{shortcode-eafb3033e2c1c941d19014883a58a5a79448befc}
Updated August 21, 2025, at 10:09 a.m.
A Harvard administrator told two professors on Tuesday that a Black Lives Matter sign displayed in their office windows would be taken down by this Saturday, describing it as a violation of University-wide rules on using campus space.
Bence P. Ölveczky and Mansi Srivastava, professors of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, posted large block letters in their windows spelling out “Black Lives Matter” in 2020 as protests broke out nationwide over the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police. Since then, the letters have faced out from the Northwest Science Building, where their labs are located.
But on Tuesday, Dean of Science Jeffrey W. Lichtman handed Ölveczky a letter addressed to him and Srivastava, saying that the message would be removed by Aug. 23. The letter — which was signed by Anthony Mantia, the building manager for the Northwest Building — claimed the message violated Harvard’s campus use rules, which were introduced in August 2024 following intense pro-Palestine campus protests in the spring.
The letter referred to a section of the campus use rules prohibiting Harvard affiliates from posting “self-mounted displays” without advance approval from their school. The Black Lives Matter lettering, which was posted before the campus use rules were introduced, has never been explicitly greenlit by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, which oversees the Northwest Building.
As of Thursday morning, the letters were still displayed. The letter said that Brenda D. Tindal, the FAS campus curator, identified them as “an important piece of Harvard cultural ephemera” and would be interested in preserving the work in the Harvard archives.
FAS spokesperson James M. Chisholm defended the plans to remove the lettering in a statement, writing that the installation was not approved and that the lab windows were not locations “where exhibits and displays are allowed.”
But Ölveczky and Srivastava believe that the window message is not in violation of the campus use rules. In interviews, they pointed to guidance distributed in October 2024 by FAS Dean Hopi E. Hoekstra. The guidance stated that for FAS affiliates, the rules do not prohibit “the customary placement” of signage, banners, and postings “inside individual offices, residential bedrooms and suites, or private work areas.”
“We need more clarity on why they believe that our sign is violating the policies because the letter did not provide that clarity,” Srivastava said — adding that the timing of the letter, which was sent a year after the rules were rolled out, was odd.
The dispute may turn on whether the Black Lives Matter lettering falls under the category of “signage/banners/postings” or “exhibits/displays,” which are described separately but never explicitly defined in the campus use rules.
The rules provide examples of displays that include “lighting projections, self-mounted displays, multimedia displays, and installations.” They state that the category of signs, which may be “part of an exhibit or display,” could include materials attached to building exteriors, windows, and doors. Both categories of messaging may only be displayed with prior written approval or, in the case of signs, in designated areas.
The FAS guidance states that signs, banners, and posters are not prohibited in private work areas. But it doesn’t address the rules on exhibits and displays.
The removal plans were formalized more than a week after Lichtman met with Srivastava and Benjamin L. de Bivort, who are the OEB department’s co-chairs, to tell them ahead of the official notice that the lettering would be coming down.
After Ölveczky met with Lichtman the next week, Ölveczky and Srivastava emailed him and Mantia, asking them to provide further explanation for why the Black Lives Matter message violated the campus use rules.
So far, they have not received a response.
Harvard has weathered months of attacks from the Trump administration, which has denounced the Black Lives Matter movement and repeatedly called universities’ diversity, equity, and inclusion programming illegal. Over the summer, Harvard and the FAS ramped up their efforts to close DEI offices and remove mentions of race from websites.
The University has defended the changes. But critics have labeled the moves as an attempt to appease President Donald Trump, whose administration has wrought havoc at Harvard with an unrelenting stream of funding cuts and threats to international students.
De Bivort said one would have to be “naive” not to make a connection between the message’s removal and the Trump administration’s pressure campaign against Harvard, and expressed concern about what the move said about the state of political speech on campus.
“This is the mildest of political speech, and it’s in a righteous direction, and the University is asking us not to do it, while at the same time saying how important it is that people on campus can hear difficult, opposing opinions and be able to engage with them reasonably,” de Bivort said. “I think there’s an inconsistency there.”
The adoption of the campus use rules last August was itself marred by concern that they posed a threat to University affiliates’ free speech — especially as Harvard faced demands to crack down on pro-Palestine demonstrators. Professors protested the rules by chalking messages in front of the John Harvard statue, with some saying they feared the broad rules would be enforced selectively.
Chisholm, the FAS spokesperson, wrote that the decision to remove the Black Lives Matter lettering was “an internal matter” that only concerned campus use rules.
Though de Bivort said he fears the removal is evidence of a crackdown on political speech, it could set a precedent that, if followed uniformly, would have broader implications for campus life. Chisholm indicated in a statement that the rules could be applied to other displays.
“Any installation like this in this location would be taken down, regardless of the content,” he wrote. “If the display said, ‘BEAT YALE,’ it would have to be removed.”
Students, faculty, and staff alike frequently use windows to display signs and messages — from support for campus unions to “Happy Birthday” notes. In the past, students have plastered Post-Its on their windows wishing their peers good luck on finals or taunting Yale ahead of The Game. American, Israeli, and Palestinian flags have all hung in dorm room windows in recent years.
Attempts to limit student displays have caused controversy in the past. In 2021, after a Harvard employee asked a group of roommates to remove an American flag featuring a superimposed photo of Nicki Minaj in a bikini from their dorm window, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression — a free-speech group — sent a public letter asking Harvard to rescind the request.
The Nicki Minaj flag continued to fly. But with the planned removal of the Black Lives Matter lettering, Harvard has waded into a much larger political firestorm.
Both Ölveczky and Srivastava said that Lichtman, the Science dean, seemed to be a messenger for a decision that was handed down from above.
Ölveczky said he also found it strange that the Tuesday letter was signed by a building manager — not an administrator. That choice, he said, suggested that taking down the message was a matter of “pro forma standard rule.”
“There was no recognition of the fact that indeed, there’s at least a lot of gray area here, and that there was indeed, at some point a decision that interpreted the rules in a particular way, presumably in a way that would then allow them to remove the signs,” Ölveczky said.
Srivastava said that removing the lettering would send a message in and of itself, especially given that it has been displayed for more than five years.
“The taking down of the sign then becomes speech, and it turns out to be speech I don’t care to make. I disagree with it,” she said.
“I’m concerned that this will make members of our community feel that they don’t belong here, that they are not supported by the institution, and that there’s a mismatch of ethical values between the institution and the community,” de Bivort said.
—Staff writer William C. Mao can be reached at william.mao@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @williamcmao.
—Staff writer Veronica H. Paulus can be reached at veronica.paulus@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @VeronicaHPaulus.
