At Thursday’s protest, students taped a list of demands to the statue of Abraham Lincoln at the heart of campus, calling for McDonald not to face criminal charges, for the officers who arrested him to resign and for students and faculty to wield control over the UW Police Department’s hiring and firing decisions. The last demand echoes calls from local activists, some of whom helped organize Thursday’s protest, for community control over police in the city of Madison.

Students also marched down Bascom Hill behind a “Black Lives Matter” banner, occupied College Library for about 45 minutes and shut down several intersections before ending their demonstration at the spot on Library Mall where McDonald was arrested last week. Several wrote messages of support for McDonald in chalk on the sidewalk.

Some of the students held signs repeating a message McDonald is accused of writing on a university building: “Racizm in the air. Don’t breathe.”

Chancellor Rebecca Blank acknowledged in a statement after the demonstration that “this has been a difficult and exhausting semester for our communities of color,” and said she understands people are frustrated that changes haven’t come more quickly.

But Blank also pushed back against the students’ demands.