October 7th National Calls and Endorsements

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As we move into another academic year of struggle to Defend Public Education, it is important for us to make the connections between our struggle and the struggles of those who seek similar goals. Please check out our Solidarity Actions Page – In Solidarity, Take Action!

Calls for Action on October 7th

Below are the National call and the California Call. We encourage endorsement of both. You can endorse the national call via this webpage. Follow instructions at the bottom of the California call to specifically endorse that call

Organizing for October 7th:
Facebook Organizing Group
Facebook Event
National Organizing Listserv Page
Join the national list via email

Endorse the national call!

Translations: En Español, Arabic, Deutsch

National Actions to Defend Public Education, October 7th 2010

Last fall, California sparked a movement that has grown drastically over the past year. Much energy went toward building March 4th 2010, National Day of Action to Defend Education, which as a resounding success in the struggle to defend public education. Thousands organized and participated in the events of that day which took place in 32 states. Major actions took place throughout California, but also in Milwaukee, New York City, Illinois, and Baltimore with hundreds of actions planned nationwide. University of Puerto Rico students capped off a two-month strike with a victory receiving many concessions from administration.

What is clear is that this fight is not over. The lines are drawn. As working families struggle to recover from the crisis, access to education is diminishing as cuts continue to come. California activists have proposed October 7th as the next Day of Action. Internationally, activists are focusing on October and November as crucial moments in the struggle to fight back against neoliberalism and defend education rights. We, the below signed organizations and individuals, call on students, teachers, faculty, staff, workers, and parents to unite together and Defend Public Education this fall.

In Texas, the Board of Education has drastically changed the content of Texas textbooks, to include praise of Joseph McCarthy, and many other clauses. In Arizona, The state has passed the racist SB1070 that mandates police detain anyone looks like an undocumented worker. Following this, Arizona is also shutting down ethnic studies programs. In New York City, Chicago, and Detroit, districts are facing massive school closings. Public universities throughout the country are raising tuition costs and looking for more private investors. Budget cuts, tuition hikes, school closings, and right-wing reforms are hitting working families the hardest, especially in communities of color.

As these cuts continue to come, we see the costs of neoliberalism hit home harder than they have before. Public education has been losing funding for years, much of which disappeared because of neoliberal changes to the economy. The current budget crisis in many states will result in further drastic cuts to public education, including further cuts to underfunded schools, increases in unpaid days off for staff, a incentive program promoting “reforms” that are outright attacks on teachers, a restructuring of the public university around the needs of private business – largely supported by massive private grants, and tuition hikes that threaten accessibility to higher education for working families and people of color.

As the education disparities between poor and affluent grow ever wider, public schools serving communities of color are swiftly being re-segregated, provided fewer resources, and less-experienced teachers. These students are being tracked into non-academic, dead-end programs while ethnic and multi-cultural classes and opportunities are being cut.

This crisis and this solution are a direct result of neoliberal-era ideology, reducing or dissolving taxes on the rich and corporations while working people struggle to provide for their families out of their ever-shrinking pockets. As private interests gain more power, as the private dollar begins to strengthen its influence in education, our democratic rights are being stripped away.

The time to act is now, students teachers and staff are preparing for the next wave of actions. We need your support and participation to make this day a historic moment in American history. To get involved please Email: fall_actions@defendeducation.org or call us at 8609162761

