1986 Anti-Apartheid Hunger Strikers

Dear folks,

We are writing to support your courageous protest. We are survivors of a 14-day student hunger strike in 1986, which not only ultimately led Columbia to abandon its investments in companies doing business in South Africa but also boosted a growing national movement for divestment. In the end that helped the anti-apartheid movement prevail in South Africa.

When you act from conviction, you get the only results that count. So be strong and know that you are carrying on a proud tradition.

Let us know if there's anything you need.


Yours in solidarity,


Tony Glover
Rob Jones
Laird Townsend
Whitney Tymas

What We Just Won

What we just won: Administrative commitment to, and student involvement in, expansion of the OMA, expansion of Ethnic Studies, and transformation of Major Cultures into a seminar format on equal footing with CC and Lit Hum.

What the Next Five Years will bring is….


Ethnic Studies
For the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race (CSER):
• Three senior faculty hires
• Increased student participation in hiring process

Senior faculty hire for IRAAS (the Institute for Research in African American Studies)

Recruitment of a scholar in Native American Studies

Resources toward strengthened ties between CSER, IRAAS and IRWAG (the Institute for Research on Women and Gender)

Student participation in the Academic Review Committee on CSER allowing for student input in CSER's development


Office of Multicultural Affairs and Administrative Reform
Review of the OMA and the School of the Arts and Sciences to:
• Identify the unmet needs for the Office of Multicultural Affairs
• Access to the OMA for the School of General Studies
• Identify the needs for a Multicultural Affairs officer in the Arts and Sciences
• Create more safe spaces for a number of campus communities

The new location of an expanded Intercultural Resource Center will be announced and funded at the end of the semester

The Annual orientation for new faculty will include perspectives that address the power and privilege

Diversity education and training for Public Safety staff


The Core and Major Cultures
Increased student participation in the re-examining of the Core beginning this semester

Commitment to funding new Major Cultures seminars when approved by the Committee on the Core and the Task Force on Undergraduate Education


Faculty, Student and Alumni Oversight
A committee of faculty, students and alumni to ensure the progress of these concerns


We've gotten the ball rolling, Columbia. We've put these things on the table and won a commitment to raise the money so that they will actually happen. Now it's up to you, students and faculty of the entire university, to shape it.

Press Release: Friday, November 16, 2007

***FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE***

November 16, 2007

*Tonight all remaining Columbia hunger strikers will break their fast*

Contact: Jamie Chen, Student Organizer, eimajine@gmail.com , 240.305.7628
Contact: David Judd, Student Organizer, davidajudd@gmail.com , 646.326.0944
Contact: Annie Salsich, Student Organizer, asalsich06@yahoo.com , 508.314.0422
Contact: Linnea Hincks, Student Organizer, linneahincks@gmail.com , 646.388.0603

Official website: www.cu-strike.blogspot.com

VIGIL 9PM, NOV. 16^TH, SUNDIAL ON COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY'S CAMPUS, W. 116^TH ST., BETWEEN BROADWAY AND AMSTERDAM

In response to the concerns of the Coalition to Preserve Community and prominent community members for the Columbia University hunger strikers' health, the remaining hunger strikers will break their fast at tonight's 9pm vigil. Although, at the urging of community members, they will change their form of protest, the individuals who have been on strike and those who have mobilized around this movement are committed to continuing their struggle for an ethical expansion by Columbia into West Harlem.

Negotiations on the strikers' demands relating to Columbia's expansion took place yesterday. The administration's response to student demands was patronizing, and led to nothing but a restating of the university's current positions, demonstrating continual resistance to engaging in constructive discussion with its students. Ryan Fukumori, CC'09 and a student negotiator, noted that, on the issue of expansion, "This administration is in a moral crisis when its financial interests surpass the greater needs of the community." He added, "Despite significant advancements made in the areas of administrative and curricular reform, we have unfortunately not seen the same cooperative attitude from administrators on the topic of expansion."

Community members have expressed their greatest appreciation for the student movement that escalated into a hunger strike ten days ago. The administration's appreciation for the community is less apparent: community members were asked by present officials to leave the gathering of silent observers at yesterday's negotiation. It had been agreed at student insistence that negotiations would be made public, but it had not been explicitly specified whether community members were included in this agreement.

Students maintained their resolve over their demands regarding Columbia's expansion. The points brought by students to the negotiations yesterday were compromises from the students' original positions. Demands include: that Columbia take eminent domain completely off the table; that it promise to negotiate with tenants and the Local Development Corporation rather than landlords and city politicians; and that resources be allocated to creating affordable housing for the 5035 people who are living in unsubsidized housing in the area of expansion.

Open Letter to the Administrators, from the Negotiators

Dear Administrators,

We would like to begin by reminding you how we got to this point. But first, we want to state why we're not here: we're not here because a small group of students decided to hold the university hostage. We're not here requesting a laundry list of concessions, or else. We're not here for our own selfish whims. We're here because this semester we saw hate far and wide on this campus. We heard President Bollinger the face and head of our university make inflammatory remarks. We've seen incidences of racist, Islamophobic and anti-Semitic language in our community and we've experienced the personal attacks on Teachers College faculty in the form of swastikas and nooses. This is unacceptable in our community, but even less acceptable is the administration's lack of response. These acts and our university's inability to address them have only illuminated the vast inadequacies of this institution on numerous levels. We're here to address the ways in which this university contributes to the marginalization of communities.

How is it that students on our campus can say that other students are overreacting when they are outraged by nooses in our community? What is the responsibility of our university to provide resources to create a safe, inclusive and just campus community and responsible world citizens? We don't think our opinions differ so vastly on these points.

What we have laid out are ways we believe we can encourage this university to be accountable to its students and community, and specifically how we can (re)envision a process, administration, and university that will lead to this safe, just and inclusive community we imagine.

Unfortunately (re)imagining the process by which we operate is not simple and unfortunately it can not be satisfied by placing checkmarks next to a laundry list of requests. Further, considering the significant difference of power between students and administrators, it is rather unfair and impractical to expect us to trust that these concerns and commitments will be followed through on without having the proposals and time tables by which these commitments will be implemented. We see our current agreements over the document as a first step in ensuring our trust in the process as we move forward.

As to those many places where we have not made agreements or where we must defer to faculty, reviews and other processes, we would simply like emphasize the importance of the blue ribbon oversight committee proposed and agreed upon. It is simply unfair to expect students to become experts on the complexities of your bureaucratic system. In the future when approached with proposals, as we have in the past, we would ask you to tell us what you can do within your purview, if our proposals don't work, to help us to make our vision for what this community can be a reality.

We would hope that your commitment to our community would extend beyond the discrete proposals we have made- beyond, even, the discrete issues we have brought up to truly interrogate how you can use your power to play a role in affecting change at every level of this institution. We expect this to be a starting point, not an end point, but we need to see that this is understood by your side as well.

Just to reiterate this clearly, the student organizing in the past weeks was not just about how many hires we can get out of this process or specifically how much funding we can secure. Rather it should have been about you coming to us and saying "I may not be able to do this but I can call a meeting" or "I can start making calls to donors" or "I can have this or that discussion with the relevant administrators."

Please understand that this is about being able to see your commitment for a new vision of our community in a tangible way, not trying to coerce you into acquiescing to some self-interested and un-negotiable demands. In that spirit, we hope that you yourselves will, in the future, be making recommendations to students above and beyond our own to make our community a safer more inclusive place, but we'll leave that to you for now.

Sincerely,
Rahel Aima, CC'10
Yadira Alvarez, CC'10
Desiree Carver-Thomas, CC'09
Ryan Fukumori, CC'09
Vivian Lu, CC'10
Andrew Lyubarsky, CC'09
Sam Rennebohm, GS'09
Julie Schneyer, BC'08
Andrew Tillett-Saks, CC'09
Christien Tompkins, CC'08
with the concerned students organizing around the hunger strike and demands of Autumn 2007

Joint Statement from Administrators and Students

Any successful negotiation results in an agreement that enables both sides to claim victory. In this case, however, there is only one winner and one side, because we all share the same commitment to building a better Columbia.

