For nearly six hours, about 100 protesters — including Yale students — blocked the staircase and escalators that lead from the station to the tracks to demand that Rep. Rosa DeLauro call for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza and stop voting for military aid to Israel. Organizers wrote in a statement to the News that the goal of the sit-in was to “end business as usual” during what they described as a genocide in Gaza. Israel disputes charges of genocide. Several event attendees told the News that they participated with the intention of police arresting them.

Dave Steckel, the MTA media liaison, wrote to the News that the nine people arrested were issued misdemeanor summons for second-degree breach of peace, which is the “intent to cause inconvenience, annoyance, or alarm or recklessly creating a risk thereof.”

Event attendees disputed the number MTA police offered, saying that 13 people received charges of breach of peace. Steckel declined to comment on the discrepancy, and the News was unable to independently verify either count. The News could not confirm whether Yale students were among those arrested.

During the sit-in, which lasted from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m., protesters chanted “Free, free Palestine” and “Get up, get down, we’re anti-war in this town” as they blocked the main stairwell and escalators to the platform. protesters hung a banner over the timetables that read “DeLAURO STOP FUNDING GENOCIDE.” 

According to multiple attendees and video obtained by the News, the protesters directly at the top and bottom of the staircase and escalators locked themselves together with bicycle locks and PVC pipes. While this blocked the stairs and escalators, passengers were still able to get from the station to the tracks using the building’s elevators. 

Around 11 p.m., at least nine and possibly as many as 13 attendees on the bottom floor of the station blocked the elevators to provoke arrest, according to several attendees. They were quickly arrested by MTA police. The rest of the protesters left the station around the same time. Some protesters continued demonstrating outside the station past midnight. 

Steckel wrote that no protesters were detained in a cell after the arrests, and all protesters left the station by 11:00 p.m. Some protesters continued demonstrating outside the station past midnight. 

“We wanted to escalate so that people in ‘lock boxes’ could get arrested because we wanted the image of law enforcement cutting them up,” said one attendee, to whom the News granted anonymity due to safety concerns. “That was the whole purpose of being locked down — you are intending to be arrested after law enforcement ‘unlocks’ you.”

Breach of peace is a Class B misdemeanor in Connecticut and carries penalties of up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine.

Advocates in New Haven and across Connecticut have protested since October in support of a permanent ceasefire to end Israel’s military offensive in Gaza, through which Israel has killed over 32,000 people in Gaza, though experts believe thousands more to be dead. Israel has undertaken the offensive in response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel, in which Hamas killed 1,200 people and took over 250 people as hostages.

The sit-in was organized by what several attendees interviewed by the News described as a collection of individuals who took issue with DeLauro’s support for military aid to Israel and refusal to call for a permanent ceasefire. 

“The point of direct action is to disrupt the business as usual, and really bring attention to these causes,” Abdul Osmanu, a Hamden Town Councilor who attended the sit-in, said. “Oftentimes the needle really doesn’t move without any real meaningful direct action.” 

Osmanu also argued that DeLauro was ignoring the will of her constituents, citing polling that shows the majority of Democrats support a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.

On March 7, DeLauro — who represents New Haven — put out a statement calling for a six-week ceasefire.

“We must work to get more humanitarian aid into Gaza, free all the hostages held by Hamas, and enact a six-week ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas conflict that allows for the protection and survival of innocent Palestinian civilians caught in the middle of war,” DeLauro wrote. 

On March 22, DeLauro voted for a $1.2 trillion government funding package which passed overwhelmingly and included $3.3 billion in aid to Israel’s military.

DeLauro did not respond to a request for comment on the sit-in or arrests.

The protesters also held an Iftar — the evening meal that breaks the fast for Muslims observing Ramadan — during the sit-in. Osmanu, who is fasting for Ramadan, said that people brought water, dates and pizza, which enhanced the sense of community among the protesters. 

Adam Nussbaum ’25, who participated in the sit-in, said that he had met with staff from DeLauro’s office earlier in the day alongside a delegation from Yale Jews for Ceasefire and described the meeting as frustrating. The protest, by contrast, brought him hope. 

“I think it can easily feel cynical, and in moments like these, seeing so many people rally and put their bodies on the line — saying that we won’t stand for this injustice and this sort of death-making is very moving,” Nussbaum said. “I feel very inspired by it. It just makes me feel like we will win.”

One bystander, who asked only to be identified by their first name Ty due to fear of retaliation from their employer, told the News that they arrived at Union Station around 7 p.m. to catch a train. They said that while they could have gone around the protest to board, they felt “uncomfortable” with breaking the line and wanted to support the ongoing protest.

They added that the protest was “very peaceful” and “powerful,” and that they believed the police were aggressive in their removal of protesters from the stairwell area. Ty ended up taking a train on Friday instead.

