At NYU, as on many college campuses nationwide, the student movement began with the civil rights movement in the early 1960s. Groups like the Congress for Racial Equality (CORE) and the Student Non-Violence Coordinating Committee (SNCC) organized students to perform educational work, to demonstrate throughout New York, and to support community voter registration and legal counseling. By 1965, student concerns began to change focus, concentrating on the escalating American involvement in Vietnam. In March, one month after the beginning of the U.S. bombing of North Vietnam, the NYU Committee to End the War in Vietnam (CEWV) organized one of the earliest American anti-war teach-ins. A few weeks later, a sizeable group of NYU students headed off to Washington to protest the war.

Students also began to focus on the need for University administrative reform. In the fall of 1965, four of the major student organizations on campus-CORE, Friends of SNCC, SDS, and CEWV-formed a coalition called the New Student Union (NSU). While NSU’s campaign to challenge a tuition hike in December of 1965 proved unsuccessful, NSU succeeded in creating the so-called "Students’ University at NYU," an alternative institution that challenged the political orientation of the official curriculum by offering courses in black history, the history of the Vietnam war, and Marxist economics.

• Operation "Rolling Thunder" Begins - President Lyndon B. Johnson authorizes Operation "Rolling Thunder," a program of sustained American bombing raids of North Vietnam.

• NYU CEWV Organizes Antiwar Teach-In - The Committee to End the War in Vietnam sponsors an anti-war, teach-in-a 2-day symposium in Loeb Student Center that attracts hundreds of students. Highlights of the conference include a discussion on the Berkeley anti-Vietnam War demonstration, an analysis of the Watts riots, and the denunciation of President Johnson's domestic policies.

• U.S. Marines Land at Denang - The first American ground troops to set foot on the Asian mainland since the end of the Korean conflict land at Denang to defend the U.S. airfield.

• NYU CORE Protests NYU’s Association with the First National City Bank - In a demonstration held in front of Vanderbilt Hall, NYU CORE criticizes NYU's administration for having deposited its funds in First National City Bank, which has been accused of prolonging segregation in the South through its banking activities.

• Student-Faculty Demonstration Against the War in Vietnam - On October 14, 1965, students and faculty, led by the War Resistor's League and the Committee to End the War in Vietnam (CEWV), protest against the war in Vietnam along West 3rd Street and West Broadway. The protest, which was pushed off campus by the administration so as not to disturb classes, includes a crowd of over 200 and six speakers—three of whom are NYU professors.

• Civil Rights Teach-In Covers Vietnam War to Watts Riots - On October 28, 1965, the NYU Friends of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) sponsors a civil rights teach-in at the Eisner and Lubin auditorium in Loeb Student Center.

• President Hester Announces First Flat-Rate Tuition Increase - 30,000 NYU graduate and undergraduate students receive letters during the winter recess announcing the University's first flat-rate tuition hike for full-time students.

• American troops in Vietnam reaches nearly 200,000