Santa Monica, California (CNN) -- Santa Monica College officials in California have launched an investigation into a raucous student protest at a board of trustees meeting in which campus police used pepper spray on demonstrators, sending three of them to a hospital, the college president said Wednesday. The students weren't allowed into the overflowing meeting room Tuesday evening and were demonstrating in a hallway against a summer pilot program creating two tiers of tuition when the pepper spraying incident occurred, said Paul Alvarez Jr., the multimedia editor for the campus newspaper who videotaped the incident. Three people were taken to a hospital, and about 30 other students needed treatment for pepper spray, said Santa Monica Fire Department Capt. Judah Mitchell. The fire department set up a decontamination unit that consisted of a fire hose with clear water, Mitchell said. Santa Monica is a coastal city adjacent to Los Angeles.
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"Insanity. Overreaction. It started out just chanting," one student says
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Santa Monica College campus police pepper-sprayed student protesters
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College president: Protesters "engaged in unlawful conduct," but no arrests were made
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Students were protesting a tuition increase under an experimental summer program
The program augments 700 regularly scheduled state-subsidized classes at $46 per credit unit for @placeholder residents, he said.