|
Comment on this article |
Email this Article
|
|
News :: Miscellaneous |
|
UConn Students End Three Day Takeover of President's Office for Living Wage |
Current rating: 0 |
by Kristie McGarry
Email: butterandguns (nospam) hotmail.com (unverified!) |
11 May 2001
|
|
University of Connecticut students ended their occupation of the president's office, satisfied that their demands for fair wages for janitors had been met. |
On Thurday, May 10, in the early evening, the GULLEY NINE (now EIGHT) left the President\'s office building, which they had been occupying for three days. University students had won their demands for a commitment to paying \"Prevailing Wage Now\" in the Justice for Janitors campaign. As the students cleaned the area and removed their belongings, they planned a victory rally for the following day at 11:30 AM. This occupation began the day that Harvard University students ended their thirty-day sit-in, demanding living wages for all Harvard Employees. UConn student\'s demands were similar: pay prevailing wage now, as required by Connecticut State Law passed in 1999, the only of its kind in the country. The law requires that employees who work in state buildings, even if not employees of the state, be paid what is called \"prevailing wage.\" The students were demanding that the 8.47 an hour, plus benefits, be paid effective July 1, 2001; the University had maintained that it was not required to comply with state law for another year, which students deny.
The students who occupied the building were supported by other students, who occupied the outside area with a tent-city and organized from the outside, bringing supporters together for afternoon rallies. At the last rally, on Thursday, professors, students, and various members of the University community lent support to the students and their demands. The campus cultural centers signed a joint letter of support, which was read at the rally, and several professors voiced their support and read from letters that they had sent to the University president. They commented in particular on the treament of \"students, who are not thugs\" by the police at the behest of the administration, who had denied students food for a day and a half, had brought out the fire department in emergency vehicles, with high-pressure hoses at 4 in the morning, to spray a hopscotch circle off of the sidewalk, spraying students books, papers, and personal belongings. Noted one professor at the rally: \"It sounds like Birmingham.\"
Said student Matt Gorham \"We have heard from several sources that administrators are telling faculty, staff, and students that we aren\'t \'real students\'. We can\'t understand why the university would want to pretend that this isn\'t a student movement, because it is.\" It was reported that administrators had said that the student protesters were students from other universities, in particular, Harvard University. Matt Gorham refuted that: \"On Wednesday, there were two students here from Clark University in support, and the rest of the 50 or so students were all UConn students. On Thursday, 3 or 4 students from Wesleyan came in support. To claim that we aren\'t \'real students\' is a lie. They checked our ID\'s themselves\".
The checking of ID\'s is a reference to a move taken by administration on Wednesday night at the \"Midnight Breakfast\"; a now tradition during study days - days after class ends, before final exams begin - where university administrators shake hands of students who are served breakfast. The university president, chancellor, and the entire administration is invited to attend and the top administrators have historically been present. This semester, the administrators enforced a \"no ID, no admittance\" policy that many students said had never before been mentioned.
UConn students were denied access to the breakfast, which is held in a dining hall in a student building, told that signs with writing on them are not allowed into student buildings. \"I mean\", said Gorham, \"how can they even say that we weren\'t UConn students? They wouldn\'t have let the 20 of us in if we weren\'t.\" Some of the students decided to leave their signs outside, in the hopes of talking to the University president. According to student Jordan Messier \"We couldn\'t find President Austin anywhere. We looked for him. We heard he was there. Maybe he heard that we were coming.\" Messier instead found the Chancellor of the University, John D. Peterson, and shook his hand, asking him \"Are workers rights human rights?\". This was a reference to the new Chancellor\'s unveiling of a Human Rights semester. His response, according to Ms. Messier: \"I\'ve already talked to you guys.\"
The students planned a victory rally at 11:30 AM, even as the sign they put up announcing the rally was taken down by police as soon as the students left the area. If it was an attempt to keep the event quiet, students say too bad: they say that the movement is here; the administration seems to have taken notice, and not kindly.
|
See also:
http://www.freeuconn.org
|
