by Andrew Alonzo | aalonzo@claremont-courier.com

A sense of calm prevailed on the Pomona College campus in the days after hundreds of students occupied and vandalized Pomona College’s Carnegie Hall during an October 7 divestment protest.

Things changed dramatically on October 11 when Pomona College President Gabrielle Starr issued a statement, “Incidents at Carnegie Hall and the Road Ahead” (viewable at pomona.edu/administration/president, click “statements/messages”), and told 12 Pomona students they had been placed on immediate interim suspension for their alleged involvement in the protest, and six others they were under investigation. This according to an opinion piece authored by “suspended students” in the Claremont Colleges newspaper, The Student Life, which is viewable at tsl.news/suspended-students-speak-out.

On October 22, two more students were sent interim suspension notices.

Two of 12 students who were suspended October 11 successfully appealed and overturned their suspensions. The appeals of the remaining 10 were denied, and on October 23 they were suspended for the full academic year, according to TSL.

In addition to those suspensions, Pomona College officials contacted other Claremont Colleges to inform them that some of their students have been banned from the Pomona campus for allegedly participating in the protest. Banned students are not permitted on Pomona College property and those taking classes at Pomona College will have to find other ways to attend them, TSL reported.

The total number of Claremont Colleges students suspended or banned from Pomona College was unclear as of Wednesday.

“I’ve heard at least 70,” said TSL Editor in Chief Ansley Washburn, a 20-year-old junior at Scripps College, on Tuesday. “I don’t have any confirmation on that, but I’ve heard from Pomona faculty, and I think also other groups are saying [that]. ‘Dozens’ is kind of what I’ve been going off of.”

Pomona College Interim Chief Communications Officer Patricia Vest would not say how many of its students had been suspended or banned from campus.

DeMethra LaSha Bradley, vice president for student affairs and dean of students at Scripps College, wrote in an email that more than 15 Scripps College students had been banned from Pomona College, but that none of its students had been suspended.

Judy Augsburger, director of public relations at Harvey Mudd College, said one HMC student was banned from Pomona College. Timothy Hussey, Mudd’s chief communications officer, said no HMC students were suspended.

Pitzer College Editorial Director Nick Owchar said Pitzer would not provide an estimate, citing an ongoing investigation.

Claremont McKenna College Director of Content Gilien Silsby said the college does not comment on student disciplinary matters.

An October 23 statement by Starr reads in part, “Several students charged with violations of The Claremont Colleges demonstration policy were placed on interim suspension … As a result of their actions, several students have been fully suspended for the remainder of the 2024-2025 academic year.” 

Starr suspended the students by invoking the “Extraordinary Authority of the President,” a power endowed by the college’s board of trustees that allows an acting president to remove, prohibit, expel, suspend, place on leave, or issue an action on a student, “with respect to the status of a student of the College that the President deems appropriate or necessary in their absolute discretion (“the Action”).”

Starr’s October 23 statement addresses why she did not consult the college’s judicial council prior to meting out punishments:

“In conformity with the authority delegated to the president by the Board of Trustees, the severity of the circumstances, and the sweeping effect on our community, these cases are not subject to discipline by the Judicial Council,” Starr wrote.

“This takeover created an environment that was fundamentally dangerous, restricting entrance and exit for Carnegie, and even leading to students leaving the building by climbing out the windows,” Vest wrote in an email on Wednesday. “The referral of these matters to the extraordinary authority of the president is based on the nature of and damages resulting from the Carnegie building takeover, which met the following conditions:

• threatened safety of individuals on campus,

• involved in the destruction of College property, and

• disrupted Pomona’s educational process.

In accordance with the student code, neither the exercise of extraordinary authority nor the sanction means that a particular student’s actions met all three criteria, but rather that the event itself met the threshold for enacting a different judicial process.”

The Student Life Editor Washburn said the decision to exclude the judicial council has roiled students.

“I think people feel like it’s not fair,” Washburn said. “I think general student opinion is that it feels like an overreach of power and you’ve seen different student groups come forward and say that.”

On Tuesday, Pomona Divest from Apartheid issued a statement which read in part, “Pomona College is resorting to indiscriminate, collective punishment to suppress pro-Palestine protests on campus. By suspending and banning students en masse, without transparent procedures or demonstrated evidence of wrongdoing, the college is not only targeting students for exercising their First Amendment rights but also disregarding its responsibility to uphold fair processes … Pomona’s punitive actions have left dozens of students without basic necessities like housing, food, and community. The administration, through President Starr, has shown a willingness to destabilize students’ lives and safety to stifle dissent and dissuade others from speaking out. The result is an atmosphere of fear and hostility, where students’ welfare is sacrificed to suppress calls for accountability and solidarity with Palestinian liberation.”

On October 24, the LA office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Southern California’s largest Muslim civil liberties and advocacy organization, condemned Pomona College for suspending the initial 10 students, calling the action “part of a long line of attempts from the college to suppress students’ pro-Palestinian advocacy.”

It’s unclear if Pomona College intends to press criminal charges stemming from the incident.

“Students currently under suspension were sanctioned for their joining in the takeover of the building,” Vest wrote. “Individuals who zip tied doors and carried out other violent actions will face more severe sanctions; we are following the evidence as we uncover it. All Pomona students who were suspended have been offered funding for transportation to their home paid for by the College. As always, we have a variety of procedures on our campus to address alleged student misconduct, all with opportunities for appeal or reconsideration.”