Shilpa Patel, a worker at the Sbarro in Union Station, said that the MTA Police “did their job” but that the police were not able to control the protesters as they blocked the escalator and elevator. 

According to attendees and video of the event obtained by the News, more than 30 police officers from four departments — New Haven police, Amtrak police, MTA police and Connecticut State police — were present at the protest, though only MTA police made arrests. 

The Union Station sit-in followed a protest on the New Haven Green Thursday afternoon where approximately 100 Yale and New Haven community members gathered to urge New Haven officials to call for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war. An organizer for the New Haven Green protest told the News that the rally on the green and Union Station sit-in were planned separately. At the end of the rally, the organizers informed protesters that they could march to Union Station to support the action. 

DeLauro has represented New Haven since 1991.

Anika Arora Seth, Khuan-Yu Hall and Kenisha Mahajan contributed reporting.

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Ferando, who is a lecturer in the history of art, is stepping down to become the Head of Academic Affairs for the Yale Center for British Art. She along with her husband, Jason Atkinson, and her son are leaving JE in August. She was appointed in 2016 to succeed former JE dean Jody Spooner.   

“JE has the warmest, kindest people and I will miss seeing friendly, familiar faces every day,” Ferando wrote to the News. “I know this is true for every residential college, but I particularly love our JE spirit.”

Before becoming dean, Ferando got a doctorate in art history and archaeology at Columbia University. Ferando has worked with a variety of commercial and non-profit galleries, museums and auction houses including the Yale University Art Gallery and the Museum of Modern Art, and she has taught courses in art history at Columbia and Williams College.

Ferando’s upcoming job as head of academic affairs at the YCBA is an inaugural position that Ferando said will include planning research initiatives centered on YCBA’s collection and British art as well as collaborating with faculty and colleagues across the University. 

“I’m thrilled to be joining this world-renowned museum and working with amazing colleagues there, some of whom I have had the privilege of working with already,” Ferando wrote. “My first book was published this year, and this seemed like a great moment to return to the world of art history, which I have missed the past few years.”

Ferando wrote that she will miss the staff, students and residential college fellows, as well as the dining hall which she called “the heart of the college.”

In an email to JE students on March 7, Head of Jonathon Edwards Paul North wrote that Ferando oversaw the college through contentious political times and the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as changes in registration and housing policies. He added that through these challenges, she kept everyone “on track and moving.”

“Dean Ferando is the most caring, and also the most firm, the most knowledgeable, and also the most fun, and all around the most responsible person I could have imagined sharing direction of JE with,” North wrote. “Her capacity for empathy is only equaled by her understanding of the arcane maze that is Yale.”

Anthony Kurz ’26 told the News that Ferando helped him adjust to college life and transition his health care provider when he moved to Yale. 

He described Ferando as a “wonderful dean” and that she has “only ever tried to make things easier for [him].”

“She has a warm and welcoming presence in the role,” Kurz said. “You can go into her office and ask her questions about anything concerning what’s going on in your life.”

Allison Lee ’25 met Ferando as a first year in 2021 and has worked with her as a college aide. She described Ferando as a “powerful and really inspiring character within JE.”

Lee, who is the incoming head first-year counselor for Jonathan Edwards, said she will be working closely with the next dean of JE and hopes that the new dean will be active in JE’s residential college life and traditions.

“She has been an incredibly profound part of a lot of JE students’ lives and we’re really thankful for her work,” Lee told the News. “We’re so sad to see her leave, but she’s only going to the Yale Center for British Art just across the street, so she won’t be very far and so it’s great that we’ll be close to there.”

Jonathan Edwards College is located at 68 High St. 

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Director of the Asian American Cultural Center Joliana Yee wrote that she and assistant director Sheraz Iqbal toured 305 Crown St. earlier this semester, along with the lead architect, to see the future home of the newly-announced MENA space. The “cultural suite” will be built over the summer on half of the first floor, according to Yee, who added that she arranged for a workshop on Friday, March 1 to solicit input from MENA students.

The lack of a MENA cultural center has long been a source of student frustration, with the new space coming after nearly six years of student organizing.The Asian American Cultural Center currently has a dedicated room for MENA students on its third floor, and, this year, the AACC sponsored the University’s first AACC-MENA peer liaisons.

“It is my goal to remain in communication with the architect and design team to ensure that the renovated space meets the needs and expectations of the MENA community within the parameters that have been approved by the University,” wrote Yee, who also an assistant dean of the College.

The latest development comes after University President Peter Salovey promised the creation of a “more plentiful and fully dedicated space” for MENA students in December. Salovey’s commitment was part of a larger message on the University’s actions to “enhance support” for students in the wake of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, including permanent security at the Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale and the hiring of a second Muslim chaplain.

“In recent years, university leaders have discussed with MENA students their requests for additional space and recognition, and we are committed to work with them and to provide resources and guidance,” Salovey wrote in his “Against Hatred” message. 