The administration recognizes the deep seriousness of the student strikers' commitment to institutional changes that will reduce the marginalization experienced by some of our communities and enhance inclusiveness for all.

The students recognize the strength of the administration's commitment to advancing change through the channels that represent the interests of the whole Columbia community.

We have worked hard together to bring these two imperatives into complementary relationship and we are confident we have succeeded.

Coming to this agreement has required a great amount of trust; trust that we must continue to build and sustain together.

Press Release: Coalition to Preserve Community, 11/16/07

A response to CPC's concerns will be released shortly and presented at tonights vigil, 9pm at the sundial.
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***** FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 11/16/07 *****

WEST HARLEM COMMUNITY GROUP ASKS HUNGER-STRIKING COLUMBIA STUDENTS TO WITHDRAW DEMAND REGARDING UNIVERSITY'S PROPOSED EXPANSION

Contact:
Tom DeMott: 917-969-0669
Nellie Bailey: 646-812-5188
Luis Tejada: 212 234-3002

Five days ago, on November 11, the Coalition to Preserve Community (CPC), a four-year old West Harlem community group opposing the Columbia University expansion plan, asked the Columbia students who had been on a hunger strike since Wednesday, November 7, to withdraw their demand that the University recall its 197C rezoning application. They rejected our request at that time, but today we are asking them again.

We do not want the students' health and welfare to be sacrificed in waiting on Columbia to engage in an honest dialogue and negotiation with the community on the rezoning application. For that to happen, President Bollinger and the Board of Trustees would have to respect the ten points raised by the Community Board as necessary to bring the Columbia plan into conformity with the community plan. The students are correct when they say that this could be accomplished, and they have done a great job bringing the true nature of Columbia's eviction plan out in the open, but we have all seen over the past five days that Columbia is stonewalling them, as it has stonewalled the community, on this issue.

The students attempted to focus in on six points concerning the expansion, and Columbia would not even make the basic commitment to negotiate a Community Benefits Agreement exclusively with the Local Development Corporation. This refusal reveals Columbia’s underhanded strategy of dealing with elected officials in back-door 11th-hour negotiations in order to circumvent the comprehensive demands developed on LDC committees by grassroots people. Columbia and its politicians want to sweep the work of community members under the rug and invent some last minute deal that will be put forth as purported "mitigation" of the devastation the Columbia plan will wreak in the community. The students should not starve themselves any longer trying to change this bought-and-paid-for scenario. It is clear that the fix is in regarding Manhattanville.

We have supported the advocacy efforts of the students on their other important demands for a democratic and inclusive education and those talks have been concluded. We will continue to work with them as we advocate for real community planning that does not cause displacement nor depend on the use of eminent domain.

Coalition members are extremely concerned for the well-being of the students. Having dealt with the Columbia administration for four years on its proposed expansion plans, the CPC is fully aware of Low Library's intransigence, deceitfulness, and cold-blooded ruthlessness. Accordingly, the CPC calls upon the students to withdraw their demand regarding Columbia's 197C application with its reliance on bulldozing a community and eminent domain and to concentrate on their other advocacy.

The striking students and their supporters will be conducting a vigil and press conference tonight at the sundial on the Columbia campus at Broadway and 116th Street.

Statement of Solidarity: Sakib Khan

Sakib Khan is an alum of Columbia University, former Chair of the Student Governing Board and former President of the Muslim Students Association.

---

As an alum of the Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science, I write in solidarity with those taking and supporting direct action. The need for direct action has been a long time coming, and I am inspired by the sacrifice of the strikers. They continue Columbia's proudest tradition, selflessly speaking truth to power, no matter the personal expense. I wish the expense was less, but in my experience and in the experience of countless others, the administrations of the University, Columbia College and the School of Engineering and Applied Science have, both jointly and separately, neglected to respect more conventional communication.

The University and its schools exercise their powers in a manner that systematically marginalizes people of color. Development powers, curricular powers, faculty-hiring and tenure-granting powers and student life powers are among those abused at the expense of neighbors, faculty, and students. The most troubling instance of this abuse of power might be the University's refusal to incorporate the principles of its neighbors' own plans for the future of Manhattanville. Here, the University chooses to unilaterally reject the community's rightful input on neighborhood development (197A) simply because land use laws allow marginalization. If expansion is to be successful, Columbia must invest in a campaign of inclusion and empowerment, not just capital.

None of these abuses--development, curricular, faculty hiring/tenure, student life--are intentional. However, the University and its schools have persisted without significantly changing their approach to power in the face of multiple race-related scandals each year for the last several years. The University and its schools have persisted without change in the face of 5 hate crimes in a 4 week span. The University and its schools have persisted without change in the face of local, national, and international media attention. Most importantly, the University and its schools have persisted without change in the face of years of cautioning, advocacy, negotiation, and protest by concerned neighbors, faculty, students and alumni. Their persistence is repulsive and unbecoming of a well-regarded institution.

However, without darkness, we would not know the light. Without obstacle, we would not learn the power of struggle. I hope that each of the strikers and their supporters takes time to reflect on the education they receive through struggle. Sadly, marginalized people coming together and taking direct action is a rare occurrence. It is among the most unique and valuable experiences they will have at
Columbia.

I pray that further escalation is not needed, but that if it proves necessary, then that it is brief and successful. I pray for the health, strength, and faith of all involved in making a more responsible and moral Columbia. God willing, their sacrifice will pay dividends for us all.

“Whosoever of you sees an evil action, let him correct it with his hand; and if he is not able to do so, then with his tongue; and if he is not able to do so, then with his heart." -Prophet Mohammed (Peace be upon him)

Peace to you all,
Sakib Khan SEAS '07

Statement of Solidarity: The Equal Rights and Access Committee of the Graduate Employees and Students Organization (Yale)

As the Equal Rights and Access Standing Committee of the graduate teachers union at Yale University, we support your struggle to hold Columbia accountable to the principles of equality and respect for all people inside and outside the institution. We, like you, wonder whether universities (must) perpetuate the systems of oppression that they claim to challenge. You challenge Columbia to confront their role in, as you put it, "a world in which racist, gendered, and sexualized hierarchies dominate the way power flows." Your demands for curricular and thus intellectual change articulate the way in which the knowledge produced in and by universities enables these harmful actions. We draw inspiration from your willingness to take direct
action to institute greater democracy on your campus.

Your struggle also speaks to other universities. Like you, we face a university that plays an increasingly dominant political and economic role in its host community and seeks to reshape it in its own image. This manifests in the forms of escalating gentrification and policing. Our administration, like yours has disregarded the voice of students, workers, community members, and faculty, and has failed to address the systemic discrimination that exists on our campus. We at Yale are also confronting articulations of white supremacy. The noose at Columbia manifests through hateful graffiti at Yale. Your example assists in providing encouragement for us.

We thank you for your determination, and most of all, your vision.

In solidarity and hope,
The Equal Rights and Access Committee of the Graduate Employees and Students Organization (GESO)
Yale University, New Haven, CT

Words from the Negotiation Team

Yesterday we, the negotiators, met with Maxine Griffith, Executive Vice President of Government and Community Affairs, to receive her responses on the points of compromise that we had presented the day before. To our great disappointment, the meeting was characterized by a disturbing incident of excluding the greater community, and a complete lack of progress on any of the issues under discussion.