Endorsers

Group:
American Association of University Professors
Bail Out the People Movement
Baltimore Algebra Project, Baltimore, MD
Brother Tracy Gibson & Associates, Inc. Philadelphia, PA
Coalition of Graduate Employee Unions, U.S. and Canada
Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration, and Immigrant Rights and Fight for Equality By Any Means Necessary (BAMN)
De Anza Restoring Education, De Anza College, Cupertino, CA
Education Action Now, CSU Monterrey, CA
Education Rights Campaign at University of Wisconsin Milwaukee
Fight Imperialism Stand Together (FIST)
Freedom Socialist Party
Freedom Road Socialist Organization
Georgia Students for Public Higher Education
International Action Center
International Socialist Organization
Jersey City Peace Movement, Jersey City
Joint Forces at SDSU, San Diego, California
Labor-Community Forum of the South Bronx Community Congress
Labor Art & Mural Project, Central CT State University
La La Voz de los Trabajadores- Worker’s Voice- LIT(CI)
Liberty Tree Foundation
M4 Coalition @ SDSU San Diego, CA
Mankato Area Activist Collective
March 4ward Coalition, CSU East Bay
May 1st Coalition for Worker & Immigrant Rights-NYC
Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice
Moratorium NOW! Coalition to Stop Foreclosures, Evictions and Utility Shut-offs
New York City Labor Against the War
Pan-African News Wire, Detroit, Michigan
Peace & Freedom Party- L.A. County
Peoples Video Network, New York, NY
Plan of Action in a Changing Era
Project Great Futures,Los Angeles, CA
Public Higher Education Network of Massachusetts (PHENOM)
Radical Women
Revolutionary Students Union – Utah Valley University
S.O.S. Save Our Schools Coalition, Providence, RI
San Diego Democratic Women’s Club, San Diego, California
Socialist Action
Socialist Alternative
Socialist Organizer
Social Justice Allainces – UCR,Riverside
Socratic Punk, Tampa, Fl
Solidarity
SpeakOut – the Institute for Democratic Education and Culture, Oakland CA
STAND at Queens College, Flushing, New York
Student-Farmworker Alliance
Students Fight Back
Students for a Democratic Society – Animas
Students For A Democratic Society – Birmingham Chapter, Birmingham Alabama
Students For a Democratic Society, University of California LA
Students for a Democratic Society – Diablo Valley
Students for a Democratic Society – Gainesville
Students For a Democratic Society, University of Illinois of Chicago
Students for a Democratic Society – James Madison
Students for a Democratic Society – McDaniel College
Students for a Democratic Society – Milwaulkee
Students for a Democratic Society – University of Minnesota
Students For a Democratic Society, University of North Carolina Ashville
Students for a Democratic Society – UNC Chapel Hill
Students for a Democratic Society – University of North Carolina- Charlotte
Students for a Democratic Society – Northern Virginia
Students for a Democratic Society – University of Oklahoma
Students for a Democratic Society – Rochester
Students for a Democratic Society – Syracuse
Students for a Democratic Society – Tuscaloosa
Students for a Democratic Society – Waukesha
Students for a Democratic Society – Wilbur Wright College, Chicago, IL
Students for an Educated California, San Diego, California
Student Labor Action Project
Take Back Our Transit System, New York, New York
UE 150, North Carolina Public Service Workers Union, North Carolina
Undergraduate-Graduate Alliance at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
United National Peace Conference
University of Georgia Living Wage Coalition, Athens, Georgia
UPTE-CWA Local 9119
Venice Student Union, Los Angeles, California
Whatcom Peace & Justice Center
Winthrop University Socialist Student Union
Young Democratic Socialists
Young Democratic Socialists – William Paterson University, Wayne, NJ
Youth Against War and Racism, Minneapolis and St. Paul Metro Area, Minnesota
Youth for Socialist Action

