Approximately 900 students, faculty, and staff gathered in the Oval from 1-4:30 p.m. Tuesday to protest Ohio Senate Bill 1 and Ohio State’s diversity, equity, and inclusion rollbacks.
The crowd, which included Ohio State community members, administrators, religious leaders, and politicians, grew from a few dozen just before 1 p.m. to around 900 by 2:30 p.m. The protest was organized by Ohio State’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors and the university’s chapter of the Ohio Student Association.
According to event organizers, this is the first time faculty and students have come together for this type of gathering.
Over 15 different speakers delivered brief speeches to the crowd during the roughly three-hour protest. Protesters chanted phrases like “Hell no, SB 1 has got to go” and “F*** Ted Carter,” while others held signs that read “Buckeyes united against SB 1,” “Kill the bill,” “Sunset Ted Carter,” and “Compliance with censorship is cowardice.”
Ben Johnson, a university spokesperson, confirmed that the group had reserved a space for the protest.
Attendees were heard reminding one another not to use amplified sound due to the university’s space standards, and there were no microphones, sound speakers, or makeshift stages, with speakers instead standing on the steps of the William Oxley Thompson Statue to make their voices heard.
Lt. Bruce Allen said that approximately ten Ohio State University Police Department officers were stationed around the Oval for safety purposes. Sydney Ball, one of the event’s student organizers and an OSA leader, informed attendees that medics and a designated “safety team” wore red bandanas to keep protesters safe.
Pranav Jani, president of Ohio State’s AAUP chapter, program director for Asian American Studies, faculty advisor for Students for Justice in Palestine, and a professor in the Department of English, began the protest with an introduction that most Ohio State students are familiar with.
“I’ve done 30 years of this,” Jani said. “I have never done what I am about to say. I am going to start with ‘O-H!'”
“‘I-O!'” the audience responded.
“I’m starting that way because this is not just a gathering of a few people,” Jani told me. “This is more than just a gathering of people who share a certain viewpoint. This is a gathering of Buckeye Nation.”
The crowd cheered.
Other speakers included the President of the Ohio Federation of Teachers, an Ohio State House Representative, university professors, department chairs, and others.
By the end of the afternoon, event organizers and protesters were humming along to “Buckeye Swag” — accompanied by live tuba and trumpet players — and participating in a call-and-response rendition of “Carmen Ohio,” with lyrics changed from the traditional “Oh come, let’s sing Ohio’s praise / And songs to Alma Mater raise” and “Time and change will surely show / How firm thy friendship, Ohio.”
Instead of protesting, they sang: “Oh come lament Ohio’s ill / As Carter caves to Cirino’s will / And our sorrowful tears do flow / For the death of Ohio.”
Attendees then engaged in a similarly structured call-and-response chant of “F** Ted Carter.”
The event, which was set to end at 4 p.m., was officially declared over by organizers around 4:30 p.m.
Tuesday’s timeline and speeches
Shortly after the official 1 p.m. start time, when there were approximately 200 people, Jani took to the Thompson Statue steps to address the crowd, which applauded and cheered as he spoke.
“We’re here to stop Senate Bill 1, we’re here to stop union busting, we’re here to stop the clamp down on academic freedom, we’re here to stop the attack on diversity and we want our voices to carry to the legislators who are gonna vote on this, to the governor who’s going to get it if it goes through the House, but also to our own administration, who has, in a cowardly way, refused to stand up against SB 1,” Jani told the crowd.
Jani then discussed the history of student protests at Ohio State. He specifically discussed student demonstrations on campus in the 1970s, many of which focused on racial and gender inequality, as well as opposition to the Vietnam War.
According to previous Lantern reporting, the university was closed for nearly two weeks as a result of the 1970s protests.
Jani also mentioned the inception of Ohio State’s Black Student Union. According to an October 2019 Lantern article, the BSU was founded in the fall of 1967 after Black students organized a series of summer meetings to advocate for better treatment on campus. Its first meeting took place under a group of trees on the Oval known as “the five brothers.”
“The Oval is a historic place that’s tied to all the issues we’re talking about,” Jani told reporters. “But you may not know, and I want you to know this, we’re against SB 1 because they’re attacking our future, and they’re attacking our present and I want to tell you they’re also attacking our past.”
Jani then stated that Ohio State’s history of student activism is “not just an empty history lesson,” and encouraged attendees to continue advocating for DEI initiatives at the university level.
“When they cancel the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, they are waging a war against our own history, against Black history, against people’s history,” Jani told reporters. “And right now, we’re rebuilding it. We are remembering that history.”
By 1:30 p.m., the crowd around the Thompson Statue had grown to almost 400. Melissa Cropper, president of the Ohio Federation of Teachers, addressed the crowd, stating that she was there to represent the OFT’s 15,000 members and the American Federation of Teachers’ 1.8 million members.
