CSUN University News Clippings

Calif. students, faculty, staff protest state cuts

(September 25, 2009)

By Terence Chea
Published: 09/24/09

University of California students, professors and other employees rallied Thursday to protest deep budget cuts that have led to layoffs, furloughs, enrollment cuts, course reductions and higher fees.
Rallies, teach-ins and class walkouts were planned at all 10 UC campuses, and a union representing about 9,000 university technical and research workers held a one-day strike because they have been working without a contract for 18 months.

It was unclear how many students and faculty members would walk out Thursday, the first day of classes at eight UC campuses.

Protesters say they are angry about state budget cuts to higher education and the UC administration’s handling of the financial crisis.

Several thousand students, professors and employees crowded into UC Berkeley’s main plaza for a noon rally. Many waved signs reading “Save our University” and “Reform UC Now.”

Agnes Balla, a 21-year-old junior majoring in public health, said she was skipping three classes to join the walkout.

“I think the quality of education has been diminished by these budget cuts,” she said. “I don’t mind paying more for my education, but what I’m paying for is classes being cut, services being cut and a system that’s becoming increasingly inaccessible.”

To address rising costs and a steep reduction in state funding, UC campuses have laid off hundreds of workers and forced most of their 180,000 employees to take furloughs and pay cuts of up to 10 percent.

Next month, the UC Board of Regents is expected to vote on reducing undergraduate enrollment and raising tuition by 32 percent for most students. That hike would follow a 9.3 percent fee hike approved in May.

More than 1,200 faculty members from all UC campuses have signed a letter supporting the walkout.

Joshua Clover, a UC Davis English professor who helped organize the walkout, was supposed to teach a poetry class Thursday. Instead, he told students that he wouldn’t be teaching and encouraged them to attend the campus rally.

“There’s obviously a fiscal crisis, but there’s also a crisis of priorities among the university’s administration,” Clover said. “The choices they’ve made disproportionately harm the lowest-paid workers and the students.”

University officials say the fee hikes, enrollment cuts and cost-cutting measures are needed to maintain the quality of education at UC, one of the nation’s top research institutions with 220,000 students.

They say students and employees should direct their anger at state lawmakers who have reduced funding to the UC and California State University systems by 20 percent to close a massive state budget deficit.

UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof said administrators shared and understood the “anger and frustration around the state’s disinvestment in higher education.”

“The challenge is taking all this energy and focusing it on a persistent campaign to explain and inform the public and state legislatures why cuts to higher education undermine California’s economic future,” he said.

Publication: Associated Press