When 97% of Wellesley students voted in favor of Wellesley divesting from its current holdings in weapons manufacturers last spring, we thought it meant something. The Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA) club on campus had worked hard for that result. The vote was a culmination of researching investment practices, circulating a petition, making signs, seeking Senate approval and encouraging students to “Vote Yes to Divest” on the 2025 College Government ballot question. So how did our proposal fail with such overwhelming support?
The administration decided, at every step of the process, that its students’ voices are not a priority. Verbatim, the question students voted for on March 11, 2025 read: “Do you support the Wellesley College Board of Trustees voting in favor of disclosing the total makeup of Wellesley’s investment portfolio in its annual report, and voting in favor of divesting from companies complicit in human rights violations as defined by the International Court of Justice?” But before this question even reached the ballot, its phrasing was shaped by administrative control.
As a first step to getting the question on the ballot, YDSA had to seek approval from Senate. In advance of this process, we circulated a petition asking students if they would support a ballot measure calling for the College to divest from companies with holdings in Israel. That petition received 390 signatures. However, just an hour before Senate voted to put the question on the ballot, two deans emailed the YDSA co-presidents, demanding to see them. In that meeting, the co-presidents experienced condescension and manipulation.
Facing time constraints and unable to consult the rest of the divestment group, the presidents were pressured into revising the question to exclude language about Israel. What began as a clear statement condemning genocide in Palestine was softened into language about “human rights violations.” It didn’t matter whether changing the language was the right decision — the administration never really left us a choice. The question would have been removed from the ballot unless we agreed to their terms. Still, when the question passed with 97% of the votes, we felt hopeful that the student body’s overwhelming support might still encourage the administration to act. The passage of the ballot initiative, however, was just the beginning of a struggle to make our voices heard.
As we tried to enact the will of the student body, we were faced with bureaucracy, intimidation, and delays. Once the ballot initiative was passed, the YDSA drafted a detailed proposal for divestment from the weapons manufacturing industry. This proposal closely mirrored a previous proposal for divestment from fossil fuel companies that the Board of Trustees passed in 2021.
On April 23, 2025, after numerous meetings with the Chief Investment Officer to refine the proposal, we met with the Subcommittee on Responsible Investment, a small group that advises the broader Board of Trustees. It was up to this subcommittee to make a recommendation to the full Board on whether or not to review our proposal. In this meeting, after hollow congratulations on our presentation, the subcommittee told us we would hear back soon. When we asked for a more specific date, we were given no answer. It wasn’t until two months later, on June 23, 2025, that the Subcommittee informed us our proposal had been rejected — over a month after students had left campus and had no possibility of protesting the decision.
The administration gave us meetings, tasks and polite reassurances — not to empower us, but to exhaust us, keeping us busy enough to feel heard without ever being listened to. In fact, the College feels so confident in its ability to stifle student voices that, despite students’ cries for divestment and clear support for Palestinian liberation, it has invited Sue Wagner, the co-founder of the asset management company BlackRock, to be honored at this year’s Alumnae Achievement Awards. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has specifically denounced BlackRock for its stake in major corporations, such as Palantir and Lockheed Martin. These companies directly enable the ongoing genocide in Gaza, as well as other human rights violations.
We find the choice of Sue Wagner as an honoree abhorrent and inexcusable — another example of the College’s continued complicity in war crimes and genocide. But YDSA has not lost hope for divestment. If anything, the administration’s efforts to manipulate and “manage” student organizers reveal something powerful: we cannot be ignored. Now, we face a new challenge. When official channels fail us, how do we make ourselves impossible to dismiss?
Contact the editor(s) responsible for this story: Caitlin Donovan, Avery Finley
