Tuesday, August 10, 2010, 11:00 am

City Hall, 200 E. Wall Street (49022)

All will march to Jean Klock Park to
protest Harbor Shores and Whirlpool's
hostile takeover of the city. 

Everyone is invited.  For info contact
Rev. Edward Pinkney, 269-925-0001,
banco9342@sbcglobal.net

Background: Benton Harbor, Michigan, is the center of a fightback against corporate power and control as the people of the city organize to oppose a corporate takeover of public land, their much-beloved Jean Klock park, for conversion to a privately owned golf course and lakefront development called Harbor Shores. Executives of the Whirlpool corporation, which is based in the city, are behind the effort to redevelop the land over strong public opposition. The struggle has been led by the Rev. Edward Pinkney, who has continued to speak out despite efforts by city officials to silence him, including a local judge's sentence of 3-10 years in prison that was later overturned as a violation of Rev. Pinkney's free-speech rights.

An all-day conference on April 24 at Santee Education Complex: 1921 South Maple Avenue, Los Angeles, bringing together schools, student organizations, labor unions, committees, coalitions, and parent and community organizations across the state with a call for involvement from all education sectors – Pre-K-12, Community College, CSU, UC, and Adult Education. The conference is intended to follow on the massive March 4 actions in California and natiowide to defend public education.

The organizers write:

The future of public education in this state - particularly for the working class and communities of color, who are being hit especially hard by the cuts - depends on our ability to unify and push forward the struggle in defense of public education.

The purpose of this Statewide Mobilizing Conference is therefore both simple and extremely urgent: to democratically discuss and decide on a unifying political platform and plan of action capable of bringing together schools, student organizations, labor unions, committees, coalitions, and parent and community organizations across the state to deepen and push forward this powerful and broad movement that shook the state and the country on March 4th.

We ask activists, organizations, and mobilized schools across the state to put their full organizational capacity into helping us collectively to build and promote this conference. We ask for maximum participation from all education sectors – Pre-K-12, Community College, CSU, UC, and Adult Education - and regions, and from all organizations of workers, teachers, and students, and we extend the invitation to all mobilized schools and organizations across the country. Get your union, student government or parent-teacher organization to endorse, attend, and participate in the conference.

The decision to call for this conference was made at the Statewide Mobilizing Conference of October 24th, 2009, where over 800 people from all of the sectors of public education decided together to call for the March 4th Strike and Day of Action in defense of public education.

Students, staff and faculty from San Francisco State University are all joining together and participating in the March 4 Statewide Day of Action against cuts to public education from Pre-K through Ph.D. Lawmakers need to recognize the fiscal irresponsibility of not providing for an appropriate tax base through progressive taxation. The Governor’s proposal to “stabilize” education funding by cutting other needed services and privatizing prisons is disingenuous. Public schools, colleges and universities have already had their budgets cut to the bone, how is that stabilization? Quality public education is critical to the future of California. Be a part of the solution – join us on March 4, 2010 at the S.F. Civic Center

SFSU plans events both on and off campus on March 4, 2010.

We, the undersigned students, faculty, staff, parents, and concerned citizens worldwide stand united across all divisions of nationality, race, religion and field of studies to declare our support for the aims and objectives of the "Education is NOT for - Global Week of Action" called for by the independent "International Student Movement".

We are united in working to ensure that:

• Public education is accessible to all and recognized as a fundamental right; NO to tuition fees!

• Public education is free from exploitative corporate practices and state interests which conflict with those of the individual and the public interest.
   

• Public education primarily serves democratic and public interests, instead of private, business, state and/or labour market interests.
   

• Public education empowers individuals to become emancipated and autonomous people, able to critically evaluate themselves and their environment, and thus be actively involved in a genuinely democratic society.
   

If we are to have such a society we need general public discussions on the role of public education systems: Whose interests do they - and should they - primarily serve?

The Private Student Loan Companies Are Telling Congress They Should Come First AGAIN.

Today the New York Times reported a story about the Private Loan Industry & their friends in Congress planning a large scale effort to block President Obama's plan to support students & working families going to college.

Over a month ago President Obama addressed the nation and proposed some of the firmest commitments to education that we've seen in generations. His bold plan promised all of us that the government would permanently fund the Pell Grant program so that anyone who wanted to go to college and needed help paying for it would be able to get the support they needed without taking out bad loans that would put them into decades of debt.

