Students, Profs Battle CUNY Bosses’ Tuition Hike

Storm College Senate Meeting

NEW YORK CITY, December 2 — Nearly 100 students and faculty members at the City University of NY (CUNY) held an indoor rally to protest next term’s threatened tuition increases and then invaded a College Senate meeting to denounce the hikes.

A student leader gave an impassioned, detailed speech explaining the racist nature of the hikes. Thirty-five years ago CUNY tuition was free. Now the majority of CUNY students are black, Latino and Asian, and because of long-standing racism in employment and wages are in an even worse position to pay this exorbitant tuition.

The speaker called on his fellow students to give more leadership in fighting the many problems that the working class faced.

A faculty member told the crowd that the PSC union (Professional Staff Congress of CUNY) was 100% behind the students’ struggle and related their struggle to students’ fight-back worldwide. He asked those present to say what they felt. At first it was quiet, but then it was like a dam bursting.

Student after student angrily condemned the injustice of ever-increasing tuition and of the deteriorating physical conditions on campus.

Plans were made for another meeting next week. When the student leader explained that the administration made it difficult for him to e-mail announcements to the entire student body, the crowd shouted “let’s go talk to him now!” We were told that at that very moment a “College Senate” was being held upstairs. As we surged towards the stairs, the chief of campus security said we couldn’t go up to the meeting. But 50 angry students went around him as he called on his walkie-talkie for back-up.

Upstairs inside the Senate meeting the student leader blasted the planned tuition hikes — which are city-wide — as well as protesting the increase in local campus fees. While some had told him to “take it easy” and “be quiet,” he said he would never be silent in the face of injustice. A veteran faculty member rose to report that the faculty council on campus had voted against the hikes. The administrators remained silent.

 Confront Board of Trustees

NYC, November 15th – Outside, students and faculty were chanting, “Let us in!” and “Education is a right! Fight! Fight! Fight!; inside, the Board of Trustees of the City University of New York (CUNY) began a “public” hearing on the proposed CUNY budget which included increases in tuition.

This is the undeniable reality of our society: CEOs, bankers and politicians, none of whom feel the crushing reality of this racist capitalist system, make decisions that consign thousands or millions of workers to more and more racism and suffering. We don’t need these blood-sucking parasites! The Board of Trustees meeting was the latest opportunity for the revolutionary vision of PLP to stand as an antidote to capitalism and its never-ending crises, war and racism.

A left-wing professor sharply attacked the trustees as being sneaky and underhanded. Why did they announce the planned hikes just a few days before the hearing?  Why was the hearing in such a small room?  If they wanted to maximize participation, why didn’t they have the hearing in a large venue on one of the campuses?

He explained that Greece, England, Ireland, France, and the U.S. were all capitalist countries facing economic crises where the bosses were trying to make the working people pay and where students and workers were fighting back. “When you call for taxing the super rich, some people say, ‘Oh, he’s advocating class war!’

“Well yes, that’s what I am talking about — class war. Because right now, class war is being waged against us — the working class. But merely taxing the rich will not end the fundamental exploitation of capitalism. CUNY will still be underfunded, our students will still live in a racist, sexist society and the bosses will still get to decide how we live. These aspects of capitalism are un-reformable. We have seen the shattered promises of capitalist reform. Workers need revolution instead.”

After his testimony, chants of  “No tuition hikes, Free CUNY” broke out. Other speakers rose and attacked the trustees. A student asked Chancellor Goldstein, “Didn’t you receive a free education when you went to CUNY?  All we are asking for is what you got already — a free quality education. Other speakers attacked Goldstein for getting a $45,000 salary increase.

While all this was going on, copies of CHALLENGE and a Party leaflet were being distributed outside and inside the hearing. The Party leaflet explained how the Trustees were businessmen appointed by politicians, and while we must fight hard against tuition increases or any attack against the working class, revolution was the only solution for working-class people. The racist parasites who feed on the mostly black and Latino CUNY students and the anger that is rising in the blood of the students are tremendous opportunities to raise this revolutionary possibility. Next semester and onward we will work to expand these possibilities. J