In January, administrators told the News that the new MENA center would have its own dedicated peer liaisons, assistant director and physical space — distinct from the AACC — by the fall 2024 semester. 

Yale added a job posting on LinkedIn for assistant director of the “MENA Cultural Community” on Jan. 18. Responsibilities include liaising with facilities staff to maintain the current MENA space in the AACC and “provide guidance throughout the build out of the new space in 305 Crown,” and to work with the AACC director in “strategic planning, financial management, program assessment, and departmental reporting.” 

Lewis told the News in February that the MENA space will have a separate budget from the AACC with “substantial funding.” He said that the YCDO will use a survey to find out how many students would be engaged with the MENA center because the U.S. Census Bureau, which the Common Application uses, does not include a category for Middle Eastern and North African identity.

“In the case of some races, we get [racial demographic] information after students have been admitted from the Common App, but I think with MENA, because it’s a complex category and not exactly one of the categories in the census, we have to just ask people,” Lewis said.

Although the Supreme Court struck down affirmative action last summer, the University can still use self-reported racial identity data gathered after the application process.

Last April, University administration ordered student groups to vacate their previously assigned spaces at 305 Crown St. by the end of the year, citing “inequities” with the building hosting only 15 student groups out of hundreds on campus. At the time, Dean of Student Affairs Hannah Peck wrote to the groups that instead, each would receive a shelf in the 305 Crown storage room. 

This year, the Yale Herald and the Yale Record both have offices on the third floor of the building, and First Year Outdoor Orientation Trips — one of the Camp Yale orientation programs — also uses rooms on the first and second floors for storage.

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Yale Hospitality Senior Director Adam Millman wrote to the News that the University will be providing vouchers to low-income students who have a family share of up to $10,000 and who live on campus. The vouchers are daily $30 UberEats credits that are only eligible at establishments within a 15-mile radius of New Haven. They are non-transferable, and unused credits do not carry over to the next day.

Millman wrote, on behalf of the Yale College Dean’s Office, that approximately 1,800 eligible students were notified of the voucher on Feb. 9.

During spring recess, select Yale Hospitality retail locations will still be open, including The Elm, Steep Cafe, Cafe Med, Health Center Cafe, West Campus Cafe and School of Management locations. 

“There aren’t enough students staying over spring break to make it feasible for the dining halls to stay open,” Lewis said. “We added one day of opening on either end [of spring break], because based on last year’s numbers that were like 700 students around, and we’re going to continue to study whether we can have one dining hall open in the future.”

Lewis explained that in the middle of spring break last year, only 200 to 300 students were eating in the dining halls, and the meal plan is not designed to support student meals over spring recess. 

Select dining halls will be open at the beginning and end of spring recess, when more students are back on campus — on March 9 and 10, and on March 22 and 23. All residential college dining halls will reopen on March 24 with brunch service. 

Yale College Council, or YCC, dining policy team director Benjamin Gervin ’26 wrote to the News that he has worked on crafting a survey to assess how many students plan to stay on campus over the break. After he receives these results, Gervin wrote, he intends to use them as quantitative evidence to explain to Yale Hospitality why they should leave some dining halls open over the break.

YCC deputy dining policy director Esha Garg ’26 wrote that she and Mimi Papathanasopoulos ’26, the YCC health and accessibility director, wrote an open letter to University administrators on the dining hall closures.

The letter stated that the lack of dining hall availability will “disproportionately affect international and low-income students who stay on campus,” as well as student-athletes with mandatory team commitments. Garg and Papathanasopoulos also wrote that the $30 UberEats credit is not enough to cover three meals for one day, especially with additional fees UberEats adds on orders.

Lewis said that while “$30 is only $30,” the amount is “adequate” for students over the recess. He also mentioned that students can save money by ordering together or getting pickup versus delivery.

“The response back was positive and partially addressed our concerns: some dining halls will now be open until Sunday, March 10 and will reopen on Friday, March 22,” Garg wrote to the News. “This means that dining halls will now be open for 2 additional days! Additionally, the YCDO team has extended the vouchers to more students on financial aid – this means that approximately 1800 students will be eligible for vouchers while in New Haven.”

In addition, Garg said the YCC is working on providing grocery store stipends for international students, in collaboration with the Office of International Students and Scholars.

Last year, dining halls were initially planned to be open over spring recess for $37.08 per day, totaling $556.20 for the entire break. After students and the Yale College Council expressed concern over the price of meals, Hospitality informed students that four residential college dining halls — Branford, Saybrook, Grace Hopper and Jonathan Edwards colleges — were open at no cost to students through the break.

Last year, Lewis told the News that the Yale College Dean’s Office was essentially subsidizing the price of spring recess dining, as the meal plan does not cover November recess, winter recess and spring recess. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, students were required to pay a fee for meals over the break. 

Spring recess begins March 8 and classes resume on March 25.