“We’re all fighting to have your back,” Cropper said. “Never be silent, and never give up your power, because you have it. And it may not always feel like it, when you have a Statehouse that ignores nearly 1,000 pieces of testimony, but every day, every action you take, you are chipping away at that power and creating a better future for others.”
Several flyers were distributed at the event, including a “Stop SB 1 Syllabus” with an attached QR code that linked to the Ohio State chapter of the AAUP’s website, as well as a petition urging university President Ted Carter Jr. to reinstate the Office of Diversity and Inclusion and the Center for Belonging and Social Change, which Carter announced were being discontinued at Thursday’s University Senate meeting.
Another speaker, Ohio State Rep. Munira Abdullahi (D-Columbus), reminded protesters that this is their state, and the people have power over the legislature.
“It’s so disappointing what’s happening across the state, and we should not comply early,” Abdullahi told the crowd. “So, shame on OSU [and] Ted Carter, shame on the universities who are pre-complying to these horrible, horrible bills.”
By 1:45 p.m., the crowd of about 600 had divided into two circles, with speakers rotating from one group to the other so that everyone could hear each address. To avoid violating the university’s space standards, event organizers instructed the crowd to snap rather than clap and cheer.
Jill Galvan, a professor in the Department of English and an executive board member of Ohio State’s AAUP chapter, addressed the audience about a provision of SB 1 that requires professors to post their syllabi — including instructor qualifications and contact information — online for anyone to view.
“If you pass a law that says to current faculty, ‘We will surveil your courses and allow for easy harassment of you by forcing you to post that information; we don’t believe that you can be trusted to determine the best program, so we’re going to eliminate that ability from collective bargaining; you’re an expert in your field, but we’re going to control what you can teach by calling certain topics controversial,’ all of those will be major disincentives for coming.
Boos erupted from the audience when Galvan mentioned Sen. Jerry Cirino (R-Kirtland), the primary sponsor of SB 1.
“Sen. Cirino has not been listening when we’ve been trying to communicate with him,” Galvan told us. “He has been hurling insults at students. In one report, he referred to the bill’s supporters as ‘clowns.'”
Mytheli Sreenivas, a chair and designated professor in the Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies who also spoke at the protest, believes SB 1 undermines two core elements of Ohio State’s mission: advanced research and teaching.
Sreenivas also called on students and faculty to “challenge the status quo and imagine a new university together.”
“As we all know, this research and teaching is necessarily controversial,” says Sreenivas. “It pushes us and sometimes disrupts things.
It necessitates debate and the modification of our beliefs in response to new evidence. And this — this work, research, and teaching — is precisely what SB 1’s clause on controversial topics seeks to prohibit.
Sam Shim, an Ohio State alum and Honesty for Ohio Education representative, also spoke at Tuesday’s rally.
Honesty for Ohio Education is a nonpartisan statewide coalition that advocates for “honest education, the affirmation of all identities, cultures, and lived experiences, as well as the rights and safety of all students, families, and educators,” according to its website.
Shim, an alumnus, called Ohio State’s decision to eliminate ODI and CBSC “horrific.”
“I want every professor to know the alumni, we have got your back,” Shim ended by saying. “The Black Alumni Society immediately issued a statement condemning what was happening.
We need ODI. We must stop SB 1. And, you know, the Asian & Pacific Islander Alumni Society immediately followed suit in support of our Black brothers and sisters.
Notably, Shim stated that many alumni are working together to fight back against these cuts and SB 1 in general.
“There are over 170 clubs and societies at The Ohio State University Alumni Association,” Shim told me. “Is that not diversity?”
By 2:30 p.m., the crowd had grown to around 900 people. Hasan Kwame Jeffries, a professor in the Department of History, addressed the audience.
“I’m here because you all are here,” Jeffries said. “I am here because my students are here. I’m here because if my students hadn’t fought for their rights in the 1960s, I wouldn’t be a professor at The Ohio State University today.”
Jeffries stated that he chose to attend Tuesday’s demonstration because he “[knows] what it means to be a Buckeye, and Buckeyes don’t stand for foolishness.”
“And unfortunately, there’s somebody across the street who apparently doesn’t know what it means to be a Buckeye,” Jeffries told the crowd.
Jeffries stated that he recently appeared on a WOSU radio program and was asked about Carter’s decisions regarding SB 1 and DEI.
“I said, ‘The verdict is still out,'” Jeffries explained. “I am not sure if he is incompetent, a coward, or complicit. But I believe we now know that it’s all three.
The crowd clapped and cheered.
Jeffries claimed university administrators and legislators are “afraid of the truth.” He stated that this is why SB 1 restricts what instructors can teach in their classrooms, which includes topics such as white supremacy, racism, sexism, global oppression, and capitalism.
“They don’t even want you to hear what we have to say — that’s why we don’t have any microphones,” Jeffries told me. “But you don’t have to hear it, you don’t have to hear the truth, because just you being here tells me that you feel the truth and the truth is who we are.”
