Feature Archives

UC Financial Crisis: Big Picture and Practical Actions is a public forum occuring at UCSC's Classroom Unit 2 on Thursday, October 29th from 7-10pm. Two of the featured speakers, Stanton Glantz and Robert Meister, have been particularly devoted to investigating the University of California's finances.

On October 21st, Fresno State saw one of its largest mobilizations since the 1960s. The student walkout was in protest against the recent fee increase of 32% (fees go up almost every year typically by around 10%), class furloughs (pay more get less), over-crowded classrooms, faculty layoffs, staff layoffs, a corrupt administration, and a corrupt Associated Students, Inc., which refuses to represent the students. The California State University master plan from the 60s promised free education to all, but the university is now run like a for-profit corporation.

On Thursday, October 15, hundreds came to Civic Center, to protest president Obama's appearance at the Westin St. Francis Hotel in a fundraiser for the Democratic National Convention. Earlier in the day another demonstration took place at SF City Hall to oppose the continuous cuts in education funding.

During the massive 10-campus walkout on September 24th, several dozen students and workers occupied the Graduate Student Commons at the University of California at Santa Cruz (UCSC), issuing statements acknowledging their intention to escalate the conflict: "Occupation is a tactic for escalating struggles," they note at their website, "We must face the fact that the time for pointless negotiations is over."

To kick off the new school year on Teachers 4 Class War on Free Radio Santa Cruz, l@s Maestr@s (the hosts) spoke with Jeff Duncan-Andrade once again, about the conditions facing teachers this year and every year in the California school system. Jeff has been a frequent guest on the show, and he's the closing speaker at this year's Teachers 4 Social Justice conference in San Francisco on Saturday, October 10th.

On September 24th, students, faculty, staff and alumni at University of California (UC) schools participated in a day of coordinated walkouts and rallies in defense of the future of public education. Hundreds rallied at the base of the UC Santa Cruz campus to protest the privatization of the UC system, which includes student fee hikes, faculty and staff furloughs and layoffs, executive pay increases, and cuts to courses, programs and services. The University Professional and Technical Employees (UPTE) held a daylong strike at all UC schools, with pickets at the main and west entrances of UCSC from 6am–6pm.

Disorientation Guide Collective writes, "So you've gotten to the University of California at Santa Cruz. Congratulations! What now? The ideas the University produces about itself construct an ideal image of what awaits you here: an image of fulfillment and understanding, a picture of the life you might build for yourself after you get your degree. So how couldn't you be idealistic and excited? After all, you’ve arrived at one of the most beautiful places in the world and prepared yourself for the journey of a lifetime."