Ribbons of purple and gold snaked down Boylston Street in August as new students arrived at Emerson College for the fall semester. The sidewalk across from Boston Common buzzed with move-in carts and freshmen eager to experience what one parent called Emerson’s “driven while artsy” vibe. But among the crowd were a few disgruntled Emerson employees distributing leaflets that served as a stubborn reminder of issues the school is eager to forget: rolling financial cuts, the 2024 arrests of pro-Palestinian protesters, and a campus left fractured in the aftermath. “When the president lives in a $5 million suite in the...