By Nicole Ouimette

Students for Affordable, Accessible and Valuable Education (SAVE) is a club at Holyoke Commu-nity College (HCC). It was formed in September 2011 out of a need for a more involved student body to address the overwhelming concerns of the inaccessibility and unaffordability of public higher education. SAVE addressed the national and statewide student debt crisis during a “Student Speak Out” event at HCC in October 2011 and hopes to continue the hard work of getting students involved on campus and in the community during the upcoming semesters.

SAVE was started with the help of HCC Anthropology professor Vanessa Martinez and student Francheska Morales. All of us felt that there needed to be a stronger activist presence on HCC’s campus. We knew that starting SAVE was the best way to discuss the concerns of student debt and the rising costs of public higher education. PHENOM made SAVE possible by supplying multiple resources and support from board members.

Starting a club on a community college campus is one of the hardest things to do, but SAVE showed that with motivated and dedicated students as well as help from faculty, forming a new club could come with great success. Veronique Leroy, coordinator of HCC’s Student Activities helped us get a spot at the Club Fair, which is held each Fall semester. The Club Fair was a success, with over 40 people showing interest in SAVE. Many students voiced their concerns about student debt. Debt is the underlying concern of public higher education costs, which is important to keep in mind when forming a club like SAVE on any campus.

At the “Student Speak Out” event, students were free to voice their opinions and concerns surrounding the student debt crisis after a short dialogue among representatives of PHENOM, the community and HCC students and faculty. The event was a huge success, with over 120 people in a room that only fit 80. Some faculty brought their classes to take part in the discussion about student debt.

Getting faculty support is very important for organizing on campus as they have many resources, such as students, access to other clubs/organizations and can help get one connected to the administration.
Next semester, SAVE hopes to organize two more events, plug into PHENOM’s statewide campaigns, and create an even more visible presence on campus. Events like a student debt teach-in or a dialogue on free education are only two ideas that SAVE is thinking of pursuing. As president of SAVE, I am hoping that we can be the catalyst for more community college students to form a student-active and faculty-supported presence as the struggle for more affordable public higher education continues.

An Interview with Hollywood Aman

Student leaders from around the state have begun talking about forming a Statewide Student Association (SSA) of the sort found in many other states. Typically organized as a federation of student governments, the SSA allows students to pool resources to have more power as they work on common issues. Hollywood Aman, a PHENOM Board member, is President of the Student Government Association (SGA) at Bunker Hill Community College and is active in the Massachusetts effort.

PHENOMENAL NEWS (PN): What’s it been like being president of the SGA?

Hollywood Aman: Extremely busy! Bunker Hill is the largest community college in the state and the 8th largest public institution. So there’s always so much to do, so many issues to address.

PN: What got you interested in an SSA?

Aman: Massachusetts is known as a college state and Boston is the biggest college town in the country – but it’s not all Harvard and MIT. Our public colleges are not what they’re supposed to be. It’s unacceptable that we’re 45th in the country in funding. So many students can’t complete school – not because of anything but finances. An SSA would help because we would bring issues to light and work toward Obama’s goal of more college degrees so we can be the most educated country in world. An SSA could hold politicians accountable. I’m so proud to be part of helping to start one.

PN: What have you learned about SSA’s?

Aman: I’ve seen what has happened in other states. When California tried — dared — to cut higher education, students took to the streets and caused chaos; their anger was felt. They were better able to organize because of having an SSA. An SSA could also help fight against what they’re doing to teachers – look at Wisconsin and Rhode Island and their ill use of power. With an SSA, students can better stand up for the teachers.

PN: What are you and others doing to help start an SSA in Massachusetts?

Aman: We’re identifying the problems, trying to educate students about our government, trying to branch out and build chapters in every public school. I went to the Community College Student Leadership Conference – it gave me good opportunity to connect with people and talk about PHENOM and the SSA.

PN: How do you see the SSA and PHENOM working together?

Aman: We have the same goals and would work well together. There lots of really committed people in PHENOM. I fully expect Alex (Kulenovic) to be a Senator some day!

PN: What should people do if they are interested in this idea?

Aman: Band together. Follow your heart. Join the movement. Write to me at massphenom@gmail.com We have access to information if you want to make a difference.

by Alex Kulenovic, PHENOM Organizing Director

These are very interesting and challenging times for public higher education, dominated by scarcity in funding and “solutions” that do not fit the problems. In Massachusetts, we’ve been hit by horrific cuts in the last two recessions. Since 2001 we have lost about 40% of our public funding.

UMass Boston Professor Heike Schotten addresses the Education for the 99% marchers in Boston on November 2, 2011.

Cuts transform campuses

Our campuses are transforming in fundamental ways. All institutions have dramatically raised fees. Many have shed staff or shelved hiring. Due to a bad economy and worse job market, many campuses have seen an incredible surge in enrollment, stretching already scarce teaching and support resources to fit an ever-increasing numbers of students.