At the start of the meeting, Ms. Griffith requested the removal of Dr. Vicky Gholson, a member of Community Board 9, on the grounds that she felt uncomfortable with the presence of community representatives, as silent observers, in an open negotiation meeting. The ground-rules agreed upon with the administration allowed for open observation by the student body, but did not specifically address community participation. The facilitator asked Dr. Gholson to leave, despite his own personal unease and the objections of the student negotiators. We are greatly troubled by the implications of this action, which implies that the administration rejects the presence of the very people whom the expansion most affects. We reject the artificial division between the student body and the broader community that Columbia has so unreasonably defined on this issue.

Thereafter, we played a recording of CB9 consultant and former city commissioner Ron Shiffman, who confirmed that, contrary to prior statements made by Ms. Griffith, direct negotiations between the Community Board and Columbia have not occurred since August, and that CB9 stands by its 32-2 vote against the 197-c plan. Ms. Griffith’s response was nebulous.

The negotiation itself confirmed our worst fears. It became evident to us that instead of engaging in a good-faith negotiation, Ms. Griffith preferred to restate the administrative position and merely clarify the functioning of various city processes with which we were already familiar. While we have been willing to compromise from our original position, we have not seen a similar commitment made by the administration, and have only been met with empty rhetoric and answers that continue to allude to vague commitments to future change.

While we have accomplished a tremendous amount in the last week, we see that this administration is in a moral crisis when its financial interests surpass the greater needs of the community. We, as students, demand that the University behave responsibly in its role as an institution of learning, rather than as a developer in a single-minded drive for its own narrowly-defined interests. Until then, the struggle for justice in Manhattanville continues.

-the negotiators

Statement of Solidarity: Prof. Gary Y. Okihiro

Please convey my support of the student strikers in their demands for equity and justice. It is unfortunate when students, who are at Columbia and Barnard for an education, must themselves educate their professors, Columbia's/Barnard's administrators, and their fellow students about the importance, nay necessity of a more democratic, responsible, and inclusive university, college, curriculum, and climate. The struggle continues.

Gary Y. Okihiro
Professor of International and Public Affairs

Statement of Solidarity: Prof. Robin D.G. Kelley

I’m writing in support of student demands for a change in the core curriculum, administrative reform, support for a stronger, expanded and more autonomous Ethnic Studies program, and a more equitable and just policy toward communities in Harlem. These demands grow out of years of thinking and struggle on Columbia’s campus, dating back at least to the formation of Ethnic Studies eleven years ago, if not before. Indeed, during my brief tenure on the faculty at Columbia University, I recall spending most of my time battling on these same fronts—attending meetings “re-thinking” the core curriculum; trying to get faculty and students to understand how Columbia’s expansion plan into West Harlem will destroy local communities; figuring out how to keep CSER afloat on a miniscule budget, mostly junior faculty, and no authority to make unilateral appointments. And, of course, we dealt with racist, sexist, and homophobic incidents on campus.

I do hope everyone—the administration, the faculty, and students who might be reluctant to support the strike—understands that the hunger strikes and the movement of which they are a part are offering a vision that would make Columbia University a better place. In struggle they have created a blueprint for what all institutions of learning (higher or otherwise) ought to aspire to be. And that is, a safe place for all students irrespective of difference, a place where knowledge is expansive and challenging, a place that engages, supports and partners with it’s neighbors rather than steam rolls over them, and an institution that places social justice at its core.

Robin D. G. Kelley
Professor of History and American Studies and Ethnicity
University of Southern California

Statement of Solidarity: Progressive Jewish Alliance

"Is not this the fast I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of tyranny,
to set the oppressed free and shatter all bondage?" (Is. 58:6)

The Progressive Jewish Alliance stands in solidarity with the brave Columbia students who truly understand the message of the prophet Isaiah, that a fast is not merely the abstention of food (or drink). Rather, it is a sympathetic response, an act of compassion, of feeling with, a radical intuition that shatters interpersonal boundaries. To fast is to refuse sustenance in a time when so many are hungering for dialogue, for fair treatment, for justice.

The PJA supports a quest for a curriculum that will educate the student body about the world in which we live, with proper attention paid to all cultures and ethnicities represented in this "global university." As members of a people historically diasporic for 2,500 years, we are appalled at the university's callous plan of expansion that will cause 5,000 people to be displaced and will utterly ruin a rich community. Lastly, as victims of recent bias incidents, the Progressive Jewish Alliance speaks out with great fervor against the appalling slew of expressions of hate and support the strikers' attempt to force the university's administration to do its duty and take care of its student body.

Our prayers are with the strikers and all their supporters, wishing them a speedy resolution and good health. Thank you all.

~PJA

Press Release: Thursday, November 15, 2007

*** FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE***

Two students to end hunger strike after winning concessions; four others to continue fast

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Contact: Jamie Chen, Student Organizer, eimajine@gmail.com, 240.305.7628
Contact: David Judd, Student Organizer, davidajudd@gmail.com, 646.326.0944

More information: http://cu-strike.blogspot.com

Two Columbia University students have ended their hunger strike after eight days. The students, Emilie Rosenblatt, CC '08, and Bryan Mercer, CC '07, have been on strike since Wednesday, November 7, in support of demands relating to the way the university deals with race in its curriculum and administration as well as its planned expansion into West Harlem.

The students' decision was made last night after the Columbia administration offered significant concessions in three of the four areas of concern to students and faculty supporting the strike. However, the administration has yet to address students' critique of its planned expansion into West Harlem, and the displacement of Harlem residents expected to result. Four other students, Victoria Ruiz, CC '09, April Simpson, CC '11, Rich Brown, CC '10, and Sam Barron, BC '10, will continue to refrain from eating until the university revises its expansion plans to bring them in line with Harlem community needs, as expressed in Community Board 9's 197-a plan.

The two students who are ending their fasts made this decision after thorough discussions with the remaining strikers and with other allies. The students will begin eating once more both for medical reasons and as a sign of good faith in response to administrators' concessions regarding curricular and administrative reform. Emilie and Bryan were warned yesterday that Columbia Health Services officials judged them to be in serious medical danger and that they would be placed on involuntary medical leave for the remainder of the current semester should they refuse to end their strike. The two strikers were prepared to continue regardless, but when further negotiations produced acceptable results, they decided to transition to other methods of struggle.

According to Bryan, "the agreements reached tonight are a true beginning of progress," which "came about through the mass rallying of students, and show the ability of students to push through their concerns." Emilie noted that "even though I've stepped out of the strike, the struggle continues, and I will continue to be involved in other ways. It's crucial that we make progress on making the expansion responsible."

A meeting is scheduled for 4pm today at which students will negotiate with administrators regarding the major outstanding issue, Columbia's expansion plans. A separate meeting will take place to work out the last details of the positions to which administrators and the coalition of concerned students and faculty and administrators have already agreed in principle. Students and allies will rally at noon on College Walk at the center of campus in support of the remaining demands, and will hold their daily candlelight vigil at 9pm.

Statement of Solidarity: United Asian American Organizations, University of Michgan

The United Asian American Organizations (UAAO) at the University of Michigan stands in full solidarity with the hunger strikers at Columbia University. UAAO is a political coalition of 37 Asian American student groups, established to work in unity to provide education on issues facing Asian/Pacific Islander Americans, to promote awareness of Asian/Pacific Islander American cultures, and to serve as a communication core for Asian/Pacific Islander American organizations and individuals.

Since the founding of the first Ethnic Studies programs in late 1960s and on, faculty and students have continuously faced institutional challenges. We struggle to uphold the principles Ethnic Studies was founded on, the right to education, to redirect resources at higher education institution to our communities, and to connect with the grassroots movements. We have received backlashes at traditional, elite institutions. Our Studies has become inaccessible and academic because of the traditional framework of higher education. Our services to our communities are not valued, quantified or qualified for the "standards," made by people who intend to shake our beliefs, who want us to abandon the movements that have preceded us and will come after us.

