UC Berkeley Lecturer Threatened For Offering Injured Student Protesters Extra Time On Papers
BERKELEY (CBS SF) – A lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley who posted a tweet offering extra time on an assignment to students injured during anti-police brutality protests has received numerous threats, prompting her to delete her Twitter account.
Kaya Oakes, an author who teaches writing at the university, tweeted Sunday, "If any of my #Berkeley students were teargassed, batoned or shot w/rubber bullets last night, you can have an extension on your essay."
Since then, Oakes and her colleagues at the university have received complaints and threats.
Before deleting her account, Oakes discussed her offer and said that students can receive extensions on their assignments for several reasons.
Oakes declined KPIX 5's request for comment Tuesday night.
For four straight nights, protesters in Berkeley have taken to the streets over grand jury decisions not to prosecute police officers in the deaths of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and Eric Garner in New York.
While the protests have mostly been peaceful, demonstrations on Saturday night and Sunday night turned violent with some looting and vandalism. Protesters on Monday and Tuesday night blocked freeways on multiple occasions.