On April 25, the University of Southern California informed the Class of 2024 that the school was canceling the main stage commencement ceremony, which would have brought together 65,000 people to celebrate the graduates’ achievement.
“For those who have never attended a graduation (like many students this year), we’ve created a gallery of photos from ceremonies of previous years so you can see how joyful and special these are,” the statement said.
USC may have been trying to explain that smaller events where graduates will receive their diplomas are just as good. But it sounded like a tablespoon of salt rubbed into the wound.
Four years ago, many of these same students were denied all their high school senior-year activities, including graduation, due to the lockdowns and restrictions imposed in response to the COVID virus. This year, they’re losing their main commencement ceremony because of a meltdown that began when the provost and faculty decided to give a high-profile platform at the event to a Muslim student who is a pro-Palestinian activist.
After the university announced that the 2024 valedictorian was 22-year-old Asna Tabassum, reports quickly emerged that her social media accounts featured anti-Israel posts. A link showcased on her Instagram page referred to Zionism, which is the movement for the creation and survival of the state of Israel, as “a racist, settler-colonial ideology.”
In another era, it would have been a coincidence that the USC student with the highest grade point average happened to be an activist who could use the commencement platform to make a controversial political speech.
It was no coincidence.
The title of valedictorian is no longer bestowed on the student with the highest academic achievement, defined objectively as having the highest grades. Now, the selection process is what USC describes on its website as “more holistic,” taking into account other factors including “service and leadership,” as well as “contribution to university and community life.”
How these things are defined is left to a faculty committee under the supervision of USC’s provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, Andrew T. Guzman. According to Guzman, 200 students met the threshold for consideration based on grades, and then roughly 100 applications were reviewed by the faculty committee. Based on the committee’s recommendation, Guzman made the final decision.
In a letter to the “USC Community,” Guzman later explained that “social media presence” is not one of the criteria for selection.
If he was trying to say he couldn’t have known of the student’s anti-Israel statements before honoring her with the title of valedictorian, it’s unconvincing. Tabassum is graduating with a minor in, no kidding, “Resistance to Genocide.” And how the university teaches that subject is troublingly selective.
The course list in this interdisciplinary minor features classes on such topics as “Terror and Resistance in Literature and the Media,” “Mass Violence and Comparative Genocide in Modern World History,” and “Law, Atrocity Crimes and Transitional Justice.”
While there are several courses offered on the Holocaust, there is nothing that connects the founding of the nation of Israel to that history. There’s no class called “Never Again: Understanding Jewish Resistance to Genocide.”
CBS News reported that the 22-year-old valedictorian said her “opinions about the world are informed by what she learned from her USC courses.”
No wonder the university canceled her speech, then canceled all speeches, then canceled the main stage ceremony completely.
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“Tradition must give way to safety,” Guzman said.
Tabassum told CBS News that she “was never given the evidence that any safety concerns were founded.”
Guzman may have been trying to keep the view of the world Tabassum learned in her USC courses from getting too much exposure.
Too late now, as the faculty of USC and other universities join the “Let Hamas Operate” rallies on campus. Protesters nationally are occupying large areas and entire buildings, spewing their anti-Israel slogans and blocking Jewish students from getting to their classes. It’s Kristallnacht on the Quad.
Last fall, Guzman gave an awkward interview to the Daily Trojan in which he was identified as “USC’s first Latine provost.”
“I am white and I don’t want to be heard as if I’m oblivious to that reality,” Guzman said.
The reality is that USC and other universities have thrown aside the values of individual achievement and pluralistic tolerance and adopted collectivism and identity politics. The conditions that made peaceful co-existence possible have been traded for permanent warfare. And not just on campus.
Write Susan@SusanShelley.com and follow her on Twitter @Susan_Shelley