As students of color in Michigan, we share the same struggles as students at Columbia University. Our faculty of color, not only in Ethnic Studies but across in various departments and disciplines, are being let go one by one. The same reasons are told to us each time we request an explanation: the faculty member's research is not qualified, given the context of the prestigious research institution; their work focuses on the community, not on research that allows the university to continuously be perceived prestigiously; their research only concerns a small minority group, not the society at large. These reasons only raise more questions: Who are the people who set the standards? Who decides what is prestigious and what is not? And furthermore, why should one be punished, not rewarded, for spending tremendous amount of time and effort in the community, outside of one's research facility?

The colonialism existing in the traditional academia framework greatly hurts students. If Columbia University claims to embrace diversity and freedom, then the diversity cannot be validated solely by having students of color on campus. The administration needs to recognize that diversity goes beyond numbers and community input is crucial in improving campus climate. The curriculum needs to be diversified, allowing knowledge in different fields, including Ethnic Studies, which promotes knowledge that has been traditionally suppressed because of colonialism. Students have the right to learn about the history and importance of people of color in building this country, founded on colonial principles. Students have the right to demand the university's support for acquiring such knowledge, if the university truly embraces diversity.

United Asian American Organizations Board
Eric Li, Co-Chair
C.C. Song, Co-Chair
Anisha Mangalick, Advocacy
George Dong, Community Historian
Katherine Takai, External Relations
Ashley Manzano, Internal Relations
Jeff Meng, Finance
Vivian Tao, Programming
Ravi Bodepudi, Service

Open the TALKS! Vigil and Rally at Hamilton

Student Power

Pictures from the 11/14 vigial at the Sundial, rally at Hamilton and march around campus:

Words from the Negotiation Team: 11/15/07

We are pleased to announce that after a day of great adversity, we have emerged with significant victories on many of our demands and a clear vision of what student power can accomplish. What began with administration threats to cut off all further negotiations and an ultimatum to end the strike by midnight ended with explicit concessions on the Core Curriculum, administrative reform, and support for ethnic studies. The struggle continues unabated around issues surrounding the university's expansion into West Harlem, which has as of yet not been addressed in a substantive fashion.

Hundreds of students packed the campus in a peaceful but boisterous demonstration that decried the university's decision to cut off civil negotiations and resort to threats of force, rallying around Hamilton Hall where administrative deliberations were taking place. As public safety guarded the doors to the building, students and community leaders demanded that the administration continue the negotiation until all issues were satisfactorily addressed. The crowd swelled in size and a continuing lack of communication with administration sources threatened to escalate the situation. Finally, we received communication from the administration that the hunger strike would continue undisturbed, that specific commitments on funding for the transition of Major Cultures to a seminar format and the expansion of the Office of Multicultural Affairs were made, that disciplinary penalties on hunger strikers would not be levied, and that negotiations for the expansion would continue.

As these victories were announced to the assembled crowd, sentiment changed from anger to elation. Scores of people remained at the Sundial discussing the advances of the evening and the necessary steps to follow. While students rejoiced in their triumph, they remained fully aware that much work is left to be done in negotiations on the expansion plan.

As the hunger strike enters its ninth day, students' resolve remains firm on the expansion demands. While the fundamental demand remains that Columbia respect the democratic voice of Community Board 9 and withdraw its 197-c plan to rezone Manhattanville, we have presented six points to Executive Vice President Maxine Griffith which represent a reasonable progression to the negotiation process. To date, we have received no response and no commitment from the administration.

Significant advances have been made, but much remains to be resolved until students return to their daily lives. The victories of the day show what power students organizing for justice can have. Today more than ever, the struggle continues.

- The Strike Committee

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The points presented to the administration are detailed below.

Point 1 – Columbia has a responsibility, as stated in the EIS, to mitigate the impact caused by the proposed actions. The body with which the university has committed to negotiating with is the West Harlem Local Development Corporation. However, the university has also reached agreements with other entities on issues of community benefits, most recently and prominently Borough President Scott Stringer, who has a representative on the LDC body. We demand that the University commit to, in writing and on the record, negotiating community benefits exclusively with the LDC, excluding any separate agreements with individual politicians, including but not limited to those politicians represented on the LDC.

Point 2 – The agreement reached with Borough President Stringer is problematic on many levels. First, demand a clarification on what exactly is proposed. Is it a loan or a grant? When does the money get transferred and how does that happen?

Secondly, with an estimate of $200,000 per creation of each affordable unit, this would create 100 units in an area with 5,035 people living in unsubsidized housing. This is an extremely low floor in negotiating an anti-displacement program with the LDC, especially given the cost and potential profit of the project. The students demand that a far more significant commitment to affordable housing be a part of any agreement with the LDC and that Columbia come to the board with a number that mitigates the full effect of its project.

Point 3­ – Columbia has pledged officially to relocated the tenants living under the TIL program to equivalent housing. This is a positive step. We demand that any relocation occur as a result of direct agreement with the tenant affected and not through an agreement of property transfer with any city agency or outside entity.

Point 4 – Columbia needs to take eminent domain off the table for the commercial property-owners in the area and reach agreements with them on an individual basis, even if that implies that they are to stay there in a revised development scenario.

Point 5 – Using funding specifically earmarked for the expansion plans or fundraised independently of existing efforts, Columbia should develop and financially empower those parts of the university that provide community programming. The university should provide resources for the development of new programs in the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race, the Institute for Research in African-American Studies, the Office of Multicultural Affairs, the Double Discovery Center, Community Impact and other university institutions that would provide services for both students and community members.

Point 6 – Columbia is one of the foremost educational institutions in the country and the world. As part of its expansion, we feel that the university has a responsibility to the community it is effecting, not merely to its own constituency. This responsibility is profound and goes beyond the Secondary School proposal. Students demand that local students be granted access to Columbia resources, including libraries and course auditing privileges. We also call for a scholarship admission program for CB9 residents, and for a comprehensive educational complex that would serve the community's needs, including not only K-12 education but also an infant and pre-K school, a health clinic, and an adult education service. This should be funded directly by the university. The university's resources are vast and can be shared more broadly.

Press Release: Wednesday, November 14, 2007

*** FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE***

Students win concessions in hunger strike negotiations; strikers to continue fasting until all demands are addressed

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Contact: Jamie Chen, Student Organizer, eimajine@gmail.com, 240.305.7628
Contact: David Judd, Student Organizer, davidajudd@gmail.com, 646.326.0944
www.cu-strike.blogspot.com

RALLY, NOVEMBER 15, 2007, 12 NOON at the Sundial at Columbia University
College Walk, W. 116^th St., between Broadway and Amsterdam

Tonight, despite the administration briefly declaring negotiations closed, the coalition of students and faculty at Columbia University involved with a hunger strike won a set of concessions from the administration regarding curricular and administrative reform. The strike will continue until administrators and student negotiators reach agreement on revisions to Columbia's plan to expand into West Harlem.

The administration has committed, subject to approval by the Task Force on Undergraduate Education, to raising fifty million dollars in order to staff a seminar format for the non-Western portion of the Core Curriculum. Currently, every other Humanities requirement in the Core is taught in capped seminar format. Administrators will also put out a call for proposals from faculty for new courses for the Core Curriculum.

The administration has agreed to raise funds for the expansion of the Office of Multicultural Affairs, to the extent recommended by a review by a consultant firm. Administrators offered a blueprint for student involvement in the academic review committee for the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race, which will decide the future of the Center. Finally, administrators guaranteed that there will be no disciplinary action brought against any hunger striker.

In the late afternoon, administrators issued a demand that two student hunger strikers end their eight day demonstration, or be forced on medical leave for the remainder of the semester. Administrators further threatened that if strikers did not accept a specific set of proposals offered at 7pm, the administration would walk out of negotiations.

