What’s New
The University of Michigan at Ann Arbor has proposed a new “disruptive activity policy” prohibiting people from interrupting campus events, activities, and other university operations. Once finalized, it’ll be one of the first policy updates at a public college in response to protests over the Israel-Hamas war.
Administrators announced the draft policy last week after pro-Palestinian student protesters interrupted a speech by Santa J. Ono, the university president, at an honors convocation ceremony on March 24.
The proposal reflects that Michigan leaders are taking a more stringent approach to handling a recent uptick in campus activism, a trend that’s played out nationwide.
On Thursday, pro-Palestinian protesters at the University of Maryland at College Park disrupted a lecture about democracy by U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin, Democrat of Maryland — accusing Raskin of being “complicit in genocide.” Darryll J. Pines, the university’s president, ended the event early. “What you saw play out,” Pines told Capital News Service, “actually was democracy and free speech and academic freedom.”
Earlier this semester, Michigan’s Board of Regents adopted a set of speech guidelines that focused on the rights of speakers and artists who come to campus. The new policy will focus on regulating protesters at university-sponsored events and activities.
The Details
The convocation demonstration was led by a coalition of 80 student organizations at Michigan. The coalition is calling for the university to “divest” its endowment from Israel — in other words, redirect billions of dollars that it says are invested in companies associated with Israel — in protest of what the students say are rampant human-rights abuses in Palestine.
During the ceremony, some students who were being honored for academic achievements held up signs that read “no honor in genocide” and refused to shake Ono’s hand when they were called to the stage, said Simrun Bose, a senior and a director of the United Asian American Organizations, one of the groups in the coalition.
Then, as Ono approached the lectern and started his speech, protesters began chanting “Ono, Ono you can’t hide. You are funding genocide,” according to a video shared by Students Allied for Freedom and Equality, the university’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, which is also part of the coalition. Ono tried to calm the crowd down, but after waiting for several minutes, he ended his speech early and returned to his seat.
The next day, he sent out a statement criticizing the disruption, saying it violated the university’s student code of conduct and policies on free speech and artistic expression.
“Like many of you, I am proud of our university’s history of protest. But none of us should be proud of what happened on Sunday,” Ono said. “We all must understand that, while protest is valued and protected, disruptions are not. One group’s right to protest does not supersede the right of others to participate in a joyous event.”
The draft policy advises that no one can “prevent or impede the free flow of persons about campus” or “disrupt the university operations of UM facilities,” including speaker events, classes, field trips, or other activities. It bars “obstructing lines of sight, making loud or amplified noises, projecting light or images, or otherwise creating substantive distractions” at such events. The university is now collecting feedback from students and employees.
“Although we support students’ right to protest, such rights are not limitless. Disrupting speakers and events is not protected speech and is a clear violation of university policy,” a university spokesperson said in a statement to The Chronicle.
The convocation protest, the spokesperson added, “intruded upon a joyous moment and prevented students and families from completing the celebration of hard-won achievements.”
To pro-Palestinian students, though, the honors convocation protest felt like a last resort, said Nicole Wan, a senior at Michigan and one of the presidents of the university’s undergraduate chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which is part of Michigan’s student coalition.
A protest without disruption is just raising awareness. A disruption is supposed to signal to everyone that the protesters do not fear the consequences of their disruption as much as the injustice of the status quo.
In November, Ann Arbor police arrested 40 students after they refused to leave a sit-in at the university’s administration building. A few days later, the administration prevented the student body from voting on two resolutions calling on the university to divest from companies — including Shield AI, a drone-manufacturing firm, and Anduril, a military contractor — that protesters say have ties to Israel. And in January, protesters also demonstrated at a university career fair where some of those companies were recruiting Michigan students.
Interrupting the March ceremony seemed like the best way to show that they wouldn’t accept “life as usual,” Wan said, especially as Palestinian people continue to die in the war.
“A protest without disruption is just raising awareness,” Wan said. “A disruption is supposed to signal to everyone that the protesters do not fear the consequences of their disruption as much as the injustice of the status quo.”
The Backdrop
As war continues to rage in the Gaza strip, many pro-Palestinian demonstrations have continued into the spring semester, with a focus on interrupting daily life on college campuses.
In February, students at the University of California at Berkeley interrupted a talk by Ran Bar-Yoshafat, an Israeli lawyer and think-tank executive. Campus police officers shut down the event after students broke a door and shattered a window. On March 1, protesters at the University of Pennsylvania forced administrators to end a Board of Trustees meeting a few minutes into a speech by J. Larry Jameson, the university’s interim president, when the students began waving their hands and chanting.
Several private colleges have announced new regulations restricting speech and expression on campus. The new protocols limit amplified sound, identify set locations where protests are allowed, and regulate what students can include on posters hung on university property. Administrators said the policies strike a balance between protecting students’ speech and their physical and mental well-being.
Public colleges, on the other hand, are bound by the First Amendment, leaving less room for restrictions. Institutions must be able to prove that speech would cause a “substantial disruption” to campus operations. Many public institutions have shut down events, including teach-ins, art exhibits, and guest speakers, often citing threats to campus safety as a justification.
On paper, Michigan’s speech guidelines and draft demonstration policy are constitutionally sound, said Steve Sanders, a law professor at Indiana University at Bloomington. The only issue is if the rules are unreasonably vague or are enforced unevenly, he said.
The regulations should be used only to prevent interruptions that would reasonably affect the university’s day-to-day operations, like the flow of traffic or a class, Sanders said.
“The test comes in how the policy is actually enforced,” Sanders said. “Will the university start being too heavy-handed and claim the authority to clear people who are just sitting on the steps enjoying the sunny day outside the library?”
The Stakes
To pro-Palestinian students, the policy is too vague and impedes on their right to speak out and protest.
Bose fears that the policy could effectively ban all protests on campus and represents a pattern in how Michigan’s administrators respond to pro-Palestinian voices.
Following the convocation, the Students for Justice in Palestine chapter said, some students who were involved in the protest received trespassing citations. The university declined to comment, citing an ongoing investigation.
Still, Bose said the policy won’t discourage students. “We will continue the fight regardless of any intimidation that the university tries to implement on us.”
