Swarthmore College declines to divest

Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania has refused to divest from fossil fuels

Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, despite a vigorous student protest, has announced that it will not divest from funds involved in the extraction of fossil fuels.

The Quaker-founded college’s board of managers said in a statement that following ‘extensive preparation, analysis, and robust discussion and debate’, it had reached consensus not to divest.

Swarthmore students have campaigned for some time to persuade the college to divest. Their protest has included a thirty-two-day occupation, where 175 students slept and studied in Parrish Hall, home to the college’s administrative offices.

The statement continued: ‘The sense of the meeting was to reaffirm its investment guidelines, which since 1991 have stated that the “investment committee manages the endowment to yield the best long term financial results, rather than to pursue other social objectives”.’

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