As it turns out, the ubiquitous anti-Bank-of-America chalking all over campus today is taking its cue from a larger movement by activist groups like the Rainforest Action Network and Students for a Democratic Society to get major corporations like Citigroup and Bank of America to stop investing in coal.
I'm not sure how active SDS actually is at Wesleyan, but groups around the country have been trying to raise awareness of Bank of America's stake in coal since last year, with rallies, cough/die-ins, and info tables having been organized (and blogged about) in at least San Francisco and Philadelphia.
It seems unclear how much attention the company is paying to these (so far) relatively minor protests, but what with the ridiculous debate going on about "clean coal" in this year's election, here's hoping that major investors like Bank of America follow the lead of other banks and develop better energy policies in the near future than the relatively uncompelling carbon principles they have at the moment.
In the meantime, if the SDS members who I assume are behind the BoA chalking are serious at all, they should probably invest in coal-rock costumes and top hats for some entertaining Usdan public theater.
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