As the Trump administration aggressively begins to strip away human rights and target LGBTQ+ people and immigrants, more than one hundred students, faculty, and staff at the University of Vermont gathered inside the Davis Center on a snowy Thursday. On-campus unions demanded that university administrators uphold policies and procedures to protect marginalized and vulnerable members of the campus community.
Representatives from United Academics, UVM Staff United, UVM Graduate Student Union and UE Local 267 (service and maintenance workers) each spoke, urging interim President Patricia Prelock to provide leadership and clarity. There are immediate concerns for the safety of immigrant students, faculty, and staff, particularly those with legal status that may be called into question by the Trump administration such as refugees, asylum seekers and those with DACA status. Speakers also spoke to the need for safety for queer students, faculty, and staff, particularly trans and nonbinary individuals. Beyond the most pressing concerns of safety, unions raised the alarm over their ability to conduct university research and teaching under a discriminatory and anti-science federal administration.
“We are calling on UVM to enforce and communicate existing policies and to enact additional policies that protect all of the people who work and study here and to take steps with us to protect academic intellectuals on campus,” said Claire Whitehouse, Co-President of UVM Staff United.
The proposed actions were sent directly to Prelock on February 4:
1. UVM will adopt as its own policy Vermont law 20 V.S.A. § 4651, which states that public agencies shall not “knowingly disclose personally identifying information to any federal agency or official for the purpose of registration of an individual based on his or her personally identifying information.” This information will be inclusive of, but not limited to:
- Immigration status
- Gender, sexuality, lived name, and pronouns
- Disciplinary history, including participation in protests
2. UVM will create, implement, and share guidance for what students and employees should do if Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) enters campus. This guidance shall include:
- Guidance for FERPA and HIPAA compliance
- Clarification on public vs. private spaces on campus
- Instructions for what to do should ICE seek to enter a private area on campus, including providing suggested verbal scripts.
UVM will communicate this guidance via:
- Written document in English and in languages spoken by non-English-speaking employees, to be determined in conjunction with UE.
- Synchronous training sessions in English. At minimum, UVM shall provide at least two virtual and one in-person session in English. These sessions shall be conducted during working hours.
- In-person training session(s) with translation made available to non-English-speaking employees. Timing, frequency, and content of the training session(s) shall be determined in collaboration with UE. These sessions shall be conducted during working hours.
UVM shall provide all employees with a single point of contact for all questions related to immigration and ICE presence on campus.
3. UVM shall not instruct Police Services, nor any employee or group of employees, to cooperate with ICE for the purposes of entering any private spaces on campus or detaining any student or employee.
4. UVM shall not discipline employees or students for refusal to cooperate with ICE.
5. If an employee has any legal status and is called into question by immigration authorities, UVM shall testify to that person’s employment in good standing and, if necessary, seek other legal means to retain that employee.
6. If UVM employees are detained or arrested by ICE or border patrol in the course of performing their jobs, UVM shall provide legal defense.
7. UVM will coordinate with other research institutions and institutions of higher education to act in defense of sound science and academic freedom. UVM will keep students and employees informed of its efforts to engage in sector-wide actions protecting targeted issues including climate science, sexuality and gender studies, race and ethnic studies, education, counseling, social work, vaccine research, health equity, and the ability to recruit diverse populations for human subjects research. UVM shall not prevent students or employees from organizing within their own professional networks to preserve their ability to conduct rigorous research.
Prelock responded to the demands with a campus-wide email less than 48 hours later, agreeing to clarify the university’s stances. However, acknowledging that information will be shared is only the first step. “UVM doesn’t need to just send us a link to these policies. They need to train us in them, and they need to adopt new ones where we need to,” Whitehouse said. Whitehouse also highlighted the need for educators and researchers nationwide to organize together to protect their ability to work, forming rapid response and mutual aid networks through unions and student groups.
“Policies are great, but they’re only meaningful if everyone knows them and what role they play in enacting those policies. So how do you do it? By coming together. Solidarity and having each other’s backs, leaving no one behind is how we use our numbers and grow our power,” Whitehouse said.
For many UVM employees, such as custodians, electricians, plumbers, carpenters, and retail workers, this type of training, particularly against ICE raids or enforcement of Trumpian policies, is paramount. “The majority of our union is made up of workers whose first language is anything other than English,” said Aurora Nowak, steward for UE Local 267. “They need to know that they have the ability to learn what to do in the instance ICE shows up, that power to protect themselves.”
Academic freedom is at risk, with the Trump administration targeting education, particularly in the sciences, which directly puts immigrants, persons of color and LGBTQ+ community at risk. “I teach courses that are being directly threatened by the federal government,” said Linden Higgins, a senior lecturer in the Biology department and member of United Academics, noting that the Trump administration is demonizing people and ideas, citing projects being reviewed because they contain terms like “female” or “barriers,” totally context-free. “I’m hoping that the UVM administration will work with us to improve the clarity and transparency in their policies and procedures for protecting all our community members, our students, staff, and faculty, and commit to protecting UVM’s mission of inclusive education in education and research.”
Much like other unions, activists and community members across Vermont are coming together to organize and push back against the threats against education and humanity itself that a second Trump administration brings.
“Our campus, our community needs all hands on deck right now,” said Ellen Kaye, Co-President of UVM Staff United. “We need to be organized and united and working with others to make meaningful change and keep the terror at bay, and create opportunities for much-needed joy.”
Matt Moore is a writer from Vermont. He is on the editorial collective of The Rake Vermont.