Looking for any and all sources of funds, campuses are now desperate to attract more out-of-state students and students who need less financial aid. Federal stimulus funds allowed Massachusetts to defer some of these effects. PHENOM and many others fought hard to apply stimulus funds to higher education. But all observers predicted an inevitable cliff, and in last year’s budget Massachusetts fell off it, with a severe cut of 17%.

Stuck with a new normal?

Ominously, there seems to be an emerging consensus among policymakers that this situation—being starved of resources, passing costs on to students and families, retooling institutions to serve wealthier students—might be unfortunate, but is nevertheless a “new normal.” We are told the money simply isn’t there, and may never be there.

The imaginations even of many advocates are limited to tiny, incremental increases at best. More disturbing is the recent, microscopic, set-aside to experiment with new programs in the hopes that if colleges can just show the public that they can operate as leaner, smarter, and more self-sustaining institutions, they can attract more investment.

Boston Foundation rips community colleges

Meanwhile we had the recent Boston Foundation report about community colleges, which isn’t shy about proposing sweeping changes. It argues that the problem with our community colleges (and probably beyond) is that they have too much autonomy, too much local democracy, and waste too much of their resources on mushy stuff like literature and abstract brainy things like philosophy. They should concentrate more on just cranking out more workers! The Department of Higher Education, they say, should not be an advocate for funding. It needs to focus on running a more efficient edu-factory. The foundation report ignores the simple facts. Campuses aren’t going to have great outcomes when they are starved of resources, staffed by a growing number of exploited part-time workers, and populated by far more students.

Community colleges are going to continue to be the only affordable option for many poor families and are going to continue to have the most diversity: They host the most students of color, the most students with children of their own, the widest range of educational aspirations. Calling for community colleges to transform into vocational schools sends a message that low-income students and students of color should be funneled into lower-paying jobs, while upper-middle-class and non-minority students have the privilege to think creatively, discover who they are, and become holistically-educated human beings.

Occupy reframes the questions

Into this infuriating excuse for a debate, enter Occupy. The “Occupy Wall Street” encampment in New York, and its many offshoots, resonated with anyone who has had the feeling that the game is rigged. Anyone who suspected that our entire economy, our tax code, our law enforcement, and our government have been made to serve the wealthiest few at the expense of the rest of us, must have at least been tempted to join a rally and even sit in a tent for a while.

While it is a movement that has confused some and certainly bypassed our notions of what a campaign is (with clear demands, strategy, and conditions for victory), it nevertheless has a crystal-clear theme and focus: that there are people in the financial sector who have gotten away with—and been rewarded for—the crime of the century.

And OWS has added more breadth and depth to that message. The accusation is finally made that the richest 1% don’t pay their fair share, that large swaths of our government are bought and don’t answer to anyone, and that the workers, the students, the unem-ployed, the sick, the poor, the old, immigrants, women, and people of color are always the ones who are asked to sacrifice, who are mocked as privileged or lazy, who are made to suffer for profit, who go to prison.

The 99% are certainly not united, and are not homogenous, but we are beginning to recognize who we are, where our power comes from, who the 1% are, and what their stranglehold on power has done. Even after the Occupy Boston encampment was raided and removed (the longest running continuous occupation to date) and while most of the camps are gone, the movement continues. It has already had its impact. Inequality is the new national concern. The concept of the 99% and the 1% is out there. While hardly a new concept it has a new dimension and a new understanding. “Class warfare” has long been going on, but we are finally fighting back.

Activist groups are using the same language, adopting a similar analysis, and becoming braver and more confrontational. With the exhausting, exhilarating, but largely unsustainable tactic of permanent occupation behind us, the movement can only become more focused. Solidarity is now less a buzzword and more simply the way we all expect to behave. We may not be united, but we will get there.

A 99% vision for public higher education

In many ways, this is the broader vision we have been waiting for, and in public higher education we must have our own version of that vision. That vision must include bold demands, or no demands at all, but rather convictions that of course institutions of higher learning are a public good.

This vision must have as its goal education that is truly for the 99%. It can no longer be consigned to what the “experts” and “decision makers” want or will pay for. It must be truly affordable, (ultimately free), high quality, and holistic. It must demand from the 1% that they pay a fair and adequate share for the same public goods that made their wealth, or their ancestors’ success, possible in the first place. Beyond education, that includes physical infrastructure and social safety nets.

This vision must include the welfare of all students and workers on our campuses, but also surrounding communities, the state, and beyond. It must harness the exuberance of Occupy in the U.S. and the Arab Spring around the world. It must grapple with the shortcomings of the current system of lobbyists, privileged access, fragmentation. It must leverage grassroots power into a cooperative good will that overwhelms the status quo and leads us in a better direction. It may require more from us—emotionally, physically, financially. It may be uncomfortable and disruptive. But it is our best chance to get out of the rut of the last 40 years and fight for a common future.

by Ken Haar, Westfield State University

What began in January 2011 as an attempt to get all the advocates of public higher education in the same room to support the FY 2012 higher education budget evolved into regular meetings with those same advocates working together to fight for public higher education on a number of fronts. Read the rest of this entry »