While these threats hung in the air, at 9pm, approximately two hundred students gathered for a previously scheduled vigil. Upon hearing the administration's position, students spontaneously formed a rally and marched across campus, gathering in front of Hamilton Hall, where administrators were convened. Hamilton Hall has been the location of student sit-ins several times in the last decades. At this point, the administration resumed negotiations.

Outstanding demands of the coalition of students and faculty include a critical revision of Columbia's plan for expansion into West Harlem. A meeting is scheduled for Thursday to negotiate specific points of compromise brought forth by students.

A larger rally is scheduled for Thursday at noon, to coincide with a luncheon between administrators and major donors to the university.

Statement of Support: General Studies Student Council

STATEMENT OF SUPPORT FOR THE HUNGER STRIKE
FROM THE GENERAL STUDIES STUDENT COUNCIL

We, the undersigned members of the General Studies Student Council, wish to affirm our support for progress within our Columbia community. At this moment, four students from Columbia and Barnard Colleges are engaged in a sincere and serious act of protest against racist and prejudicial practices, activities, and words. They have chosen a hunger strike as a tactic of last resort because they feel systematically marginalized by the administration. Our concern is for the health of our fellow students regarding the marginalization of their voices. We therefore stand in solidarity with our fellow students in their efforts to eliminate some of the myriad forms of racism, sexism, homophobia, ethnocentrism, ageism, and elitism found within our campus. Just as the administration has a responsibility to engage in fruitful dialog with the strikers, so too does the student body have an obligation to critically engage with the concerns proposed by the student strikers. The scope of the issues brought forth by the groups involved pertain to all.

For these reasons, we stand in solidarity with the hunger strike and with all who seek progress within our academic community. The kind of nourishment our fellow students need is that of support. To that end, we humbly offer this statement and hope that our campus will move in a progressive direction as a result of the efforts of these dedicated students.

Jacob Matilsky
Allen Settle
Karly Curcio
Nancy Saunders
Nicolle Rountree
Eleanor Colley
Monique Long
Ishmael Osekre
Keith Hightower
Raul Wikkeling
Elizabeth Alonso-Hallifax
Jay Kim
Todd Murphy
Helena Lellis
Ashley Forman
Brendan Rooney
Brody Berg
Niko Cunningham

Statement of Support: Student Government Association of Barnard College

In light of the strike currently going on at Columbia, the SGA writes today to inform students that the SGA is committed to addressing issues of ethnic diversity, curricular shortcomings, and necessary institutional reform on our campus. These goals have been part of SGA's 2007-2008 agenda since the beginning of the semester. To address these issues, the SGA held a Town Hall on this subject in October, attended by Barnard College and Columbia University students, faculty, and administrators. All present expressed and stressed the need for additional steps to be taken to ensure that all Barnard students graduate having had the opportunity to intellectually engage with these issues. The SGA is thus committed to reviewing and assessing necessary curricular changes. Additionally, the SGA is calling for an Ethnic Studies major at Barnard, and the provisions to be set up for the eventual creation of a center.

The SGA also recognizes that the demands being made of the Columbia administration affect Barnard students. The SGA acknowledges that many members of the Barnard community, students, faculty and departments, have been active in the strike and in response to the strike, both voicing support and dissent. Although the strike is addressed specifically to the Columbia University administration, the SGA supports the call for changes that will improve the academic opportunities and quality of education that Barnard students receive.

Moreover, the SGA officially calls for various curricular and institutional changes at Barnard College that are in a similar vein.

The SGA expresses its support for the following:

1.The SGA calls for the Committee on Instruction to move forward on the creation of an Ethnic Studies major. Towards this end, the SGA would like to see a thriving, well-funded and administered Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race (CSER) at Columbia that can support an influx of Barnard majors. In the long term, the SGA supports the creation of a center at Barnard dedicated to the study of racial and ethnic power dynamics, similar to the Barnard Center for Research on Women.

2. The SGA calls for the incorporation of discussion of racial and ethnic formation into the 9 Ways of Knowing. For the short term, the SGA plans to facilitate the creation of a more diverse First-Year English reading list. In the long term, the SGA supports the Committee on Instruction in reviewing how to better incorporate these issues into the 9 Ways of Knowing, particularly looking at the Social Analysis, Cultures in Comparison, and Reason and Value requirements.

3. The SGA calls for the appointment of a Provost for Diversity. Many of our sister schools, as well as many Ivy League universities, have such an office. A Provost for Diversity will work closely with the deans and the President of the College to ensure fair hiring, tenure, and curricular practices.

4. The SGA calls for better communication between the Office for Multicultural Affairs at Barnard and the Office of Multicultural Affairs at Columbia.

The SGA continually seeks student input, concerns and support on all of these initiatives and hopes that Barnard students feel empowered to work with the SGA. While institutional reform does take time, student voices are heard and ideas are supported by the administration through the SGA. The above mentioned goals are also part of discussions being held by Barnard faculty and administrators. The SGA does recognize the need for immediate and tangible examples of progress. From the SGA student representatives on the Committee on Instruction to all of the participants at our Town Hall, Barnard students have been actively engaged with this debate all semester. Please be encouraged to join your fellow students in these discussions by contacting sga@barnard.edu or by attending our weekly Representative Council meetings, held every Monday at 7:45pm in the North Tower.

Statement of Solidarity: Students for Environmental and Economic Justice

Students for Environmental and Economic Justice expresses love and concern for Samantha Barron, an integral part of the group, and also reaches out to the other strikers.

We feel that a variety of tactics are necessary for effective protest and to engage in the University in new and creative ways. We hope that the ends to this justify the means, and support the demands around West Harlem, as well as the non-racist principles for which the movement advocates.

We hope that all of these students, strikers and supporters, come out of this action unscathed, mentally and physically, and hope that Columbia students can continue to hone their skills as effective activists on campus and in the future.

Best wishes,

Students for Environmental and Economic Justice (SEEJ)

Statement of Solidarity: Jennifer Oki

Jennifer Oki is a Columbia University alumna and former student leader of various organizations including United Students of Color Council and Students Promoting Empowerment and Knowledge.

---

As an alumna of Columbia University I am proud to stand in solidarity with the hunger strikers and those who work so tirelessly to support them. The demands of the strikers, continuing the struggle of so many student activists before them, are in no way novel. Their existence is proof of the evasiveness and insulting disdain of an administration that counts on promises of committees and meetings, and the short stay of most undergraduates to maintain the status quo. Today's hunger strikers and organizers have taken a bold step to emphasize the severity and urgency of the situation at Columbia; their demands must be met and their call for change supported.

Over my four years as an undergraduate I sat with fellow concerned students in meeting after meeting, with committee after committee to achieve important, but limited successes. The administration's failure of us and our predecessors has led to the need for the hunger strikers' actions today.

Columbia University has an alarmingly long history of devastating disregard for marginalized communities both within the university and in the neighborhood that surrounds it. Columbia as an institution, comprising members of the university at all levels, has chosen silence and a nearly stagnant rate of change in the face of demonstrated racism, homophobia, classism, religious prejudice and other forms of bigotry. At times, the university itself has perpetrated these very injustices through direct action or through appalling lack of concern. A better Columbia necessitates a strong student voice on the side of justice and an inclusive, responsive, and accountable university, and these students have taken the necessary steps to demand their voice be heard. Administrators, faculty, alumni, and other students must in turn stand up for what is right and just and lend their support to these brave and stead-fast strikers and the vital changes they call for.

Jennifer Oki, CC '07

Statement of Solidarity: Student Organization of Latinos

The Student Organization of Latinos not only stands in solidarity with the hunger strikers, but we hunger with them. We envision, and furthermore demand, a university that respects and values all communities, whether they be communities of color, the queer community or the immediately surrounding community of West Harlem. As Latino students, an underrepresented group at this University, we feel these pangs deeply.

