Despite demonstrations and likely attempts to disrupt, universities and colleges across the United States will stage another round of commencement exercises this weekend, including on campuses roiling in nearby protests.
Pro-Palestinian groups demanding an end to the war in Gaza and divestment from Israel have embroiled at least 80 universities and colleges across more than 30 states in the largest groundswell of campus unrest since the 1980s anti-apartheid and 1960s and 1970s Vietnam War protests.
As of May 9, more than 2,700 people have been arrested on more than 63 university and college campuses in at least 22 states since the April 18 arrests of 108 Columbia University students on their Morningside campus in Manhattan, New York City, according to tallies by the Associated Press and reporters for The Epoch Times.
Columbia, where another 109 people have been arrested since, canceled its May 17 commencement in the face of upheaval, including seizures of Hamilton Hall.
Instead, it kicks off a weeklong series of college-by-college graduations on May 10 for those receiving degrees in professional services and social work, and from its Climate School, where Center for Rural Enterprise and Environmental Justice’s Catherine Coleman Flowers will deliver the commencement address.
The University of Southern California (USC), another major university forced to cancel its school-wide commencement for school-specific graduations, also stages its graduations on a campus where 93 have been arrested, including when police disassembled a campus encampment.
Yale, the University of Miami, Western Illinois. Carnegie Mellon, Connecticut, Louisiana, and Arizona’s state system universities and colleges are among those that plan commencements this weekend.
In addition to state universities, Xavier, Loyola, and Dillard are among the private schools in New Orleans that will have weekend commencements. Tulane University, where 26 have been arrested in protests, will do so on May 18.
Tulane graduates and attendees must have tickets to get into the ceremony, which will be held at Yulman Stadium rather than the Superdome. Banners, flags, signs, and noisemakers are not allowed.
Arizona’s public universities have been girding commencement sites for days, barricading fields and warning that disruption will warrant criminal charges.
More than 100 have been arrested in protests on Arizona college campuses, including at least 72—only 20 of whom were students—at Arizona State University in Tempe, where the main commencement is May 13.
A fence has been erected around ASU’s Alumni Lawn, where an encampment was established in late April and removed by police on April 26 and April 27.
The 2024 spring semester commencement cycle began last week in earnest with ceremonies at two of the nation’s largest and most prominent state universities, the University of Michigan and Ohio State University, and the Florida state university system.
Despite students waving Palestinian flags and chanting “Israel bombs, U of M pays, how many kids have you killed today?” during University of Michigan ceremonies in Ann Arbor, ceremonies proceeded unhindered.
There is reason for university administrators and local government officials to be concerned that some pro-Palestinian advocacy organizations are encouraging student groups, such as Students for Justice in Palestine, to disrupt commencements.
According to a May 1 and May 2 online poll commissioned by Intelligent.com and conducted on a SurveyMonkey audience of 763 current full-time students aged between 18 and 24 years randomly selected from across the country,
Of those 763 students, 65 percent said they support the protests with 36 percent claiming to be “very supportive.”
A quarter said they were unsure; only 11 percent said they were opposed.
Of that 65 percent cadre who support pro-Palestinian protests—that would be 420 of the 763 respondents—75 percent (315) support erecting encampments and 45 percent (190) agree with blocking students from attending classes.
Nearly 40 percent—160 of the 763—said they support demanding graduation ceremonies be canceled.
If not, they said they’d join an effort to disrupt them.
