Third day of fee protests at California universities

[struggle4progress]

Source: CNN

... On the Santa Cruz campus, .. students made a list of 20 "demands" detailing how they want the administration to increase funding, spokesman Barry Shiller said. But the school has no plans to negotiate the demands with the student body, he said. The school just doesn't have the money, he added ...

At UC Berkeley on Friday night, 41 protesters occupying a building were arrested. Authorities decided to cite them for trespassing and release them rather than take them to jail, per an agreement with student leaders, school spokeswoman Claire Holmes said. Three students were arrested there Friday morning.

Fifty-two students were arrested at UC Davis late Thursday after they refused to vacate the school's administration building.

And UCLA's Campbell Hall was occupied for several hours Thursday evening ...

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/11/21/california.student.protest/

---

Students in tuition hike protest expect police intervention soon
By Alan Duke, CNN
November 22, 2009 -- Updated 0923 GMT (1723 HKT)
Los Angeles, California (CNN) -- Students occupying an administration building at the University of California, Santa Cruz, for the past three nights expect police to soon begin forcibly removing them, a student spokesman said. There's "no chance" the protesters occupying Kerr Hall since Thursday will give up, according to graduate student Don Kingsbury ... http://edition.cnn.com/2009/US/11/22/california.student.protest/

Santa Cruz students still occupy building in protest. UC-Berkeley quiet
By Mike Swift
[e-mail]
Posted: 11/21/2009 08:20:07 PM PST
Updated: 11/21/2009 09:42:40 PM PST
Protests by University of California students angered by planned tuition hikes continued in Santa Cruz on Saturday with a possible confrontation with police in the offing following unsuccessful negotiations between students and administrators. Meanwhile, the UC campus at Berkeley remained quiet ... At UC-Santa Cruz on Friday, students occupied two buildings, including Clark Kerr Hall, the administration building, where more than 100 students remained into Saturday evening ... http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_13843640?source=most_emailed

* U.S. NEWS
* NOVEMBER 21, 2009
Berkeley Students Protest Higher Fees
By JIM CARLTON
BERKELEY, Calif. -- Students occupied a building Friday on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, in an escalation of protests over large fee increases at UC campuses statewide that echoed the unrest here during the 1960s. The occupation ended peacefully late Friday evening ... Campus police made three arrests in the occupied Wheeler Hall classroom building after discovering furniture and other items propped up against doors at about 5:30 a.m. Friday, a school spokeswoman said. There were unofficial reports of at least one person arrested outside for allegedly crossing a police line marked by yellow tape ... http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125875406845357945.html?mod=rss_Today%27s_Most_Popular

[vadawg]

1. for some reason this is pretty funny, not sure if its just the way its written.

students made a list of 20 "demands" detailing how they want the administration to increase funding, spokesman Barry Shiller said. But the school has no plans to negotiate the demands with the student body, he said. The school just doesn't have the money, he added ...


i guess the reality of the situation hasnt gotten across to the students yet, the fact that the state is in meltdown and there is no money should be a clue..

[potone]

4. There is nothing funny about the situation.

The same board of regents who voted for the 32% increase in tuition also voted pay raised for the already highly compensated administrators of the university system. If they truly care about education, they would start by cutting administrative costs. These have skyrocketed over the past three decades while salaries of many faculty members have remained stagnant and vital services have suffered.
The problem originated with the passage of proposition 13 and was increased by the ridiculously difficult system of raising taxes. California used to have the best educational system in the country from kindergarten through graduate school. This is no longer the case. It takes many years of hard work and serious investment to build good universities but it only a few short years to destroy them.

[WriteDown]

5. They're COLLEGE STUDENTS...

Reality doesn't set in until many years later. :)

[mike_c]

7. the UC has some $20 billion in reserves they could tap, if I'm not mistaken...

...to make up their shortfall for the next couple of years. Instead, the regents-- who are mostly millionaire republican business people-- view those funds as a private investment bank. There is no direct need for the UC to raise fees other than the regents' decision to NOT use the endowment to fill in the gaps temporarily.

[EFerrari]

12. Are things quiet on your campus?

[mike_c]

15. yes-- unlike the UC, the CSU raised their fees 32% BEFORE fall semester...

...and before the students were gathered at their campuses. That doesn't excuse it, of course-- it's just better planning than the UC regents, IMO.

