A Faculty Senate subcommittee tasked with reviewing disciplinary and legal proceedings for students arrested at the pro-Palestinian encampment last spring shared findings from its four-month investigation, which revealed discrepancies between arrested students’ and officials’ accounts of GW’s handling of disciplinary procedures.

Educational Policy and Technology Committee co-chairs Sarah Wagner and Irene Foster delivered the report, compiled by a working group of eight committee members, at a Faculty Senate meeting Friday, highlighting several inconsistencies between the University’s account of their role in criminal and internal conduct proceedings and the accounts provided by the arrested students and their legal counsel. Among the discrepancies is a contrast between General Counsel Charles Barber’s statement that GW did not “have a position” on the stay-away agreements issued to arrested students and the claim made by students and their legal counsel that the U.S. Attorney’s Office said the University requested the orders.

The report also states that Barber said in light of the stay-away orders — which five students are undergoing, according to a House of Representatives committee report — students requested and were granted exemptions from the U.S. Attorney’s Office to access locations on campus. According to the report, students alleged that GW did not respond to requests for access to specific areas of campus including the library, the Multicultural Student Services Center, dining halls and restaurants on-campus and health services.

Barber said at a September Faculty Senate meeting that students would have to go back to court with their attorneys to request access to spaces in Foggy Bottom or make other revisions to their stay-away orders.

“EPT, as we heard in their report, got the distinct impression, and the members affirmed this, that the more information the working groups sought, the more it became clear that there was a disjuncture between the various stakeholders,” Wagner said.

Pro-Palestinian students and community members erected tents in University Yard for 14 days last spring, with the demonstration ending when hundreds of Metropolitan Police Department officers descended on U-Yard early on the morning of May 8 to clear the encampment. The Student Coalition for Palestine at GWU, a group of pro-Palestinian student organizations, spent the summer advocating for arrested students through virtual and in-person court support and social media posts, and by urging the GW and D.C. communities to demand that the University and prosecutors drop both student conduct and criminal charges against student protesters.

Wagner said the working group took a “forward looking approach” to the investigation with the goal of understanding how the events of the past several months and the conflicting accounts of the outcomes can inform the University’s future responses to similar events. She said the working group created four recommendations for how the University should proceed in the future, including that officials support all students in pursuing their educational endeavors and avoid removing support resources unless a student poses a threat to the GW community.

Other recommendations include using the interim suspension process in a “politically neutral way” and having officials commit to increased transparency, communication and consultation with its faculty in matters that “impact instruction.” The report also states that the Conflict Education & Student Accountability office should not engage in “collective punishments” and hold each student accountable for their own actions.

The report also asks that GW provide students charged with conduct violations sufficient time to review the evidence against them, and that CESA specify the relevant information when sending students long files or videos related to a case. The Student Coalition for Palestine at GWU alleged in an Instagram post in June that CESA officials violated due process by failing to provide “sufficient time” for student groups involved in conduct processes to review the more than 150 files presented by GW as evidence against them, and by not indicating which evidence corresponded to each alleged violation.

Wagner said the working group asked the CESA office for data on how often the office has used interim suspensions over the past five years, which was “frustrating” because the office said they don’t have those records and the data is “statistically insignificant.”

Sameh Badie, a faculty senator and a professor of structural engineering, said the term politically neutral is “sensitive,” and could mean different things to different people. He said the working group should change the recommendation that GW use the interim suspension process in a “politically neutral way” to a more “non-biased” word.

Donald Parsons, a faculty senator and professor of economics, said given the University’s primary goal is to give students a “premiere experience,” the University should evaluate how the pro-Palestinian encampment disrupted some students’ educational experiences and activities. He said he doesn’t have an opinion on the framework, but believes it’s important to strike a balance between considering the needs of the student protesters and the students disrupted by the pro-Palestinian encampment.

“We want our students to have the best education, and when there’s conflict, we want to develop a way to minimize the disruption of the whole,” Parsons said.

Phil Wirtz, a faculty senator and professor of decision sciences and psychological and brain sciences, said he’s concerned that Faculty Senate reports don’t always reflect the sentiment of the whole body. He said he drafted a resolution that would turn the working group’s findings into a resolution for the body to vote on.

Wagner said the committee was “very clear” in its decision to solicit feedback from the Faculty Senate on the report before making a resolution. She said the committee will discuss the senators’ comments and develop a resolution to present to the body.

“You will hear back from us, and we will be giving you a better informed resolution,” Wagner said. “Thank you, Phil, but we want to adhere to what EPT itself has decided unanimously.”

During University President Ellen Granberg’s presidential report — which Provost Bracey delivered on Granberg’s behalf because she was absent from the meeting due to a sickness — Wirtz also raised concerns about a Washington Post article published on Thursday. The article reported that Cedar Hill Chief Executive Tony Coleman said the Medical Faculty Associates will dedicate roughly 160 clinicians to the new Cedar Hill hospital that’s slated to open in early 2025, which Wirtz said he wasn’t aware of.

School of Medical and Health Sciences Dean and former MFA CEO Barbara Bass said there were several erroneous remarks made in the report by Coleman and Kimberly Russo, the vice president of the D.C. region for UHS and chief executive of GW Hospital, respectively. She said the report that the MFA pledged to provide the hospital with 160 clinicians is an error, and the staffing plan is “not complete.”

“I can say there were several erroneous statements in the remarks that were made by both Ms. Russo as well as Mr. Coleman yesterday, and we’re in the process of trying to determine what are the best avenues for correcting that,” Bass said.

GW entered a partnership with the District in 2018 to build and staff a new hospital that will serve residents of Wards 7 and 8, who have long reported lacking high-quality, comprehensive hospital services. The city announced in 2020 that the facility would be operated by the GW Hospital’s then-majority owner, Universal Health Services, who now fully owns GW Hospital.

Granberg said in her report, which Bracey delivered, that the firm the University hired to investigate reports made by former GW Police Department officers of gun safety violations, insufficient firearm training and a poor working environment are almost finished reviewing documents and conducting interviews. She said she expects to receive the report in mid-January, which she will then share with her cabinet and the Board of Trustees around the time of the Board’s February meeting.

She said after officials present the report to the Board, they will collect their feedback and publish a summary report for the GW community. Former GWPD officers alleged in September that former GWPD Chief James Tate and former Captain of Operations Gabe Mullinax carried firearms on campus that were unregistered in D.C and Tate “routinely” stored his loaded firearm in the GWPD armory.

Jonathan Eakle, the Faculty Senate Executive Committee Liaison to the Committee on Physical Facilities and Campus Safety, nominated Associate Vice President of Business Services Seth Weinshel to join the committee as a non-voting member, which the body unanimously approved.