In Summer 2013, the students occupying President Bharucha’s office were approached by a team of documentary filmmakers led by Andrew Rossi (director of Page One: Inside the New York Times) about participating in their upcoming project Ivory Tower, an exposé on higher education across the country. The filmmakers followed the campaign through the entire summer and into the fall, documenting meetings, actions, and ongoing organizing.

Ivory Tower premiered in spring 2014 at Sundance Film Festival, providing context for the struggle for free education at Cooper as part of a larger national crisis in education. The film also includes Harvard, California’s UC system, historically black Spelman College, Deep Springs, and many more. Featuring the voices of Cooper Union’s faculty and students, Ivory Tower exposes the self-serving hubris of the administration and honors the community’s principled opposition. The film opened in theaters around the country in summer 2014, and in fall 2014 aired on CNN. Students and alumni organized a screening in the Great Hall that was almost thwarted by the admin, and the film also screened at Pioneer Works, The New School, and NYU.”