"SAN FRANCISCO — Twenty-six students were arrested at San Francisco State University before dawn on Thursday after some students barricaded themselves inside a building to protest budget cuts and tuition increases across the state’s public university system."“The doors were locked with chains from the inside so police broke through a window to get in,” a university spokeswoman, Ellen Griffin, said. “We’re approaching final exams and the end of the semester, and as many as 3,200 students have classes in that building.”
On Wednesday, classes in the building were canceled after the occupation began.
Along with indignation over budget cuts, a blog listing the protesters’ demands included forgiveness of all student loans and ending the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. With demands far beyond the purview of school administrators, negotiations with the students was nearly impossible, Ms. Griffin said.