Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) hosted a vigil on Whitman College’s campus this weekend, bringing together students and alumni during reunion events to call attention to the college’s investments and to strengthen intergenerational ties in the movement for divestment.  

For sophomore Mayah Grover, participating in SJP reflects both personal and political commitments.

“I grew up with Zionist frameworks. And I think I will forever be in the process of unlearning and re-educating,” Grover said. “Speaking out, using my privilege in a way that can help people.”

Grover said she hoped the vigil reminded peers that student organizing would not be fading away.

“Mourning the lives taken in this genocide is important and so is the action that follows. We want people to pay attention to what is happening and what has been happening,” Grover said.

Grover also emphasized the significance of alumni support, which includes a social media page dedicated to encouraging all alums to withhold donations until the college divests.

“The college relies on alumni donations heavily and keeps connections with those alumni. There’s a petition alumni can sign pleading not to donate to Whitman College until divestment, and it is important that people are aware of that,” said Grover. “A lot of alumni wanted to do this vigil, so they reached out to us. They want to have that connection with the students.”

That theme of continuity between generations of organizers resonated with alumni who returned for the event. Corinne Vandagriff, a Whitman alum, said she wanted to show students that they were not alone in their work.

“At least when I was here, and it seemed somewhat similar, Whitman’s kind of a hard place to organize. It’s pretty easy to end up with mostly peaceful vigils and move that far beyond that, and that was really my experience and I want students to feel like supportive and connected organizing these sort of events,” Vandagriff said.

She added that it was important for people outside the Whitman community to see the connections students and alumni are raising.

“To understand that, even though it can feel really far away from Gaza … [there are] so many connections and ways that these experiences are interwoven, [things] like investment in arms, lack of formal state from the college, students who are Palestinians and alumni who are in Palestine. It’s really important to be connected and involved and outraged about this,” Vandagriff said.

Anu Lingappa, class of 2015, said her involvement in human rights work shaped the way she views Whitman’s investments. After graduation, she worked abroad with refugee youth before becoming an attorney representing people seeking safety from violence, including individuals from Gaza.

“Participating in this vigil alumni weekend was important to me because I feel very grateful to my Whitman education and the opportunity that I got through being a Whitman student, especially in regards to my human rights journey,” Lingappa said. “So then it makes me really uncomfortable that the school is invested in weapons manufacturers and other companies that are facilitating, what many people, including the U.N., have described as a genocide.”

Lingappa said the vigil underscored the responsibility of the institution to recognize voices across the Whitman community.

“It’s important for the administration to know that this is not an issue that will go away on its own, and that calls for divestment are coming from all branches within the Whitman community,” Lingappa said. “It’s important to the student group, it’s also important to alum. I think it’s important to faculty [and] the staff as well, because we’re all interconnected. Even though what’s happening in Gaza is very far away, if it’s in part being facilitated by the school’s investments, and we’re complicit in it, we should view it as a connected structure.”

Throughout the weekend, the vigil highlighted connections across generations of Whitman students and alumni who see their education as tied to questions of justice and solidarity. With no plans of stopping pressure on Whitman, both past and present students urge the college to divest.