We fail to see the histories and struggles of our people properly legitimized and embraced in our administrative offices, our classrooms and in our community in Harlem.

We think it shameful that students must risk and sacrifice so much for something so basic. Our prayers and actions are with the strikers, their well-being and the well-being of this campus.

Statement of Solidarity: Prof. Gil Anidjar

General Strike

When the university forces students into a silent corner – it exercises power, not freedom.

When Western culture continues to dominate our education – it extends its power, not freedom.

When racist individuals join forces with racist institutions – they benefit from power, not freedom.

When diversity is showcased by those who still dictate the same rules – this demonstrates power, not freedom.

When professors are vilified and fired – this is the familiar face of power, not freedom.

When administrative staff and maintenance workers are ignored and overworked – they are the recipients of power, not freedom.

When the president of a U.S. institution of higher learning (“America at its best”) “criticizes” the president of a country targeted for the next war – he inflicts power, not freedom.

When corporations destroy the lives of individuals and communities – they practice power, not freedom.

When Columbia expands, and the community is told to move on – this is the doing of power, not freedom.

The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that power knows nothing of freedom, nor can it claim it for itself. Power is not freedom. Power is power.

And truth must be spoken to power.

Thank you for striking for all of us, and for speaking truth to power.

Gil Anidjar
Associate Professor
Department of Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures
Columbia University

Statement of Solidarity: Columbia University Muslim Students' Association

The Muslim Students' Association stands in solidarity with the movement that demands responsible expansion through community input, increased administrative support, support for Ethnic Studies and revised general education requirements. We support these demands because Columbia University as an institution has demonstrated in the past, and continues to demonstrate, a privileging of certain voices and points of view. The various hate crimes that have occurred on our campus in recent months, as well as disrespectful remarks delivered by the President of our University, are a testament to the systematic marginalization inherent within the structure of Columbia University.

We stand in solidarity with the students who have courageously given their bodies to a movement for student power. We pray for their health and well-being, but recognize that focusing on this particular action would be unjust to their cause. We stand in solidarity with the larger movement that engenders not simply an appreciation of diversity – be it religious, racial, ethnic, class – but a critical understanding and sincere respect of the character of each and every individual.

Statement of Solidarity: RESCUE Ad Hoc Committee

Dear Friends:

On behalf of RESCUE Association/Fund, please convey our most sincere & deepest support to the Hunger-Striking HEROS - Bryan Mercer, Emily Rosenblatt, Victoria Ruiz, Aretha Choi, and Sam Barron - who are using their BLOOD, SWEAT & TEARS to end the continuing Apartheid-Style Racism of the Bollinger Administration.

We FULLY (100%) support their Extraordinary COURAGE to take a stand against the all-powerful Bollinger Administration. We sincerely hope and pray for their continued leadership in taking a stand for this noble cause and issues of Racial Inequality & Subjugation and, hopefully will encourage the other Columbia students, faculty, staff, and administrative employees to fearlessly join in and bring about the much needed real change at this 250-years old Ivy League University.

Most Black and other minority employees at Columbia University already know about the iron-fist dictator type blatant racial discrimination, intimidation, sexual harassment and sujugation tactics of the Bollinger Administration. Bollinger is directly responsible for the illegal retaliation and firings (no questions asked!) of numerous Blacks and other minorities who stood up for any "Racial Equality & Equal Opportunity" at Columbia University. That is why you do not see any Black Professor or Administrator speaking against the Bollinger Administration in public at any time. Bollinger and his executives do not know how to discuss any racial issues reasonably; They only know how to suppress them by the "Iron-Fist." The Black/minority students are the only ones Bollinger cannot directly intimidate and fire; So, those COURAGEOUS Hunger-Strikers stand for ALL OF US - Minority Students, Faculty, Staff & Administrators.

Due to the various lawsuits and motions pending before the Federal Court against the Bollinger Administration, RESCUE is most regrettably unable to participate in the Hunger-Strikes and other protests at the present time, but we are most anxious to pursue these struggles on behalf of the minority students, faculty, and administrative staff of Columbia University at the earliest possible.

[...]

Thank you very much for your courage and God Bless All your efforts!!!

Yours Truly,
Racial Equality Struggles For Columbia University Employees
(RESCUE) Ad Hoc Committee

Statement of Solidarity: Harvard Hunger Strikers of May 2007

We, the Harvard hunger strikers of May 2007, stand in full solidarity with the hunger strike at Columbia.

Across the country, universities have failed to take a stance against injustice, discrimination, displacement, and oppression. But with this hunger strike, you have taken a stance, and it is a just, a dignified and a courageous one. Your action is a powerful example for the forces of change on campuses all over the United States.

Why do students have to go on hunger strike to engage their university? Why do students have to physically stop eating in order for their university to listen to them? The answer is clear: We are their most precious commodity. When we put our health and our lives on the line, we threaten their claims to legitimacy and their hold on power. The hunger strike shatters the illusion by striking at its heart. Complacency is not a lesson worth learning. Solidarity is a lesson worth sharing. Dissent is a lesson worth sharing.

They say they are "for" us, but our universities are not "of" us or "with" us. They are not ours. These are not democratic institutions. These are not places of true learning. But they could be. With every action, with every strike, we are taking back our universities, and we are standing with those who will not let their communities be taken from them.

Last May, Harvard students staged a hunger strike for workers' rights, for an end to poverty wages and the abuse of security guards on campus. Our strike was part of a broader movement among the students of this country to refuse to accept what is being done in our name, and to struggle for another kind of university. Our campaign was won, and we are confident that you, too, will win your demands. Justice is on your side, and so are we.

Some people may, as they did at Harvard, try to make you feel alone in your work, in your passion, in your struggle. But know that you are not alone. You are many, they are few. You have more supporters and allies, brothers and sisters than you may know, in your city and around the world. This statement of solidarity from the Harvard hunger strikers comes from Boston, comes from New York, comes from England, comes from Mexico.

There's an old saying from the labor movement: We'll hold out one day more. One day more than the bosses. One day more than the administration. We know you will. We are with you, and we will be with you to the end.

In Solidarity,
Alyssa Aguilera, Javier Castro, Michael Gould-Wartofsky, Kyle Krahel, Ben Landau-Beispiel, Kelly Lee, Jamila Martin, Jose Olivarez, Matthew Opitz, Kaveri Rajaraman, Jennifer Provost, and Supporters Geoff Carens and Austin Guest

Press Release: Tuesday, November 13, 2007

*** FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE***
Students and faculty decry serious faults within Columbia University's administration
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Contact: Jamie Chen, Student Organizer, eimajine@gmail.com, 240.305.7628
www.cu-strike.blogspot.com

After Columbia University administrators refused to meet negotiators over the weekend despite an ongoing hunger strike, students sat down with Columbia University administrators Monday evening at 6pm. This meeting addressed the demands issued by an ad hoc coalition of students calling for a change in the way the university deals with issues of race and marginalization. The administration's offers echoed conciliatory language of past negotiations that often failed to resolve the crux of students' grievances. Students will continue to meet daily with administrators until a compromise on the demands is reached.

A Statement of Concern from the Columbia University Faculty Action Committee was publicized on Monday evening as well, directly accusing President Bollinger of failing to uphold core university principles (but not mentioning the strike directly). The statement was signed by 70 faculty members, including such scholarly notables as Eric Foner, Mahmood Mamdani, and Nicholas De Genova.

The coalition of students demanding change includes four students who are beginning the seventh day of a hunger strike, undertaken to emphasize the urgency and import of these demands. Spurred by a slew of hate crimes on campus this semester and years of unproductive meetings with administrators, the coalition issued its demands on October 30, 2007, asking for more faculty support for ethnic studies, an ethical expansion into West Harlem by the university, reform of the Core Curriculum to address the marginalization of nonwhite peoples within the West, and a stronger Office of Multicultural Affairs that covers all undergraduate students. Many demands have been fought for in protests of earlier years.

