Student protesters shouting ‘divest from genocide’ disrupt Penn board of trustees meeting

A dozen student protesters disrupted the University of Pennsylvania’s board of trustees meeting Friday, ultimately cutting it short and at least momentarily creating angst for leaders again at the Ivy League institution.

The group sat peacefully in a corner of the room, one holding a dog, but then stood, raised their red-painted hands and began chanting “endowment transparency now, divest from genocide” when interim president J. Larry Jameson began his remarks. They wore keffiyehs, a symbol of Palestinian nationalism.

Board chair Ramanan Raghavendran told the group that their message was received and repeatedly asked that trustees be permitted to continue with the meeting. When the group would not stop chanting, he quickly called for the board to pass the resolutions on the agenda, including a 3.9% increase in undergraduate costs for 2024-25, and adjourned the meeting, which lasted less than 10 minutes.

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A group that calls itself Freedom School for Palestine later posted on its Instagram that its members had held the protest.

“This action comes as the result of the ongoing genocide and educide in Palestine, which is enabled by UPenn’s relationship with Israel, including study abroad programming... and a recent faculty trip to Israel,” the group said on its Instagram page.

They called on Penn to support Palestinian students and drop disciplinary charges against pro-Palestinian protesters.

The group had said in an earlier press release it formed in November as a five-week occupation of Penn’s Houston Hall with the goal of providing “liberatory educational programming on Palestine.”

The students who disrupted the meeting have been referred to Penn’s Center for Community Standards and Accountability for disciplinary action, the university said in a statement.

“Their ongoing disruption of the meeting violates the university’s Code of Student Conduct and Guidelines on Open Expression,” the statement said.

It wasn’t the first time that protesters have disrupted a Penn board meeting. In 2019 a group of students demanded that the university hold a town hall session to discuss students’ yearslong campaign to get Penn to divest its endowment from fossil fuels, citing danger to the environment. The board also adjourned that meeting after passing resolutions.

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Penn was roiled last semester after the Palestine Writes literature festival was held on campus and criticized by some for including speakers with a history of making antisemitic remarks. Tensions were exacerbated after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel, and the university was subject to complaints about not taking a strong enough stand for Israel as well as not protecting its Palestinian students, faculty and their supporters.

Former president Liz Magill resigned in December after her congressional testimony on the campus’ response to antisemitism. Asked whether calling for the genocide of Jewish people violated Penn’s code of conduct, she said it was a “context-dependent decision.”

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Jameson, formerly executive vice president for the health system and dean of the medical school, took over as interim president in December. Friday marked his first public address at a trustee meeting.

“In these early weeks, I’ve taken every opportunity to be with our students, faculty, staff and alumni,” Jameson began. “People work very hard to get to Penn, and they’re exhilarated to be here... Penn does amazing things.”

Penn released the full remarks that Jameson had intended to deliver later in the afternoon. He said “a narrative of crisis... can distort our sense of Penn,” and listed many positive gatherings and accomplishments the university has had in recent months. He noted that Penn received 65,230 applications, a record and 10% higher than last year.

Jameson cited the work being done “to combat hate and ensure safety and wellbeing,” including the Task Force on Antisemitism and the Presidential Commission on Countering Hate and Building Community, formed by Magill last semester.

“A president alone cannot move Penn forward,” he said. “But all of us, together — we can make Penn soar.”

Earlier in the meeting, the Rev. Charles L. “Chaz” Howard, university chaplain and vice president for social equity & community, talked about groups of Muslim and Jewish students sharing meals and participating in events together.

“In small and quiet ways, they are trying to understand or at least humanize the other side,” he said.