All 18 of the students suspended in connection with the Kimmel Center occupation were offered deals by the university on Wednesday that would allow them return to classes Monday, WSN has learned.
In accordance with the deals, they would be suspended through Friday, Feb. 27 - exactly one week after their original interim suspension.
Mark Taylor, one of the Kimmel 18's pro-bono attorneys, confirmed that the students have until Friday to accept the deal outlined in the letter they received from the university yesterday about their punishments.
According to NYU judicial guidelines, if any student doesn't agree to the terms, they can reject them. They would then be given a judicial hearing date.
But Taylor said most of the students will be accepting the agreements of the suspension; at least one of the 18 students told WSN that she'd be agreeing to the terms of the letter immediately.
'I'll do it tomorrow [Thursday],' CAS sophomore Emily Stainkamp said last night. 'I don't think we should have been suspended, but I'm not going to argue about it,' she added.
Stainkamp said all 18 of the students' letters are essentially the same, except for some details in the paragraph that summarizes the individual preliminary disciplinary meetings.
Included in one of the letters was a rough estimate of the cost of the occupation for the university.
'The financial impact ... upon the university community is anticipated to be substantial,' the letter stated, signed by Marc Wais, vice president for Student Affairs. 'In fact, is expected to exceed $80,000.'
All 18 students will be on disciplinary probation for the rest of their enrollment at the university. They also face several long-term consequences preventing them from taking leadership roles in student clubs and are prevented from serving as RAs, peer counselors, orientation leaders, peer ambassadors or student senators.
One of the suspended students, Gallatin sophomore Kate Peltz, has been involved in the application process for becoming a RA in past weeks, but according to the university letters, those plans will end. As outlined in the charges, she cannot serve as a student leader until March of next year, she told WSN.
According to CAS junior Drew Phillips, the suspended students met last night to discuss the deals.
Many of them were 'ecstatic,' according to Caitlin Boehne, a senior and a CAS student senator, who was not one of the 18 suspended students but was involved in the protest for the majority of the time.
'There's a party in Brooklyn tonight,' she said.
Boehne has another reason to celebrate; last night, as her fellow protesters were receiving their charges, the CAS student council voted against impeaching her for her involvement in the occupation last week.
During negotiations with the protesters, Robert Butler, executive director of the Office of Student Affairs, threatened the students with expulsion.
Mike Dearborn, LSP freshman, believes that the university should have followed through with that threat.
'Considering the students supposedly incurred that much damage to the school and actually injured two security officers, I'm surprised they're not being expelled,' he said.
A guard at a residence hall, who was granted anonymity because of contractual obligations not to speak with media, said he wasn't surprised by the way the protest played out.
' 'NYU tells us that the building comes first, and the students second,' he said. 'Their property is more important to them.'
Though she's happy with the deal she was given, Stainkamp is still upset about the handling of the occupation by the university.
'No other university that has been occupied has refused to negotiate,' she said. 'No other university has acted quite like NYU.'
Reporting by W.M. Akers, Marc Beja, Andres Gutierrez, Randy Kreider, Vanessa Liu, Arielle Milkman, Richa Naik and Jane C. Timm. E-mail them at university@nyunews.com.