Carrying mattresses on their backs and pillows under their arms, a large group of students made their way across campus and into classes on Wednesday to raise awareness about sexual assault.

Emma Sulkowicz, a senior and visual arts student at Columbia University, began the “Carry That Weight” project in August as a performance art piece to protest the school’s handling of her own rape. After she and several other female Columbia students reported a male student for rape in April 2013, he was found “not responsible.” She plans to carry her mattress around campus as long as her alleged rapist still attends school with her.

Claire Komyati | Student Life

A group of students walk across Mudd Field carrying two mattresses. Wednesday’s event followed the lead of a student at Columbia University and aimed to show support for survivors of domestic and sexual violence.

As a movement of solidarity, students at several colleges and universities joined the movement for the day on Oct. 29. Sophomore Shivani Desai heard about the day of action and felt it was important to join in the movement. She contacted members of Community Organized for Rape Education and The Representation Project to get more students involved and helped coordinate the movement on Washington University’s campus.

Desai, however, ran into a major logistical problem on Wednesday morning when bringing her mattress out of her building. She was stopped by Residential Life and told that she had to pay a $400 fine or immediately return the mattress to her room.

Several other students, however, were able to get mattresses out of their Residential Life-owned housing without any problems.

Junior Emily Alves, president of CORE, joined the display at Washington University to show solidarity with sexual assault survivors and raise awareness about the issue. She said she felt that the presence of the students participating in the display sent an important message of support.

“I think it’s really important for survivors who maybe don’t feel comfortable participating in the event to see that there are people who are going to stand in solidarity with them,” Alves said.

There was dissension within the national movement, however, that stemmed from an op-ed written by Sulkowicz in the Columbia Spectator. Sulkowicz felt that carrying pillows minimized the message about the “weight” of sexual assault. Desai shared the op-ed on the Facebook event page used to organize the demonstration but ultimately decided that any actions students wanted to take to show solidarity was important.

“We also felt like making it accessible to a lot of people served the purpose of being a conversation-starter, which is the main point of this, to raise awareness for the issue and also to show the campus what we stand for,” Desai said. “Although pillows aren’t the same weight [as a mattress], they still start a conversation and create a discourse about something that’s really important.”

Claire Komyati | Student Life

Alves added that the lighter weight of a pillow made the demonstration more accessible to people who had chronic illnesses or disabilities.

“[W]hen they identify as survivors, it’s important for them to still participate in any way that they can,” Alves said.

Freshman So A Ryu decided to help carry a mattress with several friends after having problems discussing the issue of sexual violence on her floor.

“We had this discussion in the dorm last night about sexual harassment, but one person was like, ‘You have to suck it up. It happens. One person can’t do anything about it.’ I think that’s basically bulls—. That’s not supposed to be the way you look at it. I want people to see that people do care enough to take out a big-a– mattress to show support,” Ryu said.

Residential Life was unavailable for comment on Wednesday.