Individual, in the order submitted (group names for ID purposes only):
Ben Manski, AFT 6100, Sociology Faculty, Madison College
Jackie Hayes, UAlbany Coalition to Defend Education, Albany, NY
Michael Mulholland, AFSCME Local 207, Detroit, MI
Noam Chomsky, MIT Professor Emeritus of Linguistics, Internationally renowned Critic of US Foreign Policy
Dan LaBotz, Socialist Party candidate for the U.S. Senate from Ohio. Cincinnati, Ohio
Shannon Gibney, MN Organizing Group, Minneapolis
Andre Powell, Delegate, Metro Central Labor Council, Baltimore, Maryland
Mike Gimbel, AFSCME Local 375 , Saylorsburg, PA
Susan E. Davis, National Writers Union, UAW Local 1981, New York City
Heather Cottin, La Guardia Community College
Gloria Rubac, Houston Federation of Teachers, Local 2415, Houston
Dave Welsh, Delegate, San Francisco Labor Council, San Francisco, CA
Sara Flounders, International Action Center, NYC
Greg Dunkel, PSC – AFT Local #2334, New York City
Robin McCubbin, California Teachers Association, Chula Vista, California
Minnie Bruce Pratt, Professor, Women’s & Gender Studies, Writing & Rhetoric, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Studies, Syracuse, NY
Milt Neidenberg,Local 840, IBT retired,Brooklyn, NY
Michael Friedman, PSC-AFT, NYC
Mary Lou Finley,Peace and Freedom Party,USA
Justin, DestroyIndustrY, Raleigh, nc
Jack Gerson, Oakland Education Assoc., Oakland,CA
Eugene Ruyle, Oakland, Peace & Freedom Candidate for Congress in the the 6th CD (Marin and Sonoma Counties)
Robin Goodman, United Faculty of Florida, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL
Ned Stuckey-French, Fate of the State/United Faculty of Florida
Helen Kuan, Social Justice Alliance, Riverside, CA
Anne Winkler-Morey, Ethnic Studies Week
John P. Falchi, Plan of Action in a Changing Era, San Diego, Ca
Mark Clinton,Political Science, Holyoke Community College,Holyoke, Massachusetts
Alex Steed, STEED 2010, Cornish, Maine

International Endorsers
AStA (student representative body) at the University of Marburg, Germany
Worldwide Nepalese Students’ Organisation-Nepal
Youth For International Socialism
The Brasilian Assembleia Nacional Dos Estudantes Livre

Part of the International Student Movement Global Wave of Actions

California Call – October 7th Day of Action and October 23-24th Mobilizing Conference In
Defense of Public Education and Public Services

The historic actions, protests and strikes of last Fall and Spring
showed our state and the nation that students, teachers, staff, and
our communities are determined to fight against the cuts, layoffs, fee
hikes, and the shrinking access to public education and services.
However, our fight is far from over. On October 7th, supporters of
public education plan to unite and demand accessible, affordable and
quality education for all.

Public higher-education is an engine of economic growth that benefits
all communities at large, but students of color across the nation are
being tracked into non-academic programs while ethnic and multi-
cultural classes are being cut. As public universities raise tuitions
to the level of private institutions, students of all ethnicities are
being denied access to higher-education on the basis of income— an
economic barrier that disproportionately affects people of color.

The knowledge and innovation coming from graduates of state-supported
universities create far more wealth in the state than the education’s
cost. Better educated citizens are shown to be more productive, pay
higher taxes, create a stronger economy, and provide more jobs. Thus,
it is important to seek out more revenue sources to support education
and public institutions, rather than focusing on decreasing funding.

The politicians and administrators say there is no money for education
and social services. But if there is money for tax cuts and prisons,
why is there no money for public education? Schools are now suffering
from inadequate staffing and pay-cuts. However, California’s budget
cuts are not only restricted to the education system. Our health
services, public infrastructure, transportation and library systems
will also continue to deteriorate. These issues are all intertwined.
How do we stop the degeneration of California?

We, the people, have the democratic power to beat back these attacks
and ensure that our public institutions effectively serve the public.
But to do so, members of all regions and sectors — adult-ed,
students, workers, teachers, activists, unions, and community
organizations — must unite and take action on October 7th, and
contribute our voices and thoughts to the October 23-24 conference at
San Francisco State University to defend public education.

The purpose of the October 23-24 conference is to democratically
propose demands, devise an action plan, and create a structure capable
of defending public education and public services for the benefit of
all.

We invite all supporters of education across the nation to attend and
participate in the October 7th day of action and the October 23-24th
conference.

For more information, visit http://defendcapubliceducation.wordpress.com

Take Back Our Transit System, New York, New York