Furman University’s commencement speaker, President Bush, is drawing protests from faculty, student, and other critics who say he should not have been invited, and in response a group calling itself Conservative Students for a Better Tomorrow is urging the university to force faculty members to attend the ceremony, even if they would prefer to skip it.

More than 200 critics, including students and faculty and staff members, have signed a “we object” letter in response to the announcement that Mr. Bush would address the graduating class on May 31, according to The Greenville News.

On Monday the conservative-student group issued its own letter, signed by 500 people. The letter calls on Furman to “hold professors to their contractual agreement to attend commencement exercises” and to either remove the “we object” letter from its Web site or post the conservative response in an equally visible spot on the Web site.

The senior-class leadership unanimously approved the invitation to Mr. Bush, the News reported. Furman is one of two commencement speeches the president is delivering this spring. The other, at the U.S. Air Force Academy, is scheduled for May 28. —Beckie Supiano