[EFerrari]

16. Gotcha. You're right, too. A fait accompli

so students don't find a point of entry into the discourse easily.

[EFerrari]

10. The reality of the situation is that the University doesn't depend on the state

for most of its funding. These students couldn't be more right on in their demands. It's our money, not the Regents.

And this is how the national boycott of South Africa over apartheid began.

Go, Cal!

[fasttense]

2. I bet ya that corporations and the uber wealthy still have their tax cuts.

Yet students get to pay more. If Ronny Raygun had allowed California colleges to remain free, this would never have happened.

While students fight for the right to become better workers and contribute to society by getting educated, the uber wealthy laugh at them and sit by the pool waiting for their next dividend check.

What a grand plan, balancing a budget on the backs of their future, their children, their students.

[boppers]

3. Which demand increased the budget?

Or asked for, oh, workers to get less to cover student tuition costs?

Another messy situation, another "protest".

[EFerrari]

11. The state budget isn't the issue. The university generates its own income.

And workers are striking WITH students because they are both being shafted by the same people.

But thanks for your concern.

[boppers]

20. The UC system is not entirely self-sustaining.

That's part of the cost hikes, losing state money.

They're also spending massive amounts of money on construction and expansion.

That's another part.

They're also top heavy, with non-teaching workers being hired at a much greater rate than teaching faculty.

That's another part.

[lonestarnot]

6. We better send flak jackets and steel pots and shields before next week!

oh and earplugs too.

[northernlights]

8. I only *wish* higher fees were the problem where I'm at

4 out of 5 students in my med lab tech class just receive notices that our stafford loans are "on probation" because we have "too many credits." For all of us, these are transfer credits from degrees gotten (in my case 30+) years ago that won't lead to jobs. As one fellow student put it, "As if this is a fluffy, life enrichment degree."

All of us will be more than halfway through the program -- fully invested to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars and several years of intensive work -- when we are cut off. None of us knows how we will be able to continue. All of us are trying to put this out of our minds while we prepare for finals. :grr:

[mddem9850]

9. It's only going to get worse

[EFerrari]

13. I hope so. We've let the same people shaft us for 'way too long.

I hope it gets worse and then, worse than that.

[AlphaCentauri]

14. Higher education need a reform

to be open to the brightest not to the wealthy

[EFerrari]

18. The idea used to be that UC would be free and for the top 10% of CA students.

[Kievan Rus]

17. Hardly a peep from the M$M on this stuff

[liberalhistorian]

19. They're too busy wringing their hands over

Queen Oprah ending her show TWO YEARS from now. So they really can't be bothered with unimportant trivial stuff like this, ya know! :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

[Blandocyte]

21. When my univ raised prices, I had to "occupy" a cheaper school

Same B.S. at the end. So to speak.

[Odin2005]

22. Go protesters!

:woohoo:

[Igel]

23. I'm always of at least two minds on these things.

I've seen a lot of protests. I've been in some.

I've been on student-majority and administrative-majority committees. The perspective is phenomenal. You can see a progression from undergrads, for whom the university ceases to exist upon graduation and which therefore must be shaped so as to make for the best undergrad experience for the *present* cohort; to grad students and some faculty, who see that the university will continue but can't stop trying to jiggle things more to benefit their cohort or themselves than future cohorts of students and faculty; to administrators, much of whose work is immediate but future-oriented, putting up a building in 13 months so that it can be used for the next 20.

Moreover, students want good teaching. That's fine, they should have good teaching. But a lot of their teachers are hired to produce good research. Donors don't give money for good teaching--they give money to attract big names, do cutting edge research. The university wants them to pull in extra-mural grant money. And wants to use big names and great research to attract more big names, more big grant money, more donations, and more great research--which helps build the endowment. Students go to a school often because it has such a good reputation--then, to serve their wants and needs, they want the school to sacrifice its reputation. Not all. But too many can't see beyond their own little view--living in a drop of water, they think it an ocean and themselves the most important creature in it.

Take the discourse over endowments during the last two years. A year and a half ago it was a crime--big endowments, and students paying tuition at Ivy League Schools. Now, with the endowments down by 25-30% and more the schools are having serious issues with meeting the commitments made in order to avoid having the Congress pass legislation that would make their current fiscal lives even more difficult. But 18 months ago nobody imagined, esp. among those besieging the top schools, that those endowments could take a nosedive. Just as nobody now remembers the entire controversy.