Campus student groups including the Muslim Students' Association, the Black Students' Organization, and Take Back the Night have announced their support of the strike and the demands. A rally on Saturday afternoon drew about 200 students and community members, condemning Columbia's reluctance to address the critical needs of students and the community alike.

Professor of Political Science at Barnard Dennis Dalton has been fasting since last Thursday in an act of solidarity with the student hunger strikers and to push for the demands to be met. Professors from Columbia University's Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race (CSER), the Department of Anthropology, Barnard's Department of Political Science, and the Department of Comparative Literature, as well as professors from other universities have issued statements of solidarity with the demands of the strike and supporters.

Aretha Choi, a Barnard College sophomore, was admitted to St. Luke's Hospital on Saturday evening. She will not continue her hunger strike for medical reasons.

Students continue to meet every night at 9pm at the Sundial on W. 116^th St. between Broadway and Amsterdam to show their support for the strikers.

Stop Hate on Columbia's Campus - 2006

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Statement of Support: Columbia College Student Council

The Columbia College Student Council would like to address the current state of the Columbia Campus. We feel that it is important to acknowledge the history of activism and student protest that have served to the betterment of Columbia, while also acknowledging that there are many different views about the type of protest that is currently taking place. CCSC would like to express its concern for the health of the strikers and wants it to be made known that we will continue to be involved, wherever appropriate, in finding a peaceful resolution to the situation on campus. The events of the last five weeks have had such a large impact on the student body that CCSC has been working extensively to address the issue of hate crimes and bias incidences. With that said, CCSC wishes to look at the issues that are currently at hand and inform the student body of what we voted to support at our most recent meeting. We will be publicizing the recent events in order to inform the greater student body. Many of these issues have been bought up in the past and have not been followed through on. We would like to stress the seriousness of these issues as they pertain to the improving of our University. We will follow up on these issues by working with administrators and students to develop policy initiatives and resolutions, as well as a structure of accountability, to make sure that there is sufficient follow through in this area. We invite student input as we take these steps and it is our hope that they come to us with their ideas. Not only do these issues need to be addressed broadly, they need to be addressed on specific levels. If you read below, you will see the specific goals that CCSC plans to work towards this year.

The Core Curriculum, CCSC Advocates for…

The reformation of the Major Cultures requirement to contain a variety of courses in a seminar format.

More student voices and seats for the Committee on the Core and the Committee on Instruction, as well as voting power for students on both committees, and that their process of selection be better publicized.

Ethnic Studies: CCSC advocates…

Support and autonomy for Ethnic Studies and the departmentalization of the Center for Study of Race and Ethnicity and the Institute for Research in African American Studies

Administrative Reform: CCSC Advocates that…

Columbia’s Public Safety announce instances of hate crimes when they are reported and issue an annual report of reported bias incidents and hate crimes and how they have been addressed. A clear definition of what a bias incident is

The expansion of the Office of Multicultural Affairs with more communication and collaboration between the Office of Multicultural Affairs at Columbia and the Multicultural Affairs Office at Barnard

The hiring of a Vice-Provost of Multicultural Affairs to administer and direct University policies affecting students within all of the schools of the UniversityMandatory anti-Oppression training for all incoming faculty and public safety, with full day workshops, on the level “under1roof”, on issues of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, power and privilege.

The Expansion

The Columbia College Student Council has been doing research and gathering information on the expansion through its expansion committee. The council is not in a position to take a position on the expansion this semester.

Statement of Solidarity: Barnard/Columbia International Socialist Organization

The Barnard/Columbia International Socialist Organization applauds the courage of the hunger strikers and stands with them in demanding change from the Columbia administration. All students who believe that we ought to have a say in the running of our University should actively support the strikers and their demands.

We should not accept a Core Curriculum that presents a top-down view of the development of "Western civilization" as a story of the evolution of the ideas of the ruling class, which misinforms us regarding the driving forces of history and the ability of ordinary people to affect it. We should not accept an Ethnic Studies program without the ability to hire its own professors, which cannot defend them from the attacks of the neo-McCarthyite right. We should not accept a University without a systematic or centralized way of responding to hate crimes on campus. And we should certainly not accept an expansion plan that places the costs of Columbia's growth on the shoulders of the working people of Harlem, a community already under assault by the neoliberalization of New York City policies on housing, crime, and education.

Columbia is a profit-seeking corporation, and substantive change will not come by rational argument or moral suasion alone. A hunger strike is a desperate tactic but a product of necessity. It is past time that progressive students at Columbia unite to force the administration to act.

Statement of Support: Columbia University College Democrats

The Columbia University College Democrats, like the Solidarity Coaltion, are frustrated by the group advising offices' lack of accountability to students. We agree that the system must be reformed so that advisors can help their groups without feeling pressure from the larger administration. Furthermore, the Office of Multicultural Affairs should be expanded, and we hope that the success of the OMA will serve as a model for student group advising in general.

There are clear and specific ways to address the problems as outlined in the Coalition's Administrative Reform demand. Students should have significant representation on a committee for student group advising with hiring and firing capabilities. The current system of disconnected offices with poor communication unnecessarily hinders our efforts to improve life on campus.

The CU Democrats will continue to advocate for these reforms. These proposals are nothing new; the Columbia administration has witnessed repeated calls for a more robust student presence in the advising offices. Annual inaction on the part of the administration has the unfortunate effect of forcing students to confuse bureaucratic inadequacy and ineffectuality for disinterest or disregard. It saddens us to see that our peers are forced to resort to drastic measures in order for their voices to be heard, and we wish them health and success.

Press Release: Monday, November 12, 2007

*** FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE***
Support for the Columbia University hunger strike grows as Barnard professor joins fast and cardboard octopus takes over South Lawn
Monday, November 12, 2007
Contact: Jamie Chen, Student Organizer, eimajine@gmail.com, 240.305.7628
www.cu-strike.blogspot.com

Students met with Columbia University administrators today at 6pm to address demands issued by an ad hoc coalition of students calling for a change in the way the university deals with issues of race and marginalization. The coalition includes four students who are concluding their sixth day of a hunger strike, undertaken to emphasize the urgency and import of these demands. Students are pushing for daily negotiations in order to reach a consensus, given the timely nature of the strike and the pressing need for change felt by students and faculty alike. The administration did not set a time to meet until 3:30 pm on Monday.

Spurred by a slew of hate crimes on campus this semester and years of unproductive meetings with administrators, the coalition issued its demands on October 30, 2007, asking for more faculty support for ethnic studies, an ethical expansion into West Harlem by the university, reform of the Core Curriculum to address the marginalization of nonwhite peoples within the West, and a stronger Office of Multicultural Affairs that covers all undergraduate students.

Professors from Columbia University’s Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race (CSER), the Department of Anthropology, Barnard’s Department of Political Science, and the Department of Comparative Literature, as well as professors from other universities have issued statements of solidarity with the demands and actions of the hunger strikers and supporters. Campus student groups including the Muslim Students’ Association, the Black Students’ Organization, Take Back the Night, and the Asian American Alliance Political Committee have also announced their support. A rally on Saturday afternoon drew about 200 students and community members from Harlem and elsewhere who condemned Columbia’s reluctance to address the critical needs of students and the community alike.

A statement from CSER stated its concern “about the health of our institution in responding to these actions.” Professor of Political Science at Barnard Dennis Dalton has been fasting since last Thursday in an act of solidarity with the student hunger strikers and to push for the demands to be met.