Today the private loan companies came out of the shadows to tell Congress that they must choose between investing in the America's future or funding the private loan companies that helped get us into this economic crisis in the first place. Sallie Mae is hiring powerful lobbyists to secure funding in the federal budget in attempt to block President Obama's plan to make the Pell Grant dependable for students and working families. This past year, Sallie Mae awarded its chief executive $4.6 million in cash and stock and its vice chairman more than $13.2 million in cash and stock, including the use of a company plane while students are drowning in debt.

Our country shouldn't be forced to choose between the Pell Grant and funding the private loan companies - we all deserve a fair chance and an equal opportunity to recover from the economic crisis we are in. Join us in telling members of Congress that WE NEED TO INVEST IN EDUCATION in order to rebuild America's economy and our future.

Higher Education: Public Good or Global Service Industry?

While higher education was considered a public good and an essential instrument of democratization, upward mobility, and equal opportunity for much of the last century, today it is considered by many to be a lucrative business − indeed, the core business of the “new” service economy.

Major corporations see global “trade in educational services” – “transnational” or “borderless” education – as a lucrative business opportunity. While currently estimated to be a $40-$50 billion industry, the potential for increased profitability in a “global market” of higher education services is significant. For-profit educational providers and investors see the World Trade Organization (WTO) as an essential tool to dismantle “barriers to trade” in educational services and maximize their profit-making opportunities on a global scale.

However, what one party might consider to be a “barrier to trade,” another might consider a treasured educational policy. For instance, state licensing procedures that attempt to weed out fly-by-night operations might be considered sound policy domestically, but might be considered overly burdensome “trade barriers” by foreign educational providers attempting to enter the U.S. market. To create an effective “global market” in higher education services requires the dismantling of many such domestic educational policies.

Thus, at the behest of U.S. for-profit higher education providers, the Bush administration has proposed signing up the U.S. higher education sector to the free trade rules contained in the WTO’s General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), a global pact geared towards deregulating service sectors to the advantage of multinational firms. The GATS contains many rules which would jeopardize the following: educational subsidies for public institutions; state licensing practices for higher education institutions; U.S. accreditation practices; wages and working conditions for U.S. educators; and more.

For the most part, public and nonprofit institutions of higher education have been unaware that this march is afoot and are dangerously disengaged. They must weigh in on these matters before global trade rules are finalized in any potential new rounds of negotiations, and their profession is transformed from a “public good” to a commodity in a “global services market.”

What Higher Education Policies are at Risk?

Domestic educational subsidies: The GATS “nondiscrimination” obligation means that public sector funding would have to be shared on an equal basis between foreign institutions and domestic institutions unless public funds are specifically exempted from the terms of the agreement. The United States has attempted to safeguard certain domestic subsidies in broadly worded exemption to its higher education proposal. It is unclear if this language is sufficient to protect subsidies for public and nonprofit institutions.

U.S. accreditation policies: Unlike many other countries interested in the higher education sector, the United States is making virtually unlimited commitments in cross-border educational services. This means U.S. accrediting bodies could be inundated with requests to accredit overseas distance-learning operations. Refusals to accredit or delays in accreditation could give rise to a trade complaint, as language purporting to protect accreditation jurisdiction is only included in a footnote, of dubious legal consequence, to the U.S. schedule.

State licensing requirements: State licensing of higher education institutions is based on a large number of factors including standards to ensure financial stability and quality of educational providers; appropriate curricula; faculty qualifications; appropriate library resources and physical plant; needs tests to weed out duplicative programming; and other matters. Under new “disciplines on domestic regulation” being proposed as part of these talks, individual policies pursued by states as well as state-by-state variation in policies could be challenged in WTO tribunals as “more burdensome than necessary to ensure the quality of a service.”

Efforts to police fraudulent operations: While “borderless higher education” presents new profit-making opportunities for for-profit providers, the challenges presented to regulators are extreme. At the top of the list are concerns about fraud. While policing fraudulent institutions is difficult enough domestically, it is even more difficult across borders or in the online world. Many of the policies that U.S. states maintain or may want to pursue to protect students from scam artists could be considered violations of GATS rules.

Wages and working conditions for educators: The implications of the GATS for educators are also worrisome. New technology combined with unfettered cross-border supply of educational services is likely to generate further downward pressure on wages for educators. GATS negotiations also include proposals to increase the number of educators allowed into the United States on a temporary basis to provide teaching services and proposals to harmonize qualification requirements across borders.