Jeffries urged attendees to continue their fight against SB 1 and DEI rollbacks.
“As faculty, we’re preparing you for the future that you deserve, the future that you earn, and they’re trying to rob you of that today, and I’m here to say that s*** ain’t gonna happen,” Jeffries told the crowd.
“If you wanna fight President Carter, if you want to fight [the] state attorney, if you want to fight [the] governor, if you want to fight [the] president of the United States, then goddamn it, you gotta fight.”
Jeffries concluded his speech by emphasizing that today marks only the beginning of protests against anti-DEI legislation.
“Let today be the beginning and not the end,” Jeffries said. “We take this from this yard, to the Statehouse, and then to the White House.” This isn’t over. “We are on the correct side of history.”
An hour later, around 3:30 p.m., the two groups of protesters regrouped, lining the brick paths of the Oval and singing and chanting songs like “Carmen Ohio”.
Joel Wainwright, a professor in the Department of Geography, addressed the audience and suggested ways to persuade Republican legislators to veto SB 1.
His first piece of advice was to highlight the bill’s negative economic consequences, which would “make it miserable to be a professor at Ohio State, meaning many of the best faculty here will leave for the private sector, private universities, or the country of Canada.”
“What happens if five or ten percent of our best faculty leave? “The federal research dollars they bring to this university also leave,” Wainwright explained. “It’s real. This is real. You don’t have to use hyperbole to say that everyone will leave—no, not everyone will leave, but even if only 5 or 10% leave, that’s a big deal.
Think about this: Last year, Ohio State faculty earned approximately $1.3 billion in federal research grants. That is billions, with a ‘B.’ Take ten percent of that, and you’re talking hundreds of millions of dollars.”
Wainwright’s second tip was to inform Republican legislators that SB 1 would lower the quality of undergraduate education at Ohio State, making it more difficult to recruit students.
Protesters dispersed shortly after 4 p.m., and Molly Hornberger — an OSA member and third-year student in public affairs, sociology, and African American and African studies — concluded the event around 4:30 p.m. by encouraging attendees to submit testimonies to Ohio legislators.
“This was an amazing event and action,” Hornberger remarked. “This is a marathon, not a sprint.” This will require all of us, not just a portion of us. “The fight will not end here.”
Attendee interviews
Shelby Vickers, a first-year microbiology student, said seeing the Ohio State community come together to support DEI was “powerful.”
As a transgender student, Vickers believes DEI is not “an attack on people who aren’t queer or people of color,” but rather a way to ensure that students from diverse backgrounds have equal access to higher education.
“I relied on a lot of DEI things myself because I’m a trans person, and also I’m from Appalachia, and I know a lot of Appalachian people who come here who really just [need] that help because we can’t afford it,” Vickers told me. “So, I feel like a lot of really good students wouldn’t get the opportunity they’d need for higher education because they don’t have the opportunities from, you know, inclusivity.”
According to Nick Kawa, an associate professor in the Department of Anthropology and a designated safety team member for the protest, SB 1 would prohibit educators from creating environments conducive to open discussion.
“I think, for example, with the controversial policies and beliefs, it’ll create a chilling effect in which professors will steer away from vital topics that are extremely important for [societal] debate, such as immigration policy, climate change, marriage.
” according to Kawa. “I mean, these are things that they’ve specifically identified as controversial, and these are the things that we need to be talking about, especially if they’re things that Ohioans don’t agree about.”
Ryan Skinner, a professor at the School of Music, agreed. He stated that in order for faculty to teach students responsibly, they must be free to express themselves based on their own knowledge.
“This protest is about SB 1, which is an attack on academic freedom — I’m holding up a sign to prove it,” said Skinner, who is also the AAUP’s secretary. “It’s an attack on faculty, it’s an attack on students, it’s an attack on our ability to organize and voice our protest.”
Gloria Chan, a third-year Romance Studies and Translation and Interpretation student, said she and her peers have drawn parallels between Ohio State’s recent DEI cuts and the fascist regime of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.
According to the Associated Press, Mussolini rose to power in 1922, ushering in two decades of fascist rule. Chan believes that the Italian government’s censorship at the time is similar to the university’s dismissal of students’ concerns now.
“Essentially, we’re seeing a lot of parallels to what’s going on now,” Chan told reporters. “And for people, having studied a lot about the history of Italy and the history of the resistance against fascism, it’s really, really disappointing to see what’s going on now.”
Chan expressed hope that if enough Ohio State students and faculty members speak out, the university will not repeat the oppressive patterns seen in the past.
“I know for so many people that when they come to university, this is their place to kind of explore and to hear those counterpoints that maybe, like, growing up in a smaller town in Ohio, they wouldn’t be able to discover,” Chan told me.
“And this is extremely dangerous, and it is essentially attempting to deprive everyone — people — of the tools necessary to consider resistance or fight it. I think that is truly shameful to universities, and I believe it is completely counterproductive to higher education in general.”
