The April 30 visit of Bill Ayers, co-founder of the Weather Underground and professor in the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, has engendered a wide range of opinions from students, faculty and administration that will be further explored at an upcoming series of town hall-style meetings scheduled for April 27 and 29. In the days leading up to the town hall meetings, some students have expressed their interest in attending the event, while others like Douglas Moore '11 have decided to protest against the upcoming visit through an anti-Ayers Facebook group named Bill Ayers is Coming to Brandeis, Seriously? WTF. There is also a Facebook event, Students Against Bill Ayers Coming to Brandeis, which is scheduled to take place the same day as the Ayers visit.

The town hall-style meetings will take place in Lown Auditorium and will be open forums between students and professors, according to Liza Behrendt '11, event coordinator and Democracy for America member. She said that DFA has not yet received confirmation on which professors will be present at the town hall meetings.

"We hope to discuss people's reaction. We hope that people who have negative opinions about the event will show up and express their opinions. . We're going to talk about the history, . [and] on Wednesday we're going to watch the film The Weather Underground," Behrendt said.

Ayers' visit will take place April 30 after being postponed from its initial March 30 date due to mounting security costs surrounding the event. DFA members and event coordinators Behrendt and Lev Hirschhorn '11, as well as Director of Public Safety Ed Callahan, declined to discuss the total cost of the event or the cost of security, but Behrendt and Hirschhorn both said that DFA would be paying approximately $1,400. The event is being sponsored by Democracy for America, Students for a Democratic Society, the Brenda Meehan Social Justice in Action Grant and four academic departments: Peace, Conflict and Coexistence Studies; Education; History; and Social Justice and Social Policy. The event will be held in the Carl J. Shapiro Theater. Tickets will be $5 each and will be available on a first-come, first-served basis. Only 230 tickets will be sold.

Hirschhorn, who is also a Student Union senator for the Class of 2011, said that it was important to invite Ayers to campus and hear what he has to say because "there are a lot of activists on campus, and I think people are very interested in the lessons to be learned from the antiwar movement of the 1960s and the limits of activism."

Moore, on the other hand, said, "I think that the problem with him coming to campus is his past involvement in a lot of violent acts, compared to nonviolence and other forms of protest. I think [nonviolence and other forms of protest] should be taught and should be appreciated here on campus, not something like the bombings that the Weather Underground were responsible for." Moore added that he believes the event reflects poorly on the entire campus and that the visit is "kind of pointless." Moore is undecided on whether he will attend the event.

Students Against Bill Ayers Coming to Brandeis criticizes the sponsors of the Ayers visit for "donating money to fund a terrorist, rather than use that money for something useful on campus (like saving the Rose Art Museum)." This Facebook event encourages anyone who disagrees with Ayers' outlook to come together to protest, and as of last night there are seven confirmed attendees.

Behrendt said that she thinks it is important to listen to Ayers because "he is a very well-respected person now, yet in the past [he] did horrific things in the name of justice, and that is a very challenging puzzle for current activists to work out."

The event is also eliciting reactions from several administrators and faculty members. Provost Marty Krauss said about the event, "I've never heard him speak, so I don't know what he will say. I think that Brandeis has always been a place where different speakers come, and if this is a speaker that students are interested in hearing from, I think that it is good that he is coming."

Prof. Bernard Yack (POL) said that he had no problem with the decision to invite Ayers. When asked what Ayers could add to the conversation about social justice, Yack said, "He has strong opinions on the subject, and he represents the somewhat more radical view so it certainly adds to the conversation."

Robert Mesika '12 said that he was fully behind the invitation extended to Ayers. He said, "We should get everyone's opinions and views on any matter, even if we have to get the radical left or the radical right."

-Nashrah Rahman contributed reporting