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The term bill includes tuition costs, which will rise to $67,250, and room and board for students who live on campus, which will rise to $19,900. The 2023-24 tuition was $64,700, and the room and board was $19,180. 

Despite the increase, University administration confirmed its commitment to financial aid and affordable tuition for students.

“People have difficulty understanding the relationship between the sticker price and the actual cost to them of an education at Yale,” University President Peter Salovey said. “We have to do a better job communicating that difference.”

Tuition costs have risen “mostly due to inflation,” Dean of Yale College Pericles Lewis told the News. Twenty years ago, tuition was $29,820, and in 2014, tuition was set at $44,000. Ten years later, tuition now stands nearly $25,000 higher.

But, Lewis said, the costs of higher education rise at higher rates than the national inflation rate. Indeed, tuition has doubled in the last decade even though $100 in 2014 would be worth only about $127 in 2024.

Lewis said that tuition costs cover roughly one-fourth of Yale College’s total costs, with the endowment covering half and research grants and other funding covering the last quarter. 

The total budget to run the University is about $5 billion, Lewis said, citing the 2022 Yale budget report, but “the ratios haven’t changed all that much” as tuition has grown.

Lewis said that the largest expense for Yale College is salary and benefits, from both faculty and staff salary, which make up about half of the budget. 

In April 2022, Salovey’s For Humanity capital campaign — the University’s fourth and most ambitious fundraising effort — announced a $1.2 billion fundraising goal as part of the $7 billion campaign. In October, Eugénie Gentry, associate vice president for development and campaign director, referred to this announcement as the beginning of a larger marketing effort called “Be the Key,” which has yet to publicly launch.

By the April announcement, the figure raised for this effort was greater than $603 million and included gifts that have allowed Yale to offer universally free tuition at the David Geffen School of Drama and need-based, full-tuition scholarships to students at the Divinity School.

“Yes, it’s true that for a family where they don’t qualify for any financial aid from Yale, they are going to pay more to be here and those tend to be families in the top couple of percent of the income distribution,” Salovey said. “For any other family, when tuition goes up, they should feel that that increase will be taken care of by increased financial aid and more.”

Among the challenges of leading an institution like Yale is the public’s distrust of higher education because of the belief that it is not affordable, Salovey told the News in September. 

He added that, at present, Yale is “more affordable than ever” because of its generous financial aid programs. However, Salovey said that this is a “very hard” message to communicate to the general public because “many colleges and universities can’t provide those funds,” which Ivy League universities and other member institutions of the Association of American Universities can provide. 

Politics, Salovey also said, complicates this message even more, making it more challenging to “champion what’s great about universities.”

“All of that exists in a very polarized political climate that makes it difficult for a university in so many ways,” Salovey said in September. “What we really need is a pride in our university college and university system which I think is second to none in the world and, unfortunately, for various political reasons, universities are [often] attacked [which] has made it harder to run a university.” 

Despite an increased sticker price, the University emphasized that Yale College’s need-based financial aid will not be affected. 

“If a family’s financial circumstances stay the same, their net cost will stay the same,” Kari DiFonzo, director of undergraduate financial aid, told Yale News last month.

Yale’s undergraduate financial aid budget has more than tripled since the 2007-08 academic year, according to Jeremiah Quinlan, dean of undergraduate admissions and financial aid. For the 2023-24 academic year, the financial aid budget was $241 million.

According to Quinlan, Yale is one of only eight American colleges that does not consider a student’s financial need when evaluating them for admission and meets every student’s demonstrated financial need without loans.

Yale’s need-blind status was challenged in a recent lawsuit alleging that the University — along with 16 peer institutions — was part of a price-fixing cartel. The University settled earlier this year but denied any allegations of wrongdoing.

The admissions office’s top priority in its outreach work is raising awareness about Yale’s affordability and need-based financial aid, according to Mark Dunn, senior associate director for outreach and recruitment at the Office of Undergraduate Admissions.

Dunn pointed to Yale’s college cost estimation tool, MyinTuition Quick Cost Estimator, which he said has been useful in helping families understand the difference between Yale’s sticker price and the price they will actually pay. More than 50,000 net price estimates were generated using the tool last year, according to Dunn.

Additionally, since 2013, the admissions office has run a postcard campaign for prospective students from low- and middle-class neighborhoods. The campaign advertises the extent of Yale’s need-based financial aid policies. Dunn told the News that he believes the campaign is largely responsible for the increase in applications from lower-income students over the past decade.

“Sharing Yale’s commitment to affordability is the top communications priority for the admissions office in all of our outreach work,” Dunn wrote.

The University’s endowment was $40.7 billion in 2023.

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A Feb. 20 email from Chief Campus Health Officer Madeline Wilson announced that Yale Health would be ending the Campus COVID Resource Line, a phone line for information on COVID-19, on Feb. 23 and positive COVID-19 cases would no longer be reported to the University. 