What happens if higher education is subject to WTO jurisdiction?

• Other nations that are party to the GATS are empowered to challenge a nonconforming federal and state policy as a violation of the agreement in a binding dispute resolution system.
• State government officials have no standing before these tribunals and thus must rely on the federal government to defend a policy.
• The tribunals are staffed by trade officials who are empowered to judge, behind closed doors, if the policy is a violation.
• Policies judged to violate the rules must be changed, or trade sanctions can be imposed.
• The federal government is obliged to use all constitutionally available powers – for instance, preemptive legislation, lawsuits and cutting off funding – to force state and local government compliance with trade tribunal rulings.

APRIL MOBILIZATION
FOR HIGHER EDUCATION

Students + Youth + Faculty
 + Staff + Community = 
  The Power to Rescue
     Higher Ed & Renew Democracy!

Will they do it again?  In the coming months, will state governments and campus officials again hike tuition?  Will the federal and state governments again shortchange higher education?  Will the pace of the corporatization and resegregation of higher education increase?

The youth of America are already paying the price for decades of education cuts imposed by prior generations.  Tuition costs have doubled, tripled, and in some cases quintupled from just a generation ago.  The shift from student grants to loans has produced the most indebted generation of young people in American history.  Highly trained professors, already undermined by attacks on tenure, are teaching less as lower paid teaching assistants and adjunct faculty teach more.  Hundreds of thousands of young people who joined the Guard to fund their college education and defend their country have been sent to fight in the unpopular occupation of Iraq.  And millions of young people from poor families - predominantly youth of color - have decided that a college education simply is not an option.

As a people, Americans will face grim consequences if higher education becomes a tool of the multinational corporations, rather than a source of democracy and opportunity.  They who pay the piper call the tune.  After three decades of effective corporate lobbying, public and corporate taxes now pay less than half as much as a proportion of costs at public colleges and universities.  In turn, corporations are directing their financial leverage and political influence to restructure public higher education on a corporate model:  College vouchers, charter departments, charter campuses, and fully privatized corporate schools.  Corporations are also calling the tune in setting the internal curriculum and research priorities for our universities; as campus executives emphasize those departments that can obtain outside corporate funding, fields with more social benefit (i.e. education, social work, sustainable agriculture) are left to wither.

This is a critical moment.  Now is the time for youth to demonstrate that the price is already too high.  Now is the moment for us all to face the crisis in higher education, and to demand the financial and political changes that will put our schools, colleges, and universities on solid ground.

Join the April Mobilization.  Demand full public funding for higher education; a rollback and eventual phaseout of tuition; the democratization of higher education in the USA. 

   * * * Week of Action - April 16-20 * * *

This will be a week of coordinated action and protest. On campuses and in communities across the USA, students, youth, faculty, staff, and community members will act together to force democratic changes in higher education funding, policy, and governance.  Tactics may include sit-ins, rallies, strikes, pickets, marches, banner hangs, study-ins, silent processions, grade-ins, office visits, dorm-storms, lock-downs . . . whatever non-violent tactics that local organizers believe will be most effective in their campuses and communities.

   * * * Teach-Ins & Tent States - Month of April * * *

Organizers will build momentum for the April mobilization by holding large-scale educational events in the weeks leading up to and including the Week of Action.  These events will take the form of indoor teach-ins, in which campus and community facilities become host to workshops, lectures, and debates on the future of higher education in America, or of Tent State Universities, in which tent cities spring up on campus malls, squares, and quads, showing the displacement of the public mission of higher education in America.

The April Mobilization for Higher Education is a project of the Democratizing Education Network (DEN), a network of student, youth, faculty, staff, and community organizers and groups dedicated a set of common principles:

        Democratizing Higher Education Charter

• Full Public Funding for Public Higher Education
• Free Access to Higher Education and Abolition of Tuition
• Affirmative Action to End Institutionalized Racism and Sexism
•  Full Recognition of the Right of Students and Workers to Organize
• Democratic Self-Government of Higher Education
• Service to the Public Welfare, Not Corporate Profits
• Free Speech and Academic Freedom
• Debt Forgiveness of Student Loans
• Civic Education for a Democratic Society
• Education, Not War; Schools, Not Jails

Since mid-2005, the DEN has united diverse campus and community constituencies around common projects and campaigns.  These have included the Democratizing Education Convention (October, 2005), the Tent State University movement (April, 2006), and the Virtual March on Corporate Lobbyists (October, 2006).  This summer, the DEN will host a second Democratizing Education Convention in Atlanta, Georgia, to be held in conjunction with the US Social Forum (June 22-24, 2007).

