‘No divestment, no commencement’: Students fear protests will upend their college graduations
Students in cap and gown pose for photos on the Columbia campus. Photo by Alec Gitelman
By Beth Harpaz April 29, 2024
For many in the college class of 2024, pro-Palestinian protests at commencement would mark yet another milestone celebration disrupted.
Protesters at Columbia University say disruption is their intent. “No divestment, no commencement,” they chanted early Tuesday morning in the hours after occupying Hamilton Hall, in the center of campus, where the university has already begun to set up for graduation.
Students elsewhere wonder whether protests on their campuses will also try to derail commencement. These are the same students whose senior year of high school was marred by pandemic lockdowns that began in March 2020. Classes went remote, proms were canceled and graduations were held on Zoom or in parking lots where masked students stepped out of cars, grabbed diplomas and drove off.
Their first year at college consisted of online classes, locked-down dorms and orientations never held. Now, four years later, some worry the protests roiling dozens of campuses will disrupt their college commencements, too.
Evan Heidel, a senior at San Diego State, said the derailing of his high school graduation was “frustrating but understandable,” because “it made sense to not have a bunch of people get together in the middle of the pandemic.” This time around, though, “I’m just more angry with the protesters,” he said. “There’s just a lot of uncertainty.” With San Diego students planning a walkout this week, “will it start to become something where they’re not allowing the school to function? Will they try and interrupt during peak graduation time?”
‘There’s only so much you can control’
The University of Southern California, which canceled commencement after a controversy over a Muslim valedictorian speaker, has told students to expect tightened security at smaller ceremonies that will be held for individual programs. At Columbia, where protesters set up tents on the lawn used for commencement, President Minouche Shafik told students in an email that she was “deeply sensitive to the fact that graduating seniors spent their first year attending Columbia remotely. We all very much want these students to celebrate their well-deserved graduation with family and friends.”
But even if Columbia’s lawn is cleared, there’s no guarantee protesters won’t find other ways to disrupt the ceremony. All the security in the world — tickets, IDs and bag searches — can’t stop people from chanting or walking out. Columbia couldn’t stop protesters from shouting down Hillary Clinton at a campus event in February, nor could the Secret Service prevent protesters from interrupting a fundraiser featuring Joe Biden, Barack Obama and Bill Clinton in March.
“There’s only so much you can control, even if you have policies that say we’re going to escort you out,” said Lynn Pasquerella, president of the American Association of Colleges and Universities. “I think they’re right to feel nervous after seeing what happened to Hillary Clinton and other high-profile figures. People are using the platform of public forums to express their deeply held views about what policies we should enact and what our responses should be.”
Sad to have college end this way
Ellie Hornick, a senior at Indiana University, said she feels lucky compared to students at other schools, where protesters’ rhetoric has crossed the line into antisemitism. “IU is doing a great job of supporting Jewish students and keeping Jewish students safe,” she said. “It seems like they have a lot of great measures in place to make sure that graduation goes on as planned.”
She also supports free speech and a two-state solution in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But when protesters scream “Intifada!” and “From the river to the sea,” without knowing what that means, “it’s so upsetting. I cry every single day about it. It’s frustrating to have the end of my senior year — I don’t want to say overshadowed — but just to have such a terrible and emotionally taxing thing happen.”
Hornick’s mother, Sarah, was assured by campus security that everyone attending IU commencement — 10,000 seniors and their guests — will go through metal detectors and that policies are in place to remove anyone who’s disruptive. Still, Sarah Hornick said, “I’m sad for her that this is how her college career is ending. We didn’t get to celebrate her high school graduation. Just let these kids graduate. Let them celebrate their amazing accomplishments and perseverance through some really difficult times.”
‘Let them graduate in peace’
Lilli, a George Washington University senior who spoke on condition that her last name not be used, had a drive-by graduation from high school and said she’s been “having a very hard time” with the protests, even though she feels GW has mostly been supportive of Jewish students. “Current events are important; the right to free speech is important, but when they say things like, ‘Get rid of all Zionists,’ to me that sounds like get rid of Jews,” she said. “It is nerve-racking. The slogans are pretty disturbing.” Her parents and grandmother are coming to GW’s commencement, and she’s “nervous that protests will kind of be in the spotlight for this exciting milestone.”
Gayle Shulman-Fox’s twins graduated high school in 2020 at a ceremony in a parking lot, then started college remotely. Her son had a complicated freshman year at American University in Washington, D.C., where he was living in a hotel with other students, taking remote classes, when the Jan. 6 attacks unfolded on the Capitol. He ended up transferring to the University of Rochester. His twin sister, who’d shown little interest in religion before Oct. 7, ended up becoming a Jewish activist — and getting harassed — in response to pro-Palestinian protests at her small New Jersey college. While Shulman-Fox is excited to see them graduate, she’s also nervous. “These kids have been through so much,” she said. “I just want them to be able to graduate in peace.”
Another mother, Rachel Ezekiel-Fishbein, said “it would be very disappointing” if protests disrupt her daughter’s commencement, but she’s trying to keep things in perspective: “Graduation is a culminating ceremony. It doesn’t take away from her accomplishments.” And in a world where “there are moms whose kids have been taken hostage, Hersh Goldberg-Polin’s mom hasn’t seen him in more than 200 days, and there are families in Gaza losing their children daily — in the scheme of things, I am very fortunate.”
Commencement protests: A long history
Fraught commencements at U.S. colleges are nothing new. Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice backed out of Rutgers’ graduation in 2014 after students protested her role in the U.S. war in Iraq. That same year, Christine Lagard withdrew from Smith’s commencement because of student anger over her role running the International Monetary Fund. In 1968, 300 students staged a walkout at Columbia’s commencement to protest the Vietnam War; many colleges canceled ceremonies in 1970 after the National Guard killed four anti-war protesters at Kent State.
But knowing that it’s happened before doesn’t make it easier for this year’s grads. Pasquerella, the AACU president, acknowledged that worrying about potentially disruptive protests not only adds “to the anxiety of students and their families, especially Jewish students and Palestinian students” who may feel especially vulnerable, but can also detract from the “joy and celebration” these milestones represent.
On the other hand, she said, “college teaches us about resilience and flexibility in the face of change and an unpredictable future, and the idea that we can learn from this and move forward. I don’t think this conflict will go away, and if it does, another will come up.” She pointed out that even during COVID-19 lockdowns, students and families found ways to “create a sense of community and celebrate,” often in small groups. Maybe, she said, this is “an opportunity to reimagine the ways in which we want people to celebrate academic success and milestones in our lives.”
Correction: This story has been updated to correct the spelling of AACU President Lynn Pasquerella’s last name.
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