Instructions for those who test positive for COVID-19 are now located on the Campus Health website, which has replaced the dedicated COVID-19 site. 

But English professor Katie Trumpener, who currently teaches her classes on Zoom because she is immunocompromised and was hoping to return to hybrid teaching — while masked — next semester, is worried that the lack COVID-19 monitoring may make it unsafe for her to return to the classroom. 

“I really miss live university life, including casual interactions with students and colleagues,” Trumpener wrote to the News. “But I have to keep weighing isolation against safety.” 

According to Wilson’s email, rapid antigen tests are still available at some campus locations, and undergraduates will still have access to isolation kits in their residential colleges.   

The ending of positive case reporting comes as the University has slowly moved toward relaxed COVID-19 policies since late 2022. Even as campus COVID-19 cases rose early in the fall 2023 semester, the University stuck with scaled-back policies on isolation housing and contact tracing, following the World Health Organization’s declaration of the end of the COVID-19 public health emergency on May 11, 2023. 

“These system changes do not mean that we are taking our eye off the ball—far from it,” Wilson wrote in her Feb. 20 email. “The Campus Health team continues to monitor local and national trends for COVID, other infectious diseases, and other issues that may impact campus public health.”

Dean of Yale College Pericles Lewis told the News that other resources, like isolation housing, have not been used much this academic year. In her email, Wilson wrote that recommended isolation for positive cases remains at five days. 

“I think the thing is with all of our vaccines, and especially for young people, most people are treating it a little bit more like they would some other virus,” Lewis said. “For faculty and staff, because we’re older, there’s a little bit more risk involved in general, and so we definitely encourage people who have COVID to stay home and follow the CDC guidance.” 

The current CDC guidance recommends that those who have COVID-19, or suspect they might and do not have test results, should isolate. Upon receiving a positive test result, they should isolate themselves at home for five days. 

Albert Ko, professor of public health at the School of Public Health, told the News that new COVID-19 variants are less virulent and more transmissible and more people gain immunity, either through vaccination or getting infected.

Ko said that the changes to Yale Health’s COVID-19 policy “makes sense,” but also emphasized that high-risk people, including elderly and immunocompromised populations, are still at risk and should take precautions such as masking and staying up to date on vaccinations. 

“This is a difficult situation because COVID is still a disease that’s causing significant mortality in the United States,” Ko said. “The good news is that there are ways to mitigate severe effects.”

Yale Health is located at 55 Lock St.

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The report, which the News obtained in late January, summarized data from over 1,800 student respondents in a survey focused on student concerns for the next president of Yale. 

The SAC was created after widespread student demand for student representation on the Presidential Search Committee and included 15 students from across the University. Forty percent of respondents to the SAC’s survey listed student mental health as the top challenge the University will face, and 38 percent listed mental health policy as an issue where the University performed worse than peer institutions. 

Student mental health care policy has been a point of contention for students in recent years, particularly the policy for students facing mental health challenges who want to take leave. In September, Yale settled a class-action lawsuit which was filed by mental health advocacy group Elis for Rachael and current students against the University in November 2022. In January 2023, in the midst of the suit, the University announced “momentous” changes to leave of absence policies. 

University President Peter Salovey said that the president does have much power over mental health policy. Instead, he said these policies usually fall to Vice President for University Life Kimberly Goff Crews or deans. 

“[Presidents] don’t make policy for services and generally and for issues affecting students,” University President Peter Salovey told the News. “Having said that, I’m a clinical psychologist who still has a license to practice — though I don’t practice — so student mental health is hugely important to me.”

However, Salovey said that Yale’s president can still influence mental health policy through three avenues. Namely, they can “give voice to the challenge” to raise awareness about the issue of mental health, raise funds to “support a more robust mental health strategy” and weigh in on policy decisions that are under consideration.

He added, for example, that the University’s expansion of its mental health resources to residential colleges through the Yale College Community Care, or YC3, program was a change for which he long advocated.

“Long before it was implemented, I was a very strong proponent of decentralizing mental health services and reducing the barriers in order to make it easy for students to access it,” Salovey said. “What became called YC3 is consistent with a point of view about how to deliver psychological care on campus that I’ve long championed.”

YC3 was established in April 2021 to provide short-term mental health care in the residential colleges with wellness specialists and clinicians associated with YMHC. In 2022, some students spoke of positive experiences with the organization, while others told the News that the short-term nature made it difficult to use for mental health care. 

Among the most challenging aspects of being Yale’s president are the changing needs of students, Salovey told the News in September. 

Salovey told the News in November that students today — and their parents — have different “expectations” of the University that involve institutions “being far more intentional about developing students.” This shift in expectations, he said, necessitates that universities respond with a multitude of services.

