On Wednesday, a lengthy debate and a crucial committee vote showed that the proposal had the votes to pass, making Thursday’s session anticlimactic. There was no discussion by the board before the final vote, but students made a round of angry and emotional appeals.

“You should be crying, you should be praying, you should be trying to figure out what you are going to do to fix this,” said Amelia Itnyre, a student at the Davis campus, her voice breaking.

At the conference center on the San Francisco campus where the regents met there were far fewer protesters than on Wednesday, when some students tried to block access to the building and scuffled with people trying to enter.

Instead, the protesters’ focus shifted to campuses, particularly the one in Berkeley, across San Francisco Bay. Starting on Wednesday, students gathered for an overnight protest at Wheeler Hall, a favorite spot for activists dating to the free speech movement of the 1960s. Students occupied the building’s entrance on Wednesday night and, with supplies like bottled water, peanut butter and fruit, stayed through the night and into Thursday, vowing to remain until the tuition increase was reversed.

The protesters, who at times numbered in the hundreds, voted Thursday not to block access to the building, averting a possible confrontation with the campus police, who watched but took no action.

Because of financial aid, most California resident students pay no tuition at the University of California — though their room and board costs can be steep — and the regents said that would remain so. So the tuition increases will fall primarily on families with above-average incomes and on out-of-state students.

Protesters said they understood that distinction but still objected. “A lot of people’s incomes, it looks pretty good on paper, but it’s still really hard to come up with thousands of dollars for college,” said Jasmine McGee, a third-year student at Berkeley who was one of those sitting in Wheeler Hall.

The university’s undergraduate tuition and fees are $12,192 a year for in-state students and $35,070 for out-of-staters, well above the national averages for public universities. Those figures could rise over the next five years to as much as $15,560 and $44,759. In addition, individual campuses charge several hundred dollars in added fees, and many students pay room and board, typically about $14,000.