The USC Divest from Death Coalition’s protest at Alumni Park on Wednesday had wider impacts on campus access, as well as student schedules and activities.

During the day, the University restricted access to campus due to “significant activity at the center of campus” and closed the gates to University Park Campus. Just before 1 p.m. and again around 6:30 p.m., the Department of Public Safety sent TrojansAlerts announcing students would need to present their USC IDs to enter campus.

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A statement from the Office of the Provost on Wednesday afternoon said the policy was part of efforts to keep the “campus calm” and matches the campus policy during weekends and nights. The University wrote in a subsequent statement that the policy will stand at least throughout the weekend.

Throughout the day, the protest attracted members of outside media outlets and organizations, including the People’s City Council, which posted on Instagram urging the general public to come to campus to support the student coalition. 

As a result of the University closing off many of the gates on campus, several students experienced delays in leaving the area because of a lack of clarity regarding available exits from campus. Esperanza Torres, a senior majoring in Spanish as well as communication, said it took her 30 minutes to leave campus after trying to exit through two different exits that had been closed off.

“It was just really confusing,” Torres said, “not knowing how to exit safely as a student that just got out of class. I wish there would have been more communication on how to do that.”

The University also closed multiple buildings across campus Wednesday, including the Wilson Student Union, Leavey Library and Doheny Memorial Library. The University said in a communitywide email that USC will be fully operational tomorrow.

Organizations on campus were forced to make last-minute changes to scheduled events because their spaces were closed off. 

Affinity groups at the LGBTQ+ Student Center had to move after their location in the Student Union was closed: the Queer Fandom Fanatics and Friends of Sappho groups moved to Taper Hall and canceled their planned movie night. Turnout fell to less than half of what the groups expected, said Paul Lazzari, the facilitator for the Queer Fandom Fanatics group and a sophomore majoring in theatre as well as anthropology.

The presence of Los Angeles Police Department officers also made students feel less safe, according to Lazzari. 

“Rather than talking about our usual: pop culture, media, what do we share as sapphic individuals …  we spent the entire time talking about how we’re stressed, how we are worried, if we have friends who are getting arrested,” Lazzari said.

Break Through Hip Hop, a student lead dance team on campus, had to postpone an 8 p.m. show at Bovard Auditorium. The group wrote the show would take place Saturday and attributed the postponement to a “university mandate” in an Instagram post Wednesday evening.

Earlier in the day, USC Hillel issued a statement addressing the demonstration, writing that it made Jewish students feel unsafe. 

“No student should feel unwelcome in their own campus home,” the statement read. “Our Jewish students are telling us that these actions and this hostile rhetoric induce feelings of fear, terror, and instability.”

The University announced that individual academic deans will be at liberty to decide whether to offer classes in-person or online Thursday.