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So there's been pickets at the two entrances to the University since before six in the morning. About one o'clock in the afternoon the number of pickets reached critical mass and the kids took the intersection and the cops, bless their hearts, set up barricades on the roads leading to the main entrance. They don't seem to have done this primarily to keep the picket from growing any more, but to keep automobiles away from the pickets. While I was there there was an incident of an angry driver cutting too close to the crowds who at that time were barely overflowing from the curb (and dirt. Not all of the intersection has curbs). He had a really scary expression on his face, but I don't think that particular guy would have run over a pedestrian as happened in the UPS strike. The pickets aren't all students, and the strike isn't primarily about student issues, at least not directly. The issue is that the university doesn't pay its staff well, doesn't bargain in good faith, and doesn't have fair policies in place for hiring and promotion. We're talking about the clerical staff, the food service, the maintenance workers, the technical staff (lab techs, electricians, etc), the teaching and research assistants (grad students mainly though I've held those jobs when I wasn't a student, because I am the lumpen intelligentsia). The nice fellow has been working at the University for thirty years, and while there are some very nice aspects to his work, a decent contract and all that goes with it would make a big difference. Food service workers don't even get all the "staff" benefits, though they get more now that they are working directly for the University instead for a contractor.
Some of this is a University-wide issue, and some is special to the Santa Cruz campus. Last year the University of California put away a surplus of I think 786 million dollars. This year the Santa Cruz campus hired a new chancellor at $275000, and invented a brand new job for her partner at another huge salary -- I mean a truly invented toy job, not a new program she seemed to fit in (she the partner, not she the chancellor). The job comes with free rent in a beautiful house at the edge of campus -- sweeping views of the Great Meadow, the forest and the bay, a public face and a secluded area -- but the new chancellor was also given six-figure moving stipend and other benefits I do not remember.
You will recall that this is in a period where the governor, who was elected on the platform of preserving education funding no matter what, has been systematically robbing both higher and lower education budgets, and student fees have been raised 25% the last couple of years, and financial aid programs, affirmative action programs (largely outreach, college prep programs in the middle and high schools, and retention programs), and even the curriculum have been cut repeatedly. All the support staff have been shafted for years, and this last round of insults was too much . . . plus they've been organizing the last few years and now they have AFSCME, UAW, UTPE and I forget who represents the clerical workers (I would guess SEIU but I didn't see their logo today), but these three are strong, aggressive, coalition-building unions. The United Auto Workers, by the way, represent the grad students.
Okay, that's the background. Here's what it was like today:
You really wouldn't bother going on campus unless you were management or you had to save a life. The road was blocked, tghe air was full of voices doing all the demonstration things -- chanting, shouting, singing, generally keeping their spirits up. There were lovely young people with red duct tape crosses on their shirts, mostly handing out water. UTPE (technical staff) had blue t-shirts: AFSCME (food service, maintenance, I think the shuttle drivers too) had green t shirts: CUE (Coalition of University Employees) had red ones. There was an old-fashioned folky string band which I thought was a little disappointing -- I mean I enjoyed them, but when the classic union songs were made up by Woody Guthrie and Joe HIll and all that crew they were working in the medium that was modern and popular at the time. Why not make something new, fresh, indigenous to the people on the line? Where's the ranchera, the hiphop, indie, punk, metal union songs? There was a bassoon, which I appreciated and photographed. There was a rally which I could not understand much of because I never can, but the speakers took their cue from television standup comedy which is appropriate enough but it took the audience a while to catch on to "Is AFSCME in the house?" stuff -- no, the students got it right away, but the staff didn't know they were supposed to scream. There was the obligatory guy with a megaphone who kept the chanting and slogans going all day -- he knew a lot of chants including several I have never heard before.
There's more, but this is probably too long to post already. There's more pictures here.
Some of this is a University-wide issue, and some is special to the Santa Cruz campus. Last year the University of California put away a surplus of I think 786 million dollars. This year the Santa Cruz campus hired a new chancellor at $275000, and invented a brand new job for her partner at another huge salary -- I mean a truly invented toy job, not a new program she seemed to fit in (she the partner, not she the chancellor). The job comes with free rent in a beautiful house at the edge of campus -- sweeping views of the Great Meadow, the forest and the bay, a public face and a secluded area -- but the new chancellor was also given six-figure moving stipend and other benefits I do not remember.
You will recall that this is in a period where the governor, who was elected on the platform of preserving education funding no matter what, has been systematically robbing both higher and lower education budgets, and student fees have been raised 25% the last couple of years, and financial aid programs, affirmative action programs (largely outreach, college prep programs in the middle and high schools, and retention programs), and even the curriculum have been cut repeatedly. All the support staff have been shafted for years, and this last round of insults was too much . . . plus they've been organizing the last few years and now they have AFSCME, UAW, UTPE and I forget who represents the clerical workers (I would guess SEIU but I didn't see their logo today), but these three are strong, aggressive, coalition-building unions. The United Auto Workers, by the way, represent the grad students.
Okay, that's the background. Here's what it was like today:
You really wouldn't bother going on campus unless you were management or you had to save a life. The road was blocked, tghe air was full of voices doing all the demonstration things -- chanting, shouting, singing, generally keeping their spirits up. There were lovely young people with red duct tape crosses on their shirts, mostly handing out water. UTPE (technical staff) had blue t-shirts: AFSCME (food service, maintenance, I think the shuttle drivers too) had green t shirts: CUE (Coalition of University Employees) had red ones. There was an old-fashioned folky string band which I thought was a little disappointing -- I mean I enjoyed them, but when the classic union songs were made up by Woody Guthrie and Joe HIll and all that crew they were working in the medium that was modern and popular at the time. Why not make something new, fresh, indigenous to the people on the line? Where's the ranchera, the hiphop, indie, punk, metal union songs? There was a bassoon, which I appreciated and photographed. There was a rally which I could not understand much of because I never can, but the speakers took their cue from television standup comedy which is appropriate enough but it took the audience a while to catch on to "Is AFSCME in the house?" stuff -- no, the students got it right away, but the staff didn't know they were supposed to scream. There was the obligatory guy with a megaphone who kept the chanting and slogans going all day -- he knew a lot of chants including several I have never heard before.
There's more, but this is probably too long to post already. There's more pictures here.