Students walk out of Harvard commencement

Harvard's commencement ceremony Thursday morning opened with usual ceremonial flair: an academic procession into Harvard Yard, a Latin salutatory and calls to order by the university marshal and sheriff of Middlesex County.

But early chants of "Let them walk!" could be heard during the proceedings from students, a reference to 13 seniors who were denied timely degrees by the Harvard Corporation a day earlier for their participation in campus protests against the war in Gaza.

By the time the conferral of degrees by interim president Alan Garber took place, hundreds of students — joined by faculty — walked out of the ceremony. Most of the students appeared to be undergraduates.

Chants of "Let them walk!" continued to echo throughout the yard. The walkout didn't appear to disturb to any great degree the rest of the ceremony, which featured an address by Nobel Peace Prize-winning journalist Maria Ressa.

The walkout took place as tensions were running high on Harvard's campus following the peaceful dismantling of a pro-Palestinian student encampment on May 14. Last week, the Harvard Administrative Board suspended at least five students for their involvement in the protest and placed 20 others on probation, among them 13 seniors set to graduate.

Although the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences voted to award these seniors a timely degree, the faculty body was overruled by the Harvard Corporation Wednesday afternoon, sparking a furor among many in the student body and faculty.

That discontent made its way into remarks by student speakers on stage Thursday.

Shruthi Kumar, who delivered the undergraduate senior address, took a moment to recognize the 13 students who could not graduate Thursday.

"I am deeply disappointed by the intolerance for freedom of speech and the right to civil disobedience on campus," she said. "What is happening on campus is about liberty. This is about civil rights and upholding democratic principles. The students had spoken, the faculty had spoken. Harvard, do you hear us?"

Sam Mendoza, a graduate of the master's program in public health, was one of the students who chose to walk out during the degree-conferring portion.

"Everything that's been happening has been really like an out-of-life experience to watch," she told WBUR of campus events. "I got up because it's inspiring to really believe in liberation and ... the energy ... everyone was really into it."

Rotem Spiegler, a Jewish Harvard alumni stood outside the yard Thursday, in support of Jewish and Israeli graduates who she says feel intimidated and scared at their own graduation.

“There has been a lot of hate spreading out on campus," Spiegler said, adding there are Jewish and Israeli students who feel they're "not wanted on campus" as the result of some of the chants. "We’ve been followed and harassed on campus and generally feel very much unwanted. A lot of Jewish graduate students decided they don’t want to come to their own graduation."

Protesters lined up outside Harvard Yard as commencement took place, chanting "Free Palestine!"

The tone of the day was still mostly celebratory, with lots of hugging among graduates on a hot and humid day. There were 9,262 total degrees awarded on Thursday. Of those, 1,742 were granted by Harvard College, according to the school.

"I had heard whisperings there were people who were going to be walking out," Sam Danford, who graduated with a master's degree in education, told WBUR.

While Danford did not personally participate in the walkout, "I fully support my classmates and their desire to exercise their voices, he said. "I'm proud of them. Their voices deserve to be heard."

The 2024 commencement comes after a tumultuous year for Harvard. Early this year, the school's former president, Claudine Gay, resigned after facing criticism for her comments in a congressional hearing and accusations of plagiarism. School leaders faced pushback from a group of students for not financially divesting from Israel after the start of the war in Gaza.

Harvard Yard played host to a protest encampment for 20 days this spring. On WBUR's Radio Boston Wednesday, Rep. Jake Auchincloss said Harvard and other schools could lose federal funding for not doing enough to protect Jewish students from harassment.