Amid a nationwide wave of pro-Palestinian demonstrations, East Georgia State College wants you to know that it’s not like other campuses.
“We are stable, and life is pretty predictable here,” reads a full-page advertisement the college recently placed in several newspapers across southeastern Georgia, where the small institution is located. “We value families and students that want to be part of a quieter atmosphere.”
The president of East Georgia State, David L. Schecter, is making that pitch in an attempt to attract and reassure students and families. Many prospective students in the region are on the fence about going to college, Schecter said in an interview. He fears that they might be intimidated by higher ed after seeing images of chaos and violence in the media.
Campus activism against the Israel-Hamas war has captured vast public attention in the past month, starting with an encampment at Columbia University that led to the arrests of more than 100 students. College leaders have wrestled with how to position themselves in relation to the protests.
East Georgia State’s approach is uncommon, communication experts say. It’s rare for a college that has not experienced pro-Palestinian protests to weigh in on the issue. (Schecter’s ad does not explicitly use the word “protests,” a decision he said was deliberate.)
Brandeis University took out an advertisement in The New York Times in December, pitching the institution, whose founders were Jewish, as a place where the “virulent antisemitism” that had “overtaken too many universities” would not be tolerated. (So far, the university has not seen an increase in transfer students for this fall.)
Playing the comparison game — even indirectly, by implying that other campuses created unsafe environments or handled protests poorly — isn’t advisable, the experts said.
“I would caution institutions against dog-whistle approaches for student recruitment,” said Teresa Valerio Parrot, principal of TVP Communications, a public-relations agency focused on higher education. “It’s rarely a good look to damn your own industry, and it may backfire, should you ever need the support of colleagues or find that you tempted fate and manifested your own controversy. Higher education doesn’t quickly forget.”
Bart Caylor, a higher-ed marketing consultant, said multiple faith-based institutions that have not experienced pro-Israel or pro-Palestine activism have asked him whether they should weigh in on the conflict at all. “I’ve recommended no,” Caylor said.
“These other schools aren’t living the issues that schools like Columbia are,” he said. “It’s really easy to armchair-quarterback from the sideline and say, ‘Well, we would never do that,’ without knowing everything that was going on and what they were trying to accomplish.”
Setting Boundaries
But college leaders might feel obligated to say something. In recent years, even as they have been reluctant to speak up publicly, presidents have often put out statements about major events that they see affecting their communities in some way. That’s made it difficult to define when it is appropriate for an institution to take a stand on an issue, Valerio Parrot said.
“Now, they have to be talking about this, because they haven’t set boundaries for what they do and what they’ll talk about,” she said.
At colleges that have seen encampments, most statements by presidents follow a cut-and-dried template: Leaders generally validate protesters’ grief and concern for the lives of Palestinians, emphasize that the encampments violate campus policies and are a safety concern, and reaffirm their commitment to free speech or working to swiftly end the protests.
Some statements, like one by Chancellor Mark A. Mone of the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, compare the institution’s handling of the encampment to that of other colleges.
Mone’s statement describes how the university’s response to a student encampment “differed from many others across the nation that have drawn media attention,” pointing out that university police officers had not intervened and that the university had not called in local law enforcement.
After arrests at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s encampment, on May 10, President Sally Kornbluth wrote that the community had “watched with great concern what has happened on other campuses” and that the university had been “determined to avoid violence.”
“Referencing the experience of others is a way to try to normalize what your experience is,” Valerio Parrot said. “But I would encourage leaders to remember that no situation is exactly the same. And if you’re trying to tie to a bigger movement, a bigger moment, make sure that that reflects the reality of what your campuses are going to do. Otherwise, you lose credibility.”
Valerio Parrot recommends that messages to the community or the general public emphasize what the college itself has done or is trying to do, rather than reference other colleges.
Schecter, of East Georgia State, said he doesn’t want the advertisement to be perceived as poking the bear. “There’s a lot going on on college campuses right now,” he said. “I have a great deal of respect for those going through it, as well as those who are trying to make change on their campus.”
He simply hopes the ad will remind people within and around East Georgia State, which has a significant population of first-generation and adult students, that not all campuses are like the ones featured most prominently in the media.
“Everything that’s been covered thus far is showing a world that is very chaotic higher ed that I was afraid was really turning off people who may be on the fence about coming to us in the fall or even choosing college itself,” Schecter said. “We’re always on defense, you know?”
And some applaud East Georgia State for trying something different.
“While unconventional and probably not the approach I would have taken … the campus has very clearly identified a point that they feel is distinctive for them within the higher-ed market space, and they’ve committed to making that a core part of their message,” said Sean Rossall, chief executive of the RW Jones Agency, a higher-ed consultancy. “Campuses need to do everything they can to demonstrate truly what makes them distinctive, and we need to do what we can to disrupt a sea of sameness.”