Over the weekend, Columbia University administrators refused to meet. Aretha Choi, a Barnard College sophomore, was admitted to St. Luke’s Hospital on Saturday evening. She will not continue her hunger strike for medical reasons. A cardboard octopus that “eats affordable housing” has also appeared on South Lawn, provoking discussion on an expansion that will likely displace thousands of people in Harlem.

Students continue to meet every night at 9pm at the Sundial on W. 116^th St. between Broadway and Amsterdam to show their support for the strikers.

Statement of Solidarity: Students for Justice in Palestine, Xinaxtli, Ethnic Studies Undergraduate Student Collective Kalaam (UC Berkeley)

Dear Columbia University Hunger Strikers,

We support your hunger strike, and we support your desire for change that we too believe is worth sacrifice.

As UC Berkeley students, we also feel that our university does not recognize the importance for the critical study of race through all departments on our campus, nor does it provide sufficient resources for our Ethnic Studies Department. We also feel that our university does not offer adequate administrative support for the recruitment and retention of students of color and their concerns.

We support you because we want our university to realize these needs as fundamental to our lives and because we want to reclaim our university as truly ours.

Most importantly, we support you because we want to reimagine the university. We understand that today, education is a matter of personal investment. The maximization of profit and efficiency measure success, and research is fast and reliable. The university and other institutions of higher education thus operate like corporations. We do not want our university to be an engineer of nation states and empires. We do not want a corporate university; we want a people’s university.

Input on these issues in meetings/conferences, through protests/rallies, and through other avenues of vocalization have also been ignored or patronized on our campus, and the responses to our demands have essentially been nonexistent. We overstand your decision to hunger strike and hunger striking as a physical symbol of your/our intellectual and spiritual starvation under the university administration’s current policies.

From UC Berkeley, we offer ourselves to you because we share your struggle and convictions. We imagine with you and we continue the fight on our campus. We stand in solidarity with you, and we are here for you. We learn from you, and your actions motivate us to persist and to resist. We are your comrades, and every day we send you love and positive energy.

Whose university? OUR university!

With our minds, our bodies, and our souls,

Students for Justice in Palestine
Xinaxtli
Ethnic Studies Undergraduate Student Collective Kalaam

“Until the philosophy that holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned, everywhere is at war.”
–Bob Marley

Statement of Support: Faculty of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race (CSER)

November 11, 2007

We, members of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race core faculty and faculty advisory board, are very concerned for the health of our students who are involved in the hunger strike, now entering its sixth day, and we are worried about the health of our institution in responding to these actions.

The hunger strike by Columbia and Barnard students was prompted by a chain of racial incidents, but it is directed to longer standing issues, including Columbia's expansion to Manhattanville, inadequate support for ethnic studies, and the failure of the Core Curriculum to engage in a sustained way with issues of race and ethnicity and with non-European cultures.

We concur with the students' sense that recent incidents at Columbia indicate the need to build, bolster, and strengthen the community's investment in research, teaching and administrative practices that challenge racial, ethnic, gender and sexual hierarchies. The university community as a whole needs to be reflexive about this moment: internal conflict at Columbia exhibits deeper tensions in the U.S. body politic and its education system.

The familiarity of the racist symbols that have been deployed (nooses, anti-Muslim slurs, swastikas) belies the newness of the situation that we face. Columbia is experiencing a highly mediated form of politics that test the practice of a key academic value, sustained and open discussion. We believe it is important for the community to be aware of this and to create spaces to address these challenges. Engaging the politics of the present requires investment in research infrastructure, patient and sustained discussion, and a willingness by students, faculty and administrators alike to confront the challenges before us with creativity and perseverance.

We are disappointed that there were no negotiations over the weekend. In order to protect the health of the students and the well-being of the community, we urge the administration and striking students to engage in responsible negotiations immediately.

Signed:
Coco Fusco
Nicholas De Genova
Jean Howard
Wen Jin
George Lewis
Claudio Lomnitz
Nicole Marwell
Frances Negrón-Muntaner
Mae Ngai
Gary Okihiro
Pablo Piccato
Elizabeth Povinelli
Bruce Robbins
Sandyha Shukla

Statement of Solidarity: Columbia Coalition Against the War

We, the Columbia Coalition Against the War, stand in solidarity with the hunger strikers and their demands for a fully supported Ethnic Studies department, an ethical expansion plan, an inclusive core, and administrative reform. As opponents of the Iraq War, we question a university that invests money in weapons manufacturers but does not move to fund a strong Ethnic Studies or African-American Studies program. In a country that ignores the self-determination of those occupied in Iraq, we question a university that single-mindedly forces its own plan for expansion upon the Harlem community. While racism is used to justify aggression and paternalism abroad, we fear the dangers of a narrow-minded curriculum and an administration that responds inconsistently to hate crimes and remains silent as Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week is paraded through our campus. Until the demands of the hunger strikers are met, Columbia University stands complicit in the racism and aggression that plagues our society and fails miserably to meet the standards of a global university that extends respect towards all of its students and the surrounding community.

As members of Columbia University, we all have the right and the responsibility to hold our university to the high standards it claims to uphold. Through their hunger, the strikers seek institutional change that will nourish people within and around Columbia University for years to come. The Columbia Coalition Against the War applaud their courageous efforts and call on the administration to provide an immediate response to their demands.

Statement of Solidarity: Prof. Nicholas De Genova

Statement in Solidarity with the Student Hunger Strikers
12 November 2007

I am sincerely honored and deeply gratified to salute the Columbia University students engaged in the present hunger strike against the generalized climate of racial hostility and tolerance for racism that pervade Columbia University.

The hunger strike could not be more perfectly or candidly explained than in the strikers’ own proclamation: “We strike because we abhor, viscerally, the failure of current administrators to address student concerns on these issues and because this failure constitutes violence against our intellect.” May there be no doubts about this fundamental truth: These students have been pushed and goaded by the arrogant and condescending intransigence of the university’s highest administrators into these desperate measures. These students’ persistent devotion to their cause has been routinely insulted; their exorbitant patience has been exhausted. Now, they heroically sacrifice their own physical comfort and good health in order to rouse the hearts and minds of the wider community to a higher calling. In so doing, these students valiantly embody some of the most elevated and truly universal human ideals: they dedicate their critical intellects and their moral imaginations – and more important, they put their bodies on the line – to decry and defy the racial oppression that engulfs them in contemporary society, and which is made all the more excruciatingly vulgar by the lofty pretensions and craven dissimulations of our university’s elitist presumptions of scholarly erudition.

Like their peers who, almost exactly one year ago, defied the repugnant paramilitary organization, the Minutemen, when it brought its thinly disguised racist advocacy of vigilante violence to our campus – only then to be publicly denounced and humiliated by the university’s president and then institutionally sanctioned – the hunger strikers represent and enact in practice the most esteemed and glorified aspirations of any university worthy of the name. They deserve only our admiration and encouragement as they truly teach the rest of our community and the wider society essential lessons about political courage and moral integrity, and turn abstract knowledge and theoretical concerns into elementary but fundamental practices of freedom and social transformation.

I am proud to share this campus with these student protesters. May their example flourish and inspire countless comparable acts of liberation!

Nicholas De Genova
Assistant Professor
Anthropology and Latina/o Studies
Columbia University
(from sabbatical leave in Great Britain)

Statement of Solidarity: Michael Omi and Howard Winant

Michael Omi and Howard Winant are Ethnic Studies scholars and the authors of Racial Formations in the United States (1994), widely considered to be one of the foundational texts in contemporary Ethnic Studies scholarship. Their statement is posted below.

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Today, racism is narrowly understood in ways that obscure rather than reveal its pervasiveness. It is often seen as merely the irrational beliefs or actions of individuals. Your strike redirects our attention toward the institutions, and policies and practices, that reproduce racial inequality and domination.

Is Columbia University such an institution? You are challenging Columbia, as others have done in the past, to fulfill its responsibilities to students, to the community at large