Student Union
University Applications Spike Amid Pandemic
For many high school seniors across the United States, an email or envelope in the mailbox leads to screaming, cheering, crying or despair as they learn whether they have been accepted to the college or university of their choice.
“This year, I chose to apply to seven different universities: the University of Virginia, Howard University, James Madison University, Penn State University, University of Michigan, Pace University, and New York University,” said senior Bekah Lott, who will graduate from Rock Ridge High School in Virginia in May.
Lott has committed to New York University, her top choice, she said.
The Common Application, or Common App, a nonprofit that connects applicants with more than 900 colleges and universities through a standardized process, reported that applications were up 9% this season, compared with last year.
But applications from first-generation students were up 20%, according to the Common App, to larger and more selective colleges. This was also seen with students of color and low-income students. First generation students are those born in the U.S. to parents from another country, or the first in their families to go to college.
“This really is the opportunity for the more selective institutions to impact social mobility in the way that they have been striving to do,” Jenny Rickard, president and chief executive of the Common Application, told The Boston Globe on April 5. “This is the year.”
More students applied to one or several of the eight Ivy League schools. Harvard University, for example, has received a record-breaking 57,000 applications — or 42% more than last year — according to the student-run Harvard Crimson news site.
More than 1,600 schools waived the standardized test requirement this admission cycle, recognizing the difficulty of taking tests during the coronavirus pandemic. First-generation or minority students, who typically score lower than other SAT or ACT test takers, are facing fewer barriers as scores become optional, encouraging a surge in applications, according to The Boston Globe.
“For my applications, I actually chose not to submit my ACT scores. I really didn’t have a choice due to the pandemic because my ACT was cancelled twice,” Lott said.
The year before the pandemic, Common App reported that among first-generation students who applied to large, selective universities, 83% included their SAT or ACT scores. This year, only 36% of students applied with scores.
Nitasha Mothilal, parent of first-generation high school senior Esha Mothilal who attends Foxborough Regional Charter School in Massachusetts, explains how her daughter applied to two Ivy League Universities: Harvard and Brown. Mothilal said Esha submitted ACT and SAT test scores, even though they were optional. The application fee for each university was $80, she said.
“She did not get accepted into any of the Ivy’s,” Mothilal said. “She has still not decided which college she wants to go to. It is between Northeastern University, Brandeis College, and University of Vermont,” Mothilal said. The schools are in the New England area but Northeastern and Brandeis Universities are near Boston.
The increase in applications without standardized testing has made it harder for colleges to sift through the data to see who would be the best fit for their campus, according to Bloomberg News.
“Although I don’t know every aspect that goes into admitting a student, I believe that without test scores, students needed to make every other part of their application stronger. For me, I made sure that my personal essay, my extracurriculars were very strong before submitting my application to schools,” Lott said.
Lott’s extracurriculars consisted of volunteering in theater and choir and mentoring.
“My essay was about my hair, and the struggles I have had dealing with it growing up mixed with a white mother and a Black father,” Lott said. “I went to a predominately white private Christian school for the majority of my childhood and constantly had dress code violations and negative remarks said about my hair.”
The Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education projects that minority representation at U.S. colleges and universities will continue to increase until 2036, when college enrollment is expected to decline because of fewer births.
High school seniors are not the only ones awaiting their admission results. Undergraduate students who applied to the Ivy League for graduate school are also in the same situation.
Alex Woodward tweets about her acceptance into Harvard and Yale Universities as a first-generation undergraduate student.
“Today I was accepted into Yale divinity and I am just stoked. As a first gen college student I did not think I’d be getting any sort of graduate degree let alone from an Ivy. Feeling very grateful,” Woodward wrote in a tweet in March.
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Pro-Palestinian protesters break through barricades to retake MIT encampment
Pro-Palestinian protesters who had been blocked by police from accessing an encampment at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Monday broke through fencing, linked arms and encircled tents that remained there, as Columbia University canceled its university-wide commencement ceremony following weeks of pro-Palestinian protests.
Sam Ihns, a graduate student at MIT studying mechanical engineering and a member of MIT Jews for a Ceasefire, said the group has been at the encampment for the past two weeks and that they were calling for an end to the killing of thousands of people in Gaza.
"Specifically, our encampment is protesting MIT's direct research ties to the Israeli Ministry of Defense," he said.
Protesters also sat in the middle of Massachusetts Avenue, blocking the street during rush hour in the Boston area.
The demonstrations at Columbia have roiled its campus and officials said Monday that while it won't hold it's main ceremony, students will be able to celebrate at a series of smaller, school-based ceremonies this week and next.
The decision comes as universities around the country wrangle with how to handle commencements for students whose high school graduations were derailed by COVID-19 in 2020. Another campus shaken by protests, Emory University, announced Monday that it would move its commencement from its Atlanta campus to a suburban arena. Others, including the University of Michigan, Indiana University and Northeastern, have pulled off ceremonies with few disruptions.
Columbia's decision to cancel its main ceremonies scheduled for May 15 saves its president, Minouche Shafik, from having to deliver a commencement address in the same part of campus where police dismantled a protest encampment last week. The Ivy League school in upper Manhattan said it made the decision after discussions with students.
"Our students emphasized that these smaller-scale, school-based celebrations are most meaningful to them and their families," officials said.
Most of the ceremonies that had been scheduled for the south lawn of the main campus, where encampments were taken down last week, will take place about 8 kilometers (5 miles) north at Columbia's sports complex, officials said.
Speakers at some of Columbia's still-scheduled graduation ceremonies include Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright James Ijames and Dr. Monica Bertagnolli, director of the National Institutes of Health.
