She noticed that many of her friends were among the protesters. Her lab partner, a girl from her study group, and two of her other friends. This was their third year doing this protest. The protest was held twice a semester and organized among 20 schools along the east coast. They also contacted loan companies on multiple occasions with no response.

On the day of graduation it was warm and sunny. Sara, her friends and 15 other students walked outside with their diplomas in hand.They crumpled them up in a pile and set them on fire. The following day those students returned to their schools to renounce their degrees.

They documented everything they did and posted it on youtube along with a manifesto stating what they expect from schools and loan companies. The video went viral on all social media platforms with headlines even showing up in the news. Still there was no response from any loan company.

In the following years more students burned their diplomas and renounced their degrees, but loan companies didn’t mind because those students still had to pay their debt. five years after Sara’s video a group of seniors at Princeton walked across the stage to grab their diplomas. Their parents were all in attendance, proud of their children. Those students followed in Sara’s steps and burned their diplomas. That group of students were all children of executives of the top three student lenders in the country. Within the week the CEOs of these companies put out statements freezing the interest of all their loans.

This story shows how protest is is highly effective when it impacts the people in control