By Mary Johnson, Sarah Tan and Caroline Jumpertz
DNAinfo Staff
GRAMERCY — Hundreds of students protested outside Baruch College Monday while trustees for the City University of New York held a meeting inside, voting to approve tuition hikes of $300 a year over the next five years.
Four people were arrested during the demonstration, the NYPD said, as an estimated 30 police officers were stationed at barricades along East 25th Street between Lexington and Third avenues, which was closed to traffic for the protest.
The school was on high alert Monday as trustees voted on tuition increases for CUNY schools, which include Baruch College. Baruch cancelled all classes after 3 p.m., the same time that a rally marched from Madison Square Park toward the college.
A 22-year-old male and 23-year-old female were arrested for reckless endangerment, a 31-year-old male was arrested for harassment, and a 25-year-old male was arrested for disorderly conduct, police said.
It was not immediately clear whether the individuals arrested were CUNY students.
Last week 15 people were arrested by CUNY public safety officers during another protest against tuition increases.
City College psychology professor Bill Crain was ejected from the trustees' meeting, after trying to cross a barrier set up inside the conference room while demanding that trustees apologize to students for what happened last week.
"You can feel the tension in the air," said Crain, who joined the student protest, when looking at all the police and security outside the building prior to the meeting.
He was removed by college security staff while shouting, "You are ruining us!", but not arrested.
The board voted almost unanimously in favor of the tuition increases. The lone dissenter was Kafui Kouakou, chair of the University Student Senate and a graduate student at Brooklyn College.
"Don't cut education," Kouakou said. "That's the message you have to send to the state."
Taking part in the rally was Don Julian, 20, who said he transferred to CUNY from a private institution that was too pricey.
"The reason that I came to CUNY was because it was inexpensive here, and now I have to fight for the very reason I transferred," he said.
Another student at the rally, Mimiko Watanabe, 20, said, "We need to get some attention from the people in power."
Nearly 60 percent of CUNY students receive some form of financial aid, with nearly $1.1 billion in financial aid awarded to students in the school's network during the current school year, according to CUNY spokesman Michael Arena.
"We're one of the few places where students in need are fully protected," Arena said. "That's our special mission."
The college promised to reschedule Monday's cancelled classes for Friday afternoon, but that still left many staff and students inconvenienced.
Carly Smith, 30, an adjunct professor at Baruch and a CUNY doctoral student, had a 5:50 p.m. communications studies class that was cancelled due to the trustees meeting.
"I think it's appalling that they've cancelled classes, especially on short notice," Smith said. "The vast majority of CUNY students work and study."
Making staff and students come back on Friday "just shows how out of touch the administration can be," she added. "It's a pattern of balancing the budget on the backs of the students."
David O'Brien, a professor in the psychology department at Baruch since 1986, was one of several faculty members who agreed to serve as an intermediary between security forces, school administration and students, following the violence last week.
He called last week's rally and subsequent tumult "unjust," and estimated he had 200 students that would be affected by the closure this afternoon.
"For three decades or so, we've had pretty docile youth in this country," O'Brien said. "People have started to wake up in the last three or four months."
Kristofer Petersen, 27, a doctoral student at the CUNY Graduate Center, said, "Were just beginning to start to mobilize people. I think you can expect this from now on every time the board has a meeting."
In an opening discussion at Monday's meeting, trustees said they had found no evidence of security officials raising batons and hitting protesters. However, they conceded some students were taken to the ground while being arrested last week.
CUNY chancellor Matthew Goldstein said he wanted to organize a review of how university security officials behaved and get recommendations about how they can improve their response in the future.
