California University Cuts Protested

BERKELEY, Calif.— Thousands of students, faculty members and employees at the 10 University of California campuses protested budget cuts, unpaid faculty furloughs and tuition increases on Thursday.
Officials at the University of California, Berkeley, estimated that several thousand protesters were in Sproul Plaza chanting and waving signs. Most academic departments on campus reported that some classes had been canceled because faculty members and students walked out. Other campuses reported smaller turnouts at rallies and marches.
“Everyone agrees there is a budget crisis and that the university must respond,” said Joshua Clover, an associate professor of English at U.C. Davis who was a co-author of a petition calling for the faculty walkout on Thursday. The problem, Mr. Clover said, is that the administration’s handling of the budget cuts “disproportionately harms those who can least afford it both among the workers and the students.”
The online walkout petition was signed by 1,221 of the 19,000 faculty members statewide. A union representing more than 11,000 university professional and technical staff members supported the protest and called a one-day strike.
The Legislature approved a reduction of $637.1 million, about 20 percent of the university’s 2009-2010 fiscal year financing, as part of the budget agreement reached in August. The university’s budget now stands at $2.6 billion. Friction has developed between the administration and some faculty and staff members and students over how and where to cut.
Among the more contentious items are a proposed 32 percent increase in student tuition by fall 2010, and decisions made by the university president, Mark Yudof, over how to handle mandatory faculty furlough days, which will reduce pay by 4 to 10 percent. Average yearly tuition and fees for undergraduates this academic year are $8,720.
“I chose Berkeley over all the other universities because it offered me a very good education at a price my family could afford,” said Brandon Pham, 17, a freshman political science major who skipped the day’s classes in protest. Mr. Pham held a sign that read: “We make the university. They make the crisis.”
Steve Montiel, a spokesman for the University of California’s office of the president, said, “We respect people expressing themselves, but we hope they realize that the true source of their frustration is in Sacramento at the state capital.”
What started as a planned faculty walkout to address specific furlough issues ballooned into a 10-campus protest of the larger implications of the reduction of money for public higher education in the state.
“We are operating on the assumption that the state’s disinvestment will continue,” said Chancellor Robert J. Birgeneau of Berkeley, adding that the university would now have to rely on higher fees, private foundation donations and better investments. The pain of budget cuts will be felt broadly, he said, and “paying for public education is going to be increasingly difficult for middle-class families.”
Catherine Cole, a professor in the theater department, who canceled her classes on Thursday to attend the rally, said: “We’ve hit a tipping point. What is emerging here is people realizing it doesn’t have to be this way.”
Still, many students at Berkeley did not participate in the protest and walked about campus as they would on any other Thursday. “I haven’t been near Sproul Plaza today,” said Ray Liang, 18. “I have classes to go to and homework to do.”

Source :  http://www.nytimes.com