OREM — Dozens of flags hang gracefully and motionless on the south side of the Utah Valley University campus. It's called the Hall of Flags, where thousands of students walk, meet and study every day.

However, one flag doesn't hang next to the rest at UVU: the nation of Palestine.

Rashad Nijim, a senior, said he thinks it's unfair that his people are not represented in the hall. He has been trying to get the flag on display since October of 2011 by talking to administrators and student association representatives — discussions that the school describes as informal. Now, the school has taken up the task of making a decision.

He said he was met with resistance and confusion. Some were worried the flag might cause offense.

"I'm not trying to offend anyone; I'm trying to do what I feel is right, which is for every student to be represented equally, especially at any public institution like UVU which wants to promote diversity," Nijim said speaking over the phone from Ramallah.

Nijim, who is Palestinian, said he first heard that Palestine's flag was not on display back in 2011. He was a teaching assistant, and one of his students, who was part of the student association, encouraged him to get the flag up.

He donated his own flag to the student association in October of 2011. In December, it still wasn't flying. When he asked about the situation, he was told by the student association that Palestine wasn't recognized as a state by the United Nations and the flag couldn't be flown.

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But that changed somewhat in November of 2012, when Palestine was made a non-member observer state in the U.N. He said he again asked the student association to hang the flag, but heard nothing back.

In March 2013, he went to talk to an administrator in International Student Services to ask for the flag to be flown. Nijim said he was essentially told "no" in various ways: Palestine wasn't an official state, the flag might offend Israeli students, and the U.S. doesn't recognize Palestine.

"He told me that by putting the Palestinian flag in the Hall of Flags, that would give the message to students or whoever walks in the hall that UVU recognizes Palestine as a state," he said.

In March, Nijim also started a petition, which he said hundreds have signed so far, including some Israelis.

Guam, Taiwan and Puerto Rico all have flags hanging in the hall, though none are technically countries recognized by the U.N. Nijim also said that Iran and Israel's flags hang right next to one another, though the two countries have serious tensions with many nations, including each other, and could conceivably cause offense as well.

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Part of the reason there has been no decision on the matter is that here has been no formal process for determining which flags are hung and which aren't, according to UVU spokesperson Chris Taylor. The task of developing that framework has been turned over to the Global and Intercultural Council, "which advises on issues of global and cultural significance to campus and to our students," he said. It was developed about a year ago to deal with exactly these kinds of issues.

"I understand that the Hall of Flags has been on the council's radar for some time, including prior to this most recent request," Taylor said.

He said no decision has yet been made and no timetable has been laid out.

For Nijim, it's really just about having his culture and his people represented equally on the campus he loves.

"When they just have Israel up there, I feel like it's unfair for any Palestinian student, even for me — it's unfair," he said. "If they're able to represent Israel as a whole state but not allow the representation of Palestinians as well, to me that gives the message that UVU doesn't recognize all their students equally."

He also said that the politics and conflicts between states shouldn't determine how students are represented on campus, but that the hall should "represent the student as a person, not the politics behind it."

When he gets back from a summer trip to Palestine with his family, he plans to take up the matter again with school officials.

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