As California State University, Fullerton celebrated new president Ronald S. Rochon at its annual Convocation on September 19, the student group Titan Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA) held a demonstration demanding University divestment.

                                           All photos by Isabella Rollison

“The People’s Convocation” began with picketers marching back and forth near the California State University Fullerton’s Nutwood parking structure from 10:00 am to 10:50 am, later moving to the lawn in front of the Clayes Performing Arts Center where the University’s Convocation was taking place.

CSUF Student Jack holding a “CSUF Funds Genocide Divest Now” Sign. Photo by Isabella Rollison.

In a press release shared with the Observer on September 17, Titan YDSA wrote that the demonstration “comes amidst a refusal by CSUF administrators to divest from companies that financially and materially support the genocide in Palestine, and a refusal by CSUF’s new president, Ronald Rochon, to meet with student organizations.”

The event echoed the divestment demands of previous CSUF student-led demonstrations, from the “Shutdown for Palestine” walkout on November 9 of last year to the “CSUF, Divest from Death!” protest on May 8. “We have been fighting for a year across multiple campus presidents to have our complicity in genocide come to an end,” said Titan YDSA General Secretary Amy Parker in a speech she gave at the event. “They will not meet with us. They hide our emails. They do whatever it takes to make sure that there is not even a chance that their complicity in genocide will end.”

CSUF administrators have not announced plans to alter their investment policies based on student demands. In a statement released by the CSUF Philanthropic Foundation on May 9, University CFO Alexander Porter wrote, “Cal State Fullerton has no direct investments in companies that endorse or support the [war in Gaza].” When asked to respond to Porter’s statement, Parker called it “misleading.”

“The CSU system cannot have any direct investments in companies per state law; what we have always been targeting is indirect investments,” she explained. “The CSU invests in index funds and hedge funds. These index funds and hedge funds then invest in companies that financially and materially support [Israel]. They can change which index funds they invest in. They can demand that their hedge fund managers change what they invest in.”

Photo by Isabella Rollison.

According to CSUF’s Senior Director of Strategic Communications Cerise Valenzuela Metzger, University leadership met with Titan YDSA before the demonstration to discuss protest regulations, including the CSU’s System Wide Interim Time, Place, and Manner (TPM) Policy. Implemented across all CSU campuses on August 15, the policy limits certain activities, such as the construction of tents, barricades, and platforms on University property.

“We’ve seen this at universities across the country,” said Parker of the policy. “They all created this verbiage, and the specific mention of encampments shows exactly why they made it. It’s not in response to anything else; it is specifically [designed] to crack down on Palestine organizing.”

This isn’t the first time the CSU has been publicly criticized for its TPM policy. On September 5, the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California sent a letter to the California State University, Long Beach (CSULB) administrators, claiming that the TPM policy was selectively enforced against faculty members who disagreed with the University’s support of Israel. After participating in a Pro-Palestine demonstration on the CSULB campus, some faculty members received an email from the CSULB administration warning that they had violated the TPM policy’s amplified sound clause. The letter claims that while multiple faculty members had used amplified sound during the demonstration, the only members who received the email were also co-authors of an article accusing the University of “complicity in Palestinian genocide.”

Students who witnessed “The People’s Convocation” seemed to be supportive of its messages. “[CSUF] is invested in a country that’s committing the largest mass genocide of our lifetimes,” said Nisien Notario, a student who stopped to view the demonstration. “I don’t know how that supports education or is beneficial to anybody who’s part of the university.”

CSUF’s Vice President for Student Affairs, David Forgues, responded to the Observer’s request for comment regarding the demonstration, writing that President Rochon plans to meet with Titan YDSA and meaningfully address their concerns in the near future. Forgues also affirmed that, to his knowledge, “The People’s Convocation” was conducted in accordance with CSUF’s policies, as well as local and state laws.