately show support.
They organized a photo on campus where students and faculty dressed in black and held signs that read “black lives matter,” one of the slogans of the post-Ferguson/Garner movements.
Along with BLSA — which many students pronounce “balsa” in speech — 14 other campus groups participated.
University of Chicago students posed for a similar photo.
“I think the beautiful thing about the photo was that after the non-indictment came down, I started getting e-mails and texts from other student group leaders wanting to know what BLSA was doing,” Garrett said.
“That was beautiful to me because at that point, it became clear that this was not just a BLSA problem.”
At DePaul University College of Law, Sara Cruse, the school’s BLSA vice president, organized a “hashtag protest” in which students wrote #AsAFutureBlackAttorney on their social media sites, followed by a statement about what they will do in that role.
Otuwa’s post on Instagram featured a photo of her holding a piece of paper that said “#AsAFutureBlackLawyer, I vow to be uncomfortably unrelenting in my fight to protect the civil liberties of those who haven’t been protected.”
Cruse reached out to representatives at U. of I., Loyola and The John Marshall Law School to participate, along with the Midwest and national chapters of BLSA.
“Right now, (protestors) are showing support and bringing awareness,” Cruse said. “But without us being lawyers and future lawyers, they cannot create the change that they are asking for.
“They need our help. We pretty much felt that this was the best way to acknowledge that we’re not ignoring the problem because we realize that we are part of the real solution to the problem.”
Students at Loyola and John Marshall are writing letters.
Loyola’s director of public services programs, Mary J. Bird, started a letter-writing campaign to students in Ferguson of all ages, thanking them for making their voices heard and offering encouragement.
“This is an issue,” Montgomery said. “We see it. It’s in our face.”
John Marshall students e-mailed the school’s BLSA listserv encouraging people to “protest peacefully and obey all laws,” said BLSA communications coordinator Kenese Clay.
Other John Marshall students participated in protests downtown, as did some students at DePaul, who also volunteered as legal observers through the National Lawyers Guild.
“I think the best thing we can do (as law students) is give people information,” Clay said.
BLSA students at U. of C., U. of I. and Loyola are planning symposiums for the spring that will address issues of race, police and the law. Loyola’s is the only one with a scheduled date: March 19.
Students at Northwestern, U. of C. and U. of I. participated in “die-ins” on campus, protests where people lay down motionless, as if they were dead, in public space.
Students at Southern Illinois University School of Law organized a campus protest in late October. IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law hosted a panel discussion in October about police militarization in the wake of Ferguson, with additional events forthcoming.
Dean Jennifer L. Rosato Perea of Northern Illinois University College of Law wrote her support for students in her weekly school newsletter.
And Garrett and Northwestern BLSA president Jarrett Burks anticipate groups from their respective schools cooperating on events in the spring.
Most of this work is being done in the heart of finals season, which is underway for all nine schools.
The students interviewed for this story all said they feel supported by their administration.
At U. of C., the dean of students, Amy M. Gardner, e-mailed students before Thanksgiving to express support and remind them that resources — such as counselors — are available during times of stress.
U. of C., as well as multiple other schools, accept and review student requests for special accommodations during final exams.
While U. of C. does not release numbers on how many accommodations have been made, Gardner said it typically provides them for “documented emergencies,” such as a death in the family, illness or a birth.
Still, while students sympathize with their East Coast colleagues and anyone else who needs time away — many calling it a personal decision — they seemed to be taking a different approach.
“It’s been difficult realizing that there are people outside in the streets protesting, and I’ve been stuck in the library studying,” Burks said.
“But I also realize that there are many battles that need to be won, and I came to law school to fight those battles. I can’t lose sight of my job here.”