By FARAZ T. TOOR
A group of students, faculty, and staff members from the College of Staten Island held a campus protest for tuition-free public education and other demands on Thursday, joining more than a hundred rallies with similar appeals at colleges throughout the country.
“Every year we all go deeper into debt,” said Krystal Sanchez, a CSI junior who helped organize the Staten Island protest.
About 30 people marched with signs around a fountain outside the school’s arts building, shouting calls to action as a few students watched:
“Education is a right!” they shouted. “Education should always be free!”
Most demonstrators were students, including from Sanchez’s community group, Staten Island Against Racism and Police Brutality, CSI’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, and the college’s student government.
A handful of college faculty and staff members also marched with the students, including some City University of New York union members.
According to Sanchez, they rallied in response to calls on social media for students across the country to protest for tuition-free public education, a cancellation of student debt, and a $15 minimum wage for campus employees.
The protests, called the Million Student March, spanned from coast to coast and included four other CUNY campuses.
“I think it’s a good cause. It’s not right that they raise tuition every year,” Ahmad, a CSI junior, said about the university system. “They think [students] won’t do anything about it.”
“The salaries for CUNY are out of control, while students can’t pay,” protestor Zachary Glass, a junior and member of student government, said about the executives, most of whom earn over $200,000 a year.
As more groups joined the cause, the protest on Staten Island added more. The local chapter of the Professional Staff Congress, the union that represents many of the university system’s faculty and staff, also continued to call for the university system to negotiate a satisfactory labor contract, and for Gov. Andrew Cuomo to sign the Maintenance of Effort bill to “stabilize public funding for CUNY.”
“We don’t even want adjuncts. We want equal wages,” said Jay Arena, a College of Staten Island sociology professor.
Some students also protested police brutality and mass incarceration.
The U.S. Department of Education reported that American public colleges collected $62.6 billion in tuition from undergraduate students in 2012.
Some analysts have argued that the federal government would need to appropriate about $10 billion more to fund tuition-free public education today.
Many protestors said while it would be difficult to achieve this goal, it was possible.
For example, Glass said, “If you have higher taxes, you have a higher standard of living,” he said.
“It’s a good start, to do this on campus” said Hyeseung Yoo, a junior. “If we don’t care, we’ll be screwed over.”
The College of Staten Island could not be reached for comment in time for publication.
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