More than 30 University of Michigan students protested defense companies recruiting at the Winter Engineering Career Fair on North Campus Wednesday afternoon. Students marched through the Duderstadt Center, the Electric Engineering and Computer Science Building and then remained at the career fair in Pierpont Commons for the entirety of the event. The protest was organized by the TAHRIR Coalition, a multicultural coalition of more than 60 U-M student organizations, and Students Allied for Freedom and Equality.
Protesters carried model babies covered in towels and fake blood to represent Palestinians killed in Gaza. While students marched, they chanted slogans including “Shame on you” and “Fund our education, not the occupation.” Students also carried signs with pictures of victims in Gaza that read, “30,000+ slaughtered by American weapons, how many more?” and “War profiteers off our campus.”
The event organizers handed out flyers that claimed General Dynamics, HP and Hyundai actively contributed to genocide in Palestine by manufacturing weapons for Israel.
In an interview with The Michigan Daily after the protest, Zainab Hakim, SAFE education committee member, said the goal of the organization’s protest was to push the companies to stop aiding Israel in committing mass violence against Palestinians and protest the University’s financial connections to these companies.
“(At) the Engineering Career Fair, they invite certain companies, we were talking about HP, Hyundai and then obviously the U.S. Army that are profiting off of the genocide of the Palestinians,” Hakim said. “The idea for us is to apply pressure to the University to stop inviting companies like these to campus and also to get these companies to stop propping up war, violence, genocide (and) apartheid.”
Alex Sepulveda, activism chair of the U-M chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, told The Daily in an interview that defense companies at the fair moved locations for the remainder of the career fair after learning about the student protest. According to Sepulveda, the University also heightened security measures for the career fair.
“(They) also added increased security measures even though we were in no way a threat to security,” Sepulveda said. “This school has cultivated an environment which routinely performs security theater, where they can feel emotional security by adding police officers to all the protests that we do.”
In an email to The Daily, University spokesperson Kim Broekhuizen confirmed that the University was aware of the protests in advance and made arrangements accordingly.
“In regard to student protests, the University is keenly aware that some companies and industries raise concerns with members of our community,” Broekhuizen said. “The protests over the past two days have been vocal, but peaceful, and have allowed for members of our community to be heard. Arrangements were made with organizers yesterday to move select booths to locations better suited for interactions between students and employers.”
Hakim said SAFE’s actions are intentional and serve to remind students that they have a say in decisions made by the University and their potential employers.
“For the students out there, a) don’t work for these companies until they change their practices, but b) as a student, and as a person who’s entering the job market, you also have agency and power to make certain demands of the University, of maybe your future employers, of the engineering department,” Hakim said. “We’re paying the University, we’re the University’s customers — the University should listen to us.”
Broekhuizen also wrote that the University will continue hosting events to provide students with the opportunity to connect with companies.
“The University of Michigan is proud to have some of the top-ranked engineering programs in the nation, and the Winter Engineering Career Fair is intended to connect our talented and knowledgeable students with top companies and industry leaders,” Broekhuizen said. “The University will continue to host similar events that provide our students the chance to explore career opportunities and connect with employers across industries.”
Rackham student Zachary Eichenberger, who attended the career fair, told The Daily he believed the protest encouraged some students to think about the ethics of working for a defense company.
“When I was there, I saw that, each time (protesters arrived), they were protesting around HP,” Eichenberger said. “I also saw a couple of their companies leaving early because of being heckled by these protesters. And I think for the students who were standing in line, they started conversations … I ended up having a couple conversations with the people before me (and) behind me and around me about what it meant to work at one of those corporations.”
Daily News Editor Sneha Dhandapani can be reached at sdhanda@umich.edu. Daily Staff Reporter Noor Khanafer can be reached at noorkk@umich.edu.