MARCH 4TH RALLY

March 4th Rally! Students discuss what happen and what’s happening now!

How was the rally? What is the atmosphere on CCNY's campus after the rally? Don't let the fight for public education stop was the word on CCNY's campus before and after the March 4th rally!

It was a beautiful day for a march; the sun was setting as student activists crossed the avenues of Manhattan with signs that read "NO BUDGET CUTS TO CUNY". In the middle of the March as students approached FIT students were stopped by a barricade that separated them from the front of march. Students could not hear the speeches and were cut off so that cars could go down 29th street and the rally could be suppresses or made to look less impactful. Student activist begged the police to let them over the barricade. The idea to jump over the gates and blocks was in the air but fear of being arrested discouraged students. One protestor encouraged everyone to go back and forth around the rally, soon after the police conceded and opened the gates. As the sun began to set, students were not allowed to enter FIT to fight for the student metro cards and cuts to transit. Cheers, such as, "Let Us In!" was heard throughout the streets. Students found them blocked again, this time trapped in front of FIT behind the barricades. Students began to push the gates and the police pushed back. The pushing continued until finally, again, they let us out but there was no way into FIT buildings. After the confusion the march ended. On the Wednesday after the march there was a post March 4^th general activism meeting in the Hoffman Lounge. All student activists were invited to discuss what should be doing the next coming months and how students can support each other.

After the March 4 rally students, faculty and administrators from CCNY took a trip to Albany on March 9 to lobby for CUNY and SUNY. From City College, Davey Czyzyk from SER (Students for Educational Rights), Shannon Ayala from SEJ (Students for Environmental Justice and WE ACT @ CCNY (West Harlem Environmental Justice @ CCNY) and Lisa Lui from USG (Undergraduate Student Government) were students that went as well as Stanley Fritz, NYPIRG project coordinator.

On March 10^th students from SER, ISO, SFJ, CAN, CARE, Convent Collective and NYPIRG as well as "independent parties" came together to discuss connecting, the education movement. The Undergraduate Student Government is making great efforts to engage students in the discussion of a proposal to raise the student activity fee. The momentum is continuing on campus as students continue to raise their voices in the fight for education.

Oronde Tennant




Students at CUNY heeded the call, in the face of tuition increases and continued large-scale budget cuts to our university, and organized with others around the city to stop the devastation of public education. With attempts to close 19 schools in New York City and to eliminate free student Metro Cards alongside the budget cuts, the problem is grave indeed.
Gov. David Paterson has proposed cuts of $104 million from CUNY, decreases in funding for the state’s Tuition Assistance Program (TAP), elimination of grants like the Vallone Scholarship, and tuition hikes of several hundred dollars. All of this comes on top of cuts of $160 million in the last two years, and a tuition increase of $600 last spring. He has also proposed the Higher Education Empowerment and Innovation Act, which would allow CUNY’s Board of Trustees, composed of numerous wealthy business people, to increase tuition rates as they please, without state authorization. These austerity measures were made particularly offensive in light of the fact that CUNY’s president Mathew Goldstein is receiving a $40,000 dollar raise, bringing his annual salary to $580,000, in addition to a 14% pay increase in November 2008.
In New York City, a citywide coalition of students from CUNY colleges as well as private universities such as NYU and the New School, teachers from the Grassroots Education Movement, MTA transit workers, and university staff took shape around the fight to stop the budget cuts. In addition to stopping budget slashes, the coalition demands that CUNY education be upgraded and made available to all high school graduates through reinstatement of open admissions policies. Furthermore, they demand the elimination of tuition fees, that resources for schools be increased not cut, and that school closings, teacher firings and pay cuts halt.
At City College, there was a steady simmer of activity leading up to March 4. As soon as the semester got going, an ad-hoc coalition of student groups, activist organizations, and students frustrated by the growing financial pressure on them began meeting weekly in the Morales-Shakur Center to plan out the campus activities on March 4th.
On March 4th, the group Students for Educational Rights (SER) held a musical event in the NAC rotunda to grab the attention of the student body for the downtown rallies. Other activist groups such as the International Socialist Organization tabled in the rotunda, and distributed flyers for a post-March 4th town hall meeting to keep momentum going. Many students stopped, curious to know what all the agitation was about. Some were not aware of the serious attacks to their education coming down the pike. Yet, after talking to activists about the cuts to CUNY, chanting with SER folks on the bullhorn, and writing their demands for education on a huge banner in the rotunda, about thirty students showed up to head downtown to the rallies. The group of protesters shouted “Who’s school?! Our school!” from campus to the train station. On the train, students solicited riders for support in their campaign to keep education accessible to all. They appealed to them to join the protest before gathering with the countless other New Yorkers around the city to defend our education.
It’s important to note that the actions at City College were good steps in opening up the budget cuts fight to a broader layer of the student body, though the turnout on March 4th, overall, was small. The weekly City College coalition meetings as well as the town hall and the Day of Action sharpened their political awareness, got students involved in organizing other students and communication and strategizing for unified action.
To keep up momentum and develop the movement at City College, we may look to the successes of student actions in California. UC students and staff are fighting back against a proposed 32% tuition increase for UC students and large-scale layoffs of university employees. In an economy as deeply troubled as America’s, there’s little likelihood that many of UC’s poor and working-class students will be able to stay in school if the already heavy tuition fees of $7,788 are raised to the proposed $10,280 next year.
At UC Santa Cruz, a student strike on March 4th shut down the campus for the entire day, energizing students on a mass level to take further action to defend their education. They did this with a small core of people who actively organized for months beforehand. Aside from successful militant actions last semester, this semester they created large study groups called “How to Win A strike,” discussing successful workers strike tactics from history. Strike Committee meetings were advertised publically, and began drawing new students long before March 4th. The organizers created a strike pledge campaign that committed countless students to join the strikers’ picket lines. They reached out in solidarity to student organizations and anti-racist groups on campus, and made connections to university unions on campus, without whom, they claim, the strike would not have been possible.
These are tactics that any and all student activists and organizers should look to emulate as the struggle heats up at CUNY. We have the power to get our education back, and that power must be organized.

Written by Sam Kimball