WMU Board of Trustees Meeting:
Protect Students’ Rights
Date: Thursday, April 17, 2025
Location: WMU Student Center Ballroom (2nd floor)
Time: 12PM - 2PM
Public Comment: 3-minute limit
Pizza for the People: 11AM - 12PM
Grab a piece of pizza outside the Student Center Ballroom to learn more about student demands and how you can help.
WMU Students for Justice in Palestine Statement:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
WMU Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) Rejects WMU’s Institutional Neutrality Policy
February 11, 2025
Western Michigan University Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) firmly rejects President Montgomery’s statement and the administration’s newly announced “Guidelines for Stewarding our Institutional Voice,” a move that abandons its international students and faculty at a time of heightened political repression. This so-called neutrality is a thinly veiled attempt to disengage from the urgent concerns of students and faculty who have spent nearly a year working with the President’s cabinet to implement tangible actions in solidarity with their students. Rather than standing for justice and academic freedom, WMU has chosen to prioritize optics over action, issuing vague statements while refusing to acknowledge the real threats that students and faculty now face under the Trump administration’s executive orders.
At last week’s WMU Board of Trustees meeting, numerous students and faculty members delivered public comments highlighting the university’s duty to protect international students from politically motivated federal policies, yet President Montgomery sat in silence, offering no response, no acknowledgment, and no commitment to action. Instead, the administration chose to prioritize drafting this performative neutrality policy, which effectively silences the university from taking any stance on issues of human rights and social justice—including the genocide of what most experts now agree to be as many as 300,000 to 800,000 Palestinians murdered.
The FAQ document accompanying this statement makes it abundantly clear that the university’s new neutrality policy is a direct response to students demanding divestment from the military industrial complex. Instead of working on meaningful resolutions to uphold the university’s ethical and moral obligations, WMU’s administration has chosen to insulate itself from accountability, ensuring that student concerns will be ignored in the name of “neutrality.”
Furthermore, WMU’s undergraduate student enrollment has dropped by a staggering 25% since 2017, while international undergraduate enrollment has surged by 28%. In the past year alone, international enrollment grew by 20%, nearly single-handedly preventing another major enrollment decline. Despite these numbers, the administration refuses to acknowledge its financial dependence on international students while simultaneously failing to protect them.
WMU invests hundreds of thousands of dollars annually in international recruitment efforts, benefiting from higher tuition rates paid by non-resident students. Yet, when these same students are targeted by the federal government, WMU remains silent. This is not neutrality—this is complicity.
The administration’s own FAQ page states: "An issue is considered to affect a campus community member in their role at Western if it interferes with their ability to learn, teach, conduct research or creative scholarship, or work on campus."
The executive orders will interfere in all of these areas:
International students now risk deportation for exercising their free speech rights, making it impossible to focus on coursework without fear of retaliation.
Faculty on visas may be forced to leave, disrupting research, teaching, and student mentorship.
Students from marginalized communities are disproportionately targeted, creating a hostile and unsafe campus environment.
Mental health concerns will skyrocket, as international students live under the constant fear of surveillance and deportation.
Let us be clear: There is no neutrality when it comes to genocide. There is no neutrality when international students are actively under threat of deportation, political repression, and state violence. There is no neutrality when this university relies exclusively on international student enrollment and tuition to make up for two decades of domestic enrollment in freefall, while utterly failing to cultivate safety and inclusivity for those international students in the wake of unprecedented executive orders.
This administration cannot remain neutral while its own students are under threat. If WMU truly values its international student body, it must act now to provide tangible protections—not vague promises or performative neutrality. To accomplish this, SJP is demanding WMU take the following steps to protect international students:
Legal Protections & Advocacy
Provide free legal consultations and create an emergency legal fund.
Offer Know-Your-Rights workshops in partnership with legal aid organizations.
Assist affected students in filing asylum or visa extensions.
Noncompliance with Federal Targeting of Student Activists
Refuse to act as an informant on student activism.
Commit to noncompliance with politically motivated investigations.
Implement a sanctuary campus policy protecting students from unjust deportation.
Immediate Implementation of a Campus Raid Response Plan
Establish designated safe zones where students can seek emergency legal support.
Develop a rapid-response system to alert legal teams and advocacy organizations.
Public Assurance of Safety & Non-Discrimination
Issue a public statement rejecting the executive orders.
Ensure that student activism is not grounds for disciplinary action or immigration reporting.
Transparency & Student Involvement
Establish a task force of international student representatives and legal experts.
Hold quarterly town halls where students can voice concerns directly to the administration.
We call on all students, faculty, and community members to stand with us in rejecting WMU’s neutrality policy and demanding action. The administration has made its position clear—now, it’s time to make ours.
TAKE ACTION:
Email President Montgomery and the WMU Board of Trustees to reject this so-called neutrality policy and demand protections for international students.
Sign and share our petition calling for institutional accountability.
Follow @sjpwmu on Instagram to stay up-to-date on our actions and events.
We refuse to accept neutrality in the face of oppression. WMU must choose a side.
WMU Students for Justice in Palestine