“When I was in college, the student attitude about many, many things with respect to the institution could be summarized in the following sentence: ‘leave us alone’ …  my generation for whatever reason as young adults was focused on autonomy,” Salovey said. “As a psychologist, I love that the stigma around getting help for psychological issues like anxiety or depression seems to largely be gone and students want that help … but it does change the demand and the nature of how a university responds to that demand.”

Chief of Yale Mental Health and Counseling Paul Hoffman attributed the large student concerns to students going through the COVID-19 pandemic, the political climate and influence of social media, all of which he said have taken a toll on students’ mental health. He said that rates of students in therapy nationally have risen from 13 to 36 percent, and the rate of students taking medications for mental health have increased from 12 to 29 percent.            

Yale, Salovey said, “is moving aggressively” to expand mental healthcare but is not “100 percent there yet.” 

In addition to the leave policy, concerns around mental health policy have also centered around long wait times and the YC3 program’s branding as being “short-term.”

Prior to the lawsuit regarding leave policies, in April 2022, the University relaxed the coursework and interview requirements for reinstatement following leave. The 2023 policy changed the process of taking leave for mental health reasons from a “withdrawal” to “medical leave of absence,” which now allows  students who take time off to have benefits like health care coverage through Yale Undergraduate Affiliate Coverage and the ability to work student jobs. Students are now also able to enroll in two course credits at the start of the term or drop down to two course credits with urgent medical and mental health needs. 

Despite these changes, Ben Swinchoski ’25, co-director of the Yale Student Mental Health Association, told the News that there are still some concerns about access to mental health care. Swinchoski described mental health care as “a lot better post settlement,” but raised concerns about wait times students face at Yale Mental Health and Counseling.  

“I think there are still some issues that persist,” Swinchoski said. “There’s a lot of variability in the wait time and also in the quality and consistency of care that people get.”

Swinchoski described hearing student concerns about wait times for the intake process, or the time until the initial appointment, as well as the time it takes to get matched with a therapist post-intake. Swinchoski said that the main role he sees the University president in helping this issue is raising funds for more clinicians at YMHC. 

Chief of Yale Mental Health and Counseling Paul Hoffman said that YMHC has expanded over the past four years, increasing the number of clinicians from 34 to 73 as well as partnering with Yale College to create the YC3 program. Hoffman added that YMHC has the largest staff of any school of equivalent size and one of the largest staffs of any college mental health center in the country. Additionally, YMHC has partnered with Yale’s graduate and professional schools to create counseling programs in eight schools and opened two additional locations — 205 Whitney Ave. and 60 Temple St. 

“This extensive growth has led to significantly reduced wait times both for initial appointments as well as the time to get matched to a therapist,” Hoffman wrote to the News. 

Yale Mental Health and Counseling is located at 55 Lock Street.

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The faster process will give students more time to decide whether they want to move off-campus after receiving their housing assignments. The change comes a year after Yale’s housing system underwent major reforms last year, as it became a centralized process run through a housing office, rather than through individual residential colleges.

The housing process has been a source of student ire in recent years, as residential colleges have faced housing shortages stemming from the historically large size of the class of 2025. 

With these shortages, off-campus housing numbers have spiked, leading to displacement and a strain on the New Haven housing market. According to Dean of Yale College Pericles Lewis, many students chose to live off-campus during the COVID-19 pandemic, a trend later exacerbated by the size of the class of 2025, but he said that he hopes it will return to pre-COVID-19 levels soon.

“I’m not too upset when a senior moves off campus, but I’m not in favor of juniors living off campus and wish and believe we should do everything in our power to make it possible for every junior to live on campus,” University President Peter Salovey told the News. 

While students are not guaranteed housing after their first four semesters, seniors get priority in picking their rooms. Sophomores and first years are both required to live on campus, so juniors face the greatest uncertainty in the process. 

With the expedited timeline, the deadline for students to declare intent to live on or off campus this year was Feb. 12, while last year’s deadline was Feb. 27. Group formation for all rising sophomores, juniors and seniors opens Feb. 20 and the lottery will occur on March 25. The room selection process is open from March 27 to 28 for rising sophomores, March 27 to April 1 for rising seniors, and from April 1 to April 2 for rising juniors. Last year’s group formation was March 8 to 28 for rising sophomores and seniors and March 8 through April 13 for rising juniors. Room selection took place from April 10 to 12 for sophomores and seniors and April 20 to 21 for juniors. 

Justin Thornton, the associate director of undergraduate housing, wrote to the News about the adjusted room draw timeline, saying that the change occurred “based on feedback from Yale College students and staff from the 2023-2024 cycle.”

Lewis told the News that the timeline was moved in order to provide students who entered the housing lottery with housing information by the end of March. In order to do this, the deadline to apply for first-year counselors was also moved forward from Jan. 31 to Jan. 22. Seniors who become FroCos do not enter the housing lottery for their residential college. 

