Students of Columbia University in New York expressed fear that their commencement ceremony would be canceled after the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles did so in the aftermath of pro-Palestinian student protests and encampments in several universities in the past few days.
While schools across the country have not divulged their future academic plans in the aftermath of the protests, students feared that the developments of the demonstrations would cause a domino effect across many colleges and universities in the United States.
The most affected are graduating students whose high school graduation ceremonies were canceled or delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
They said that the new round of setbacks was just another bump on their road to an education.
"The top concern that I've been thinking about is what will happen with commencement, especially since our first year of college was online," Columbia senior Henry Sears told NBC News.
He is also the co-president of the school's chapter of J Street, a student group that describes itself as "pro-Israel, pro-Palestine, and pro-peace."
"I'm a senior in college, and, especially as someone who graduated high school in 2020, I never had a real high school senior year, either," said Jacob Schmeltz, another Columbia senior and vice president of the Jewish on Campus Student Union.
It was recently reported that USC canceled the commencement speech of 2024 valedictorian Asna Tabassum after it was revealed that her speech allegedly propagated "antisemitic and anti-Zionist rhetoric," according to the student group Trojans for Israel.
This triggered a protest movement not only in USC but also across the country.
With the cancellation of USC's graduation ceremony, the keynote speech of "Crazy Rich Asians" director Jon M. Chu—himself a USC alumnus—also had to be canceled.
Due to the protests and encampments, Columbia was prompted to switch to hybrid learning for the rest of the semester.
Meanwhile, the University of Michigan said that it would continue its graduation ceremonies while protests continue, saying in a recent statement that the rites "have been the site of free expression and peaceful protest for decades and will likely continue to be."
The statement added, "The University of Michigan does not attempt to prevent peaceful protests or other speech protected under the First Amendment. "Many ceremonies will have a designated area for protests outside the venue."
The university specifically stated that while protests are allowed, they would only be in designated areas away from the graduation ceremony, and no banners or flags would be allowed in the venue, the Associated Press reported.
