Announcements

Heading into another school year, students and campus workers are told to prepare for even more budget cuts and tuition hikes. This time, state legislators are cutting all public services to the bone. Attacks on everyone’s right to an education are being waged. These attacks are not only in the form of service cuts and fee hikes, but also include the continued denial of undocumented students’ access to higher education, as well as the increasing efforts to resegregate and privatize K-12 schools.

On Monday, April 26th notable former U.S. Representative Tom Tancredo will return to UNC-CH. Since last year's failed attempt to speak on the campus, Tancredo has become an important figure in the so-called Tea Party Movement. Among the movement’s leadership, remarks including racist and sexist appeals are common, as are efforts to demonize hard-working immigrants. At the Tea Party National Conference in February, Tancredo put his bigotry on vivid display, proclaiming:

"Because we don't have a civics literacy test to vote, people who couldn't even spell "vote", or say it in English, put a committed socialist ideologue in the White House named Barack Hussein Obama."

Literacy tests have a sordid and overtly racist history in America, and this is just one example of Tancredo’s point of view. His view that the culture of "western civilization" should be taught in our classrooms, at the expense of learning about other cultures, is not consistent with democratic norms or notions of free inquiry. He argues not for intellectual discussion, but rather openly advocates for hatred and oppression. With arguments disturbingly similar to those of the Ku Klux Klan or the Nazis, his speeches seek to divide people against one another in order to advance his political agenda.
 
Tancredo is not only in the position to have his hate speech heard by millions of people, but he also has the connections and money to put his words into action. Tancredo has helped campaign for founders of the Minutemen, the vigilante group whose racist efforts include shooting immigrants at the Mexican-USA border. Tom Tancredo also has direct connections with the John Locke Foundation, a right wing think tank that has been crucial in the re-segregation of Wake County Public Schools. Tancredo is also the honorary chair of the Youth for Western Civilization, the white supremacist student group responsible for bringing Tancredo to UNC's Campus.

At UNC Chapel Hill, students organized a week of action leading up to a demonstration on March 4. On March 1, the ad-hoc March 4 coalition organized a street theater action on campus that showed the massive amount of student debt — on average $18,000 per student in North Carolina. On March 3, a campus discussion on local and national education cuts and tuition hikes was held.

About 60 students, workers, and faculty members gathered on March 4 for a “Funk the Cuts” rally followed by a march to the administration building. Chanting “No cuts, no fees, education must be free” and “They say cutback, we say fight back!” the march swelled up the front steps of the building. Once there, a group of nine students held a sit-in inside the building, presenting the chancellor with a statement and list of demands, including chop from the top, no privatization or commercialization of the university, an increase on corporate taxes to fill the budget shortfalls, and for full and equal access to education for undocumented students.

Nine students staged a sit-in in South Building, which ended after nearly an hour with no arrests. The chancellor agreed to meet with students to discuss their demands in two weeks.

On March 4, tens of thousands of students and workers across the U.S. will be taking action against budget cuts, tuition hikes, and the privatization of education as part of the March 4 National Day of Action to Defend Education. From California to New York, Chicago to Tuscaloosa, Boston to Milwaukee, Seattle to Knoxville, Gainsville to Asheville, and all points in between, students and workers will be standing up and speaking out on March 4 to defend education in what is shaping up to be one of biggest days of action this country has seen in years.

On Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=312083917612&ref=ts

A report back from a fact-finding delegation to Colombia

Monday November 16 at 7:00 PM — Murphy 116, UNC-Chapel Hill

RSVP: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/event.php?eid=173315794784&ref=ts

"The government does not care for the poor and has completely abandoned us to poverty. Human life is worth only the value of a bullet." - Colombian Trade Unionist

Upon returning from their August 2009 fact finding delegation to Colombia, members of the Colombia Action Network and Campaign for Labor Rights have been touring across the country to spread the message of solidarity with the Colombian people, share eyewitness reports about the facts on the ground in Colombia, and build the movement to halt the proposed seven U.S. military bases in Colombia.

The delegation met with farm workers, students, and human rights activists and lawyers, and heard testimony from Afro-Colombian Communities, displaced peoples, and many that have experienced and continue to suffer from paramilitary violence. The delegation met with leaders and rank-and-file organizers in the Colombian people's struggles, and has a broad range of perspectives about the effects of U.S. intervention in Colombia.

Join us for a report from participants in the delegation, and learn more about U.S. intervention in Colombia, how this relates to the infamous School of the Americas, and what we can do to support the people of Colombia. The event will be Monday November 16 at 7:00 PM in Murphy 116, UNC-Chapel Hill.

We welcome endorsements and co-sponsors from other organizations, please contact us if you are interested!

In solidarity,

Students for a Democratic Society
unc.sds@gmail.com | http://www.chapelhilsds.org

We have a meeting tomorrow!