Columbia had already canceled in-person classes. More than 200 pro-Palestinian demonstrators who had camped out on Columbia's green or occupied an academic building were arrested in recent weeks.
Similar encampments sprouted up elsewhere as universities struggled with where to draw the line between allowing free expression while maintaining safe and inclusive campuses.
The University of Southern California earlier canceled its main graduation ceremony. Students abandoned their camp at USC on Sunday after being surrounded by police and threatened with arrest.
Other universities have held graduation ceremonies with beefed-up security. The University of Michigan's ceremony was interrupted by chanting a few times Saturday. In Boston on Sunday, some students waved small Palestinian or Israeli flags at Northeastern University's commencement in Fenway Park.
Emory's ceremonies scheduled for May 13 will be held at the GasSouth Arena and Convocation Center in Duluth, almost 20 miles (30 kilometers) northeast of the university's Atlanta campus, President Gregory Fenves said in an open letter.
"Please know that this decision was not taken lightly," Fenves wrote. "It was made in close consultation with the Emory Police Department, security advisors and other agencies — each of which advised against holding commencement events on our campuses."
The 16,000-student university is one of many that has seen repeated protests stemming from the conflict that started Oct. 7 when Hamas militants attacked southern Israel, killing about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking roughly 250 hostages. Student protesters are calling on their schools to divest from companies that do business with Israel or otherwise contribute to the war effort.
Vowing to destroy Hamas, Israel launched an offensive in Gaza that has killed more than 34,500 Palestinians, about two-thirds of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-ruled territory. Israeli strikes have devastated the enclave and displaced most of its inhabitants.
Hamas on Monday announced its acceptance of an Egyptian-Qatari cease-fire proposal, but Israel said the deal did not meet its "core demands" and that it was pushing ahead with an assault on the southern Gaza town of Rafah.
"Cease-fires are temporary," said Selina Al-Shihabi, a Georgetown University sophomore who was taking part in a protest at George Washington. "There can be a cease-fire, but the U.S. government will continue to arm the Israeli military. We plan to be here until the university divests or until they drag us out of here."
At the University of California, San Diego, police cleared an encampment and arrested more than 64 people, including 40 students.
The University of California, Los Angeles, moved all classes online for the entire week due to ongoing disruptions following the dismantling of an encampment last week. The university police force reported 44 arrests but there were no specific details, UCLA spokesperson Eddie North-Hager said in an email to The Associated Press.
Schools are trying various tactics from appeasement to threats of disciplinary action to get protestors to take down encampments or move to campus areas where demonstrations would be less intrusive.
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago said in a Facebook post Sunday that it offered protesters "amnesty from academic sanction and trespassing charges" if they moved.
"Many protesters left the premises of their own accord after being notified by the police that they were trespassing and subject to arrest," the school said. "Those that remained were arrested after multiple warnings to leave, including some of whom we recognized as SAIC students."
A group of faculty and staff members at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill asked the administration for amnesty for any students who were arrested and suspended during recent protests. UNC Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine said in a media advisory that it would deliver a letter on behalf of more than 500 faculty who support the student activists.
Other universities took a different approach.
Harvard University's interim president, Alan Garber, warned students that those participating in a pro-Palestinian encampment in Harvard Yard could face "involuntary leave." That means they would not be allowed on campus, could lose their student housing and may not be able to take exams, Garber said.
Columbia University cancels main commencement after protests that roiled campus for weeks
Columbia University is canceling its large university-wide commencement ceremony amid ongoing pro-Palestinian protests but will hold smaller school-based ceremonies this week and next, the university announced Monday.
"Based on feedback from our students, we have decided to focus attention on our Class Days and school-level graduation ceremonies, where students are honored individually alongside their peers, and to forego the university-wide ceremony that is scheduled for May 15," Columbia officials said in a statement.
The protests stem from the conflict that started Oct. 7 when Hamas militants attacked southern Israel, killing about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking roughly 250 hostages. Vowing to destroy Hamas, Israel launched an offensive in Gaza that has killed more than 34,500 Palestinians, about two-thirds of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-ruled territory. Israeli strikes have devastated the enclave and displaced most of its inhabitants.
The University of Southern California earlier canceled its main graduation ceremony while allowing other commencement activities to continue.
- By VOA News
Where Are Pro-Palestinian Campus Protests Happening?
Colleges in the U.S. have been rocked by a wave of campus protests calling for an end to the war in Gaza, and for U.S. colleges to divest from Israel.
The Wall Street Journal’s Steven Russolillo rounds up some of the most important ones. (April 2024)
Pro-Palestinian protests in US could impact 2024 election
Despite the fact that many of their encampments at university campuses have been dismantled, pro-Palestinian demonstrators in the United States are standing their ground. If the protests continue, some analysts say they could have an impact on the 2024 presidential election. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias explains.
- By VOA News
Pro-Palestinian protest ends quietly at University of Southern California
Pro-Palestinian protesters at an encampment at the University of Southern California, one of the focal points of anti-Israel protests across U.S. college campuses, left the scene early Sunday after authorities warned them that they could be arrested.
Their departure came after university safety officers and Los Angeles police began clearing the center of campus, where police had arrested 93 people on April 24.
"If you are in the center of campus, please leave,” the university warned the protesters on the social media platform X, saying they could be arrested if they stayed.
Elsewhere, pro-Palestinian protests continued at several college graduation ceremonies on Saturday.
At the University of Virginia, 25 people were arrested for trespassing after police clashed with pro-Palestinian protesters who refused to remove tents from the campus.
At the University of Michigan, demonstrators chanted anti-war messages and waved flags during graduation ceremonies. More protests occurred at Indiana University, Ohio State University, Princeton University in New Jersey and Northeastern University in Massachusetts.