VIRTUAL MARCH & PHONE-IN
Calling everyone: Email and phone-in right now . . . Tell the corporate sector and politicians to end the education cuts!

Every community college, tech school, and university in the USA is experiencing the same thing. Major cuts in public funding. Massive tuition increases. Ballooning student debt. Collapsing educational quality and staff support. Young people dying in Iraq for the price of an education. The word for this situation is crisis.

Right now, college administrators, state legislatures, governors, and federal officials are preparing for the next round of cuts in funding, quality, and access. If you are unwilling to allow the crisis to worsen
- if you're willing to do something to make it better - take action.

Week of Action: Virtual March & Phone-In

October 23-27, 2006: Hundreds participate, take on corporate lobbyists

Every community college, tech school, and university in the USA is experiencing the same things. Major cuts in public funding. Massive tuition increases. Ballooning student debt. Collapsing educational quality and staff support. The word for this situation is crisis. Right now, college administrators, state legislatures, governors, and federal officials are preparing for the next round of cuts in funding, quality, and access.

During this fall's Democratizing Education Week of Action, hundreds of students, faculty, campus workers, and community members did something about this crisis.

A weeklong nationwide protest against attacks on higher education culminated Friday, October 27 in a coordinated Phone-In to corporate lobbyists. Protesters phoned the national and state offices of the Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers and told them to reverse course and start lobbying for more public funding for higher education. Political leaders in Congress and in state office received phone calls as well.

The Phone-In came on the heels of a nationwide web-based Virtual March, in which participants wrote letters expressing similar demands. More than 100 campuses in 36 states participated in the Virtual March. The protesters weren't merely against further cuts in higher education funding. They are promoting an alternative. In 2001, it cost 32 billion US to pay for the full cost of tuition and fees for all students enrolled in 2- and 4-year degree-granting institutions of public higher education. The Democratizing Education Network (DEN) supports, among other things, eliminating tuition at public institutions by fully supporting them with public financing. Funding for quality free higher education is available, DEN activists say, pointing to the 2 billion US poured weekly into the occupation of Iraq, as well as to the declining share of taxes shouldered by corporations and the wealthy.

View the Press Release.

Many student peace and civil liberties groups, most notably UC Santa Cruz Students Against War, UW-Madison's Stop the War, and NYU Law's chapter of OUTLAW, have been subjected to ongoing federal government surveillance. These and other non-violent campus organizations were recently described as "Threats to National Security" in a Pentagon report.

The New York Times recently wrote an article on a new legislative attack on academic freedom.[1] In two states, Louisiana and Maryland, legislators have introduced bills to restrict the cases and clients that law clinics at public universities can take on. These bills come hot on the heels of two high profile public interest lawsuits filed by clinics at the University of Maryland and Tulane.

Law clinics provide important hands-on training for law students at public universities across the nation. Challenges to the academic freedom of these law clinics are not new. Research from Professor Robert R. Keuhn at St. Louis University found that more than a third of faculty at law clinics expressed fears about university or state reaction to their casework and a sixth had turned down unpopular clients because of these fears.[2] But the two bills currently being considered are the first time that legislators have directly tried to restrict the opportunities afforded law students through these clinics. Both of these bills have been introduced at the behest of industries that have recently been the targets of lawsuits from public law clinics.

In Maryland the state senate tacked a provision onto a routine budget bill threatening millions of dollars of funding for the University of Maryland if its law clinic did not disclose information about its clients and finances. While our allies in Maryland were able to get the state assembly to remove this amendment, some of these provisions appear to have been reinserted in the final draft bill.

In Louisiana, State Senator Robert Adley has introduced a bill to prevent public law clinics from litigating against government entities, corporations, or individuals unless approved by the state legislature. The bill, being promoted by oil and gas companies, comes on the heels of a suit from the law clinic pushing for better enforcement of the Clean Air Act.

Both of these bills are attempts by powerful interests to restrict what amounts to course content and take control of those decisions out of the hands of faculty members. This legislation shows us that while Horowitz and his Academic Bill of Rights may have fallen out of style with the opponents of the academy, the attack on the free exchange of ideas is not over.