Senior Rayna Robinson attended the Wall Street protests on Oct. 15 while touring colleges in New York. Her tour convinced her that the on-going Occupy movement had legitimate grievances.

   “I was there because college tuition should not be this high,” she explained. “I did the math, and by the time I graduate, I’ll be $18,000 in debt. And that’s not even that much, comparatively.”

   The College Board reports that the average tuition for public out-of-state colleges has risen over 5.2 percent from last year to around $29,657—a ridiculous number, Robinson said. This inspired her to hold up a homemade sign reading, “Americans can’t afford the American dream.”

   “Occupy Wall Street is certainly in line with the American tradition,” said Advanced Placement U.S. history teacher Kathleen Skelton. “Since the beginning of the two-party system, public displays and rhetoric and protests have brought attention to issues of the people as well as inspired great change.”

   Skelton called the Occupy movement the middle and lower classes’ counterpart to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens v. United ruling. The 2010 case forbade the government from banning corporate spending on elections—essentially granting First Amendment protection to companies, Skelton said.

   The leaderless Occupy protests began mid-September in Liberty Square on Wall Street, the financial district of New York City and the epicenter of America’s economy. Within weeks, protests sprung up in cities all over the world. Baltimore is no exception. McKeldin Square has been occupied since October.

   The movement was inspired by the Arab Spring, last year’s frenzy of uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa. The Twitter-fueled Arab revolutions are also comparable to the Occupy movement in their use of social media.  Robinson said most students only know about the protests via micro-blogging site Tumblr.

   Skelton said that governments will hesitate to crush the protests after the Arab Spring’s success. Instead, conservative leaders are criticizing the protesters’ lack of organization, political knowledge and suggested solutions.

  “I think these critical comments are showing the ‘fear’ that the protests are revealing a truth,” Skelton said. “Like the TEA Party movement (which seems to be quiet lately), they really show a counterweight to powerful structures of globalization that diminish democracy’s effect.”

   Though disappointed by how every protester seemed to support a different cause, Robinson praised the peaceful atmosphere.

   “Everyone is supporting each other and what they have to say,” she said. “I recorded parts of it, and I got strangers hugging each other.”

   Advanced Placement economics teacher Philip Bressler said that most students don’t know of the protests. He said students should be more involved and aware of the economic and political turmoil, considering how strongly the economy’s future will impact them.

   He pointed out that this generation will be the first to graduate in tremendous debt without the promise of suitable jobs waiting.

   “It’s their future,” Bressler said. “You know, I’m going to be dead, and you’re going to live through this.”

   Even senior Lareb Zehra, who passed by the Wall Street protest while visiting family, was unsure of the movement’s aims.

   “At first I didn’t know what was going on, but after I read a few of the signs, I figured it was about the economy,” she said.

Some students seem passionate about the cause, though—at least anonymously. Before it was painted over, a girls’ bathroom stall on the third floor had the words “#occupydulaney” scrawled across the wall.