With the updated timeline, students will have more time to decide if they want to live off campus once they have received their housing assignments. In past years, due to housing shortages, many students have been annexed to on-campus housing outside of their residential colleges. Lewis attributed annexation housing as a reason why students may choose to live off campus. 

Despite the rise in off-campus housing, which Lewis said has been a long-term trend for the last 10 to 15 years, he said that he wants to ensure that students living off-campus stay involved in campus life. 

But he does not expect any students to be kicked off campus this year. 

While the class of 2027 had an unprecedented 72 percent of students accept Yale’s offer of admission, Lewis said that the rising sophomore class size would not have a “big impact” on the housing draw. He added that while there is a possibility of Yale running out of beds, the University is far from reaching that threshold. 

In February of last year, Lewis told the News that no students had ever been kicked off campus due to housing shortages. Thornton wrote that housing is not guaranteed for junior and senior students per undergraduate housing policies but that housing is usually available for students who request it.

“I think any sophomore who wants housing next year will be able to get it if that’s what they go for,” Lewis said. “It’s not a 100 percent guarantee, but I think it’s almost certain that they would be able to find a room.”

The centralized housing process is in its second year of operation after years of each of Yale’s 14 residential colleges handling their own housing draws. With the change, students now choose their future rooms online in an effort to reduce problems that arose with annexation housing.

A new inclusion to the online housing intent form this year was an option for students to indicate whether they want to live on a single-gender floor.

Last year, when Yale College switched its housing system, there was not an option for students to request single-gender floors and bathrooms for religious reasons. After a petition and rallies, Yale allowed students to submit requests for single-gender housing. 

Other than the room draw timeline, no other changes have occurred to the undergraduate process to accommodate the large class size of 2027. 

The Yale Housing Office is located in Helen Hadley Hall at 420 Temple St.

The post Housing process for 2024 commences on expedited timeline appeared first on Yale Daily News.

CSC ServiceWorks is the laundry contracting service that is responsible for machine maintenance at Yale. Marisa Figueira, director of operations for the Yale College Dean’s Office and Faculty of Arts and Sciences, told the News that in August 2026, when the University’s contract with CSC is set to end, the University will begin the “request for proposal” process, where laundry vendors will present bids for a contract. 

Free laundry may not come with a switch in contractors, but the switch opens up discussion for improving Yale’s laundry systems, a central source of student ire, namely in terms of the cost of laundry and the cleanliness of laundry spaces. 

“The termination of the CSC contract is a pretty big deal for us and gives us hope, but we worry that the new contractor might not bring free laundry,” Emily Hettinger ’26, a Yale College Council senator, wrote to the News. 

Viktor Kagan ’24, who is co-leading the laundry advocacy effort with Hettinger, wrote that, unlike Hettinger, “the ending does not signify a win to him.” Both Hettinger and Kagan expressed disappointment that Pericles Lewis, the dean of Yale College, and the Yale College Dean’s Office do not seem to be taking steps toward free laundry.

Lewis said that there are insufficient funds for free laundry. Instead, the termination of CSC’s contract serves as “an opportunity for us to review how [CSC ServiceWorks] is doing and whether we want to make any changes,” he said. 

Lewis told the News that the financial aid package sent to students includes costs for unbilled expenses, which applies to laundry services. 

At Yale, students pay $1.50 for each laundry cycle, or $3 to wash and dry a load of laundry. Figueira wrote that this cost is “below industry (and local laundromat) standards.”

The cost of laundry has long been a source of student outcry, with YCC members negotiating with the Yale administration to change the policy for free and clean laundry for years. Many representatives have also included laundry policy changes in their platforms during past YCC elections. 

Hettinger said that she has been at least the third YCC member to take on the laundry advocacy role which “in itself demonstrates how long and drawn out this fight for free laundry has been.” 

While Lewis said there are currently not enough funds for free laundry, he said that he will be evaluating funding now that the contract is ending. 

“I don’t have the funds available to do that now, but we’ll be looking at the funding model when we consider renewal or switching the contract,” Lewis said. “I don’t want to promise anything because it’s a fairly expensive investment on the part of the Dean’s Office.”

Lewis emphasized programs the YCDO is currently funding, including Yale College Community Care and subsidizing student formal ticket costs. 

He did not explicitly rule out free laundry in the future. 

“After extensive work, it has become clear that the Dean is waiting for the YCC to forget about the progress on the issue and restart the progress made over the last three years,” Kagan wrote. “Each year, we provide data, images, and testimony of the inequity of charging for laundry, especially when the contractor does not maintain its machines and they are filled with mold, destroy clothing, and do not function properly.” 

Student outcry around laundry on campus has not just been about costs, but it has also focused on the cleanliness of laundry rooms, as well as the responsiveness of CSC. 

Kagan also pointed out that Dartmouth College recently terminated their CSC contract and switched to free laundry last year amid similar complaints over cleanliness. Dartmouth chose to end its contract with CSC ServiceWorks early due to complaints from students living on campus, ranging from failing machines to moldy washers, according to The Dartmouth. 

Kagan said that the CSC laundry machines are “both an equity issue and a health one,” writing that “the company disregards most, if not all, requests for support from students.”

Figueira wrote that CSC’s average response time is two days, but that the YCDO knows of instances when the response window was “significantly” outside that time frame and works with CSC to address the issue. She also emphasized that laundry users should submit service tickets when they see an issue, as there is “no concern” with creating multiple tickets.

“In partnership with the Director of Student Administrative Services, Yale College has worked with CSC to increase the frequency of preventative maintenance beyond the contract terms,” Figueira wrote. “The custodial team has also taken on additional support in the laundry rooms. They were already washing the floors and now also wiping down the machines.”  

CSC did not respond to a request for comment from the News.

Yale is one of three Ivy League universities — along with Harvard University and Cornell University — that does not offer free laundry services to students. 

The post Yale’s CSC contract is set to end in 2026. Is free laundry next?  appeared first on Yale Daily News.

In February last year, the dinners took place on nine days spread across the month, with either one or two dining halls hosting a Black History Month menu on the same night. This year, Branford, Saybrook, Jonathan Edwards, Davenport and Pierson dining halls will host their dinners on Feb. 15; Silliman, Benjamin Franklin and Pauli Murray colleges will have theirs on Feb. 22; and Berkeley, Grace Hopper, Ezra Stiles/Morse and Trumbull will have their dinner on Feb. 29. Timothy Dwight College’s will occur on Feb. 28. 

“The act of reducing the dinners to only three days of the month, with no notice or garnering of student opinion or interest, [not only] only works to minimize the good food we get to eat, but also devalues and minimizes the culture and feelings of belonging of Black students and workers on campus,” Stephanie Owusu ’24 told the News. At the time of this quote, Timothy Dwight College had yet to move its Black History Month dinner. 

Timothy Dwight’s dinner was rescheduled due to an event conflict, meaning that the dinners were originally supposed to be spread across three days. 

Timeica E. Bethel ’11, dean of the Afro-American Cultural House, wrote to the News that students at the Af-Am House have been talking about and looking forward to the Black History Month dinners for months.

“While all 14 dining halls are still participating, the experience won’t be the same,” Bethel-Macaire wrote. “Last year, students were able to enjoy nine meals across the different dining halls that reflected the breadth of the Black diaspora; now, they have to choose between colleges and only get to enjoy three.”

The Black History Month dinners began in 2022, with Yale Hospitality collaborating with Black staff members to bring their personal recipes to the dining hall menus. The featured recipes showcased the foods from the Black diaspora and highlighted the identities of many Black team members. 

The change was made due to the meals’ popularity resulting in long lines and some colleges running out of food last year, according to Stacey Hepburn-James, senior director of residential dining. 

“Knowing how popular and well received these events are, we want to alleviate the bottleneck, and give all students ample time and venues to enjoy their meals which the teams worked so hard on,” Hepburn-James wrote to the News.

Hepburn-James also wrote that Yale Hospitality works with all heads of the residential colleges, assistant directors of operations and their dining teams to curate the Black History Month dinners.

Yet, four students expressed concern over the consolidation of Black History Month meals, emphasizing the benefits the dinners provide. 

A student worker with Yale Hospitality, who wished to remain anonymous due to employment concerns, told the News that they were “surprised” by the choice to reduce the number of nights with Black History Month meals. The student worker said that they were not officially informed of the choice by Yale Hospitality before the information was publicly available. 

Troi Slade ’26 told the News that the Black History Month dinners were one of the only meals that felt like home and found the change to be “disheartening.”  

“Although the dining hall food could never compare to home-cooked meals,” Slade told the News, “it was the closest thing to home in a culinary form that Yale had offered me.”

Owusu also emphasized the unique opportunities the meals provide for the Black community at Yale to celebrate their culinary tradition and for the broader Yale community to engage with food rooted in Black culture. 

“I think [the new schedule] reduces the opportunities for students to interact with Black history, especially students who may not have been exposed to certain cuisines before coming to Yale,” the student worker said. 

The student worker added that they hope there will be a restoration of the old schedule for next year’s Black History Month dinners as they said it featured more opportunities for students to engage with Black cuisine. 

Madeleine Keenan ’26 told the News that she felt the meals were a highlight of the University’s celebration of Black History Month and that she was “worried” that this year will not have the same experience of Black students coming together to one dining hall.

She also said a possible solution to the busy dining halls could have been increasing the amount of food or making the dining hall hours longer when they were hosting a Black History Month dinner.

Black History Month was federally recognized in 1976. 

The post Yale Hospitality cuts number of Black History Month dinners from nine to four nights appeared first on Yale Daily News.