On April 17, 2018, over one hundred Harvard Medical School and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health students in white coats, with faculty and staff, staged a “die-in” as part of a nationwide demonstration organized by White Coats for Black Lives. The peaceful protest was put together in the wake of the police shooting of Stephon Clark, a 22-year-old man who was standing in his grandmother’s yard, holding a cell phone.
Demonstration participants said their goal was to continue to bring awareness and attention to social injustice, implicit bias, and violence against Black people by police. National White Coats for Black Lives demonstrations began in 2014 after grand jury non-indictment in the cases of the murders of Michael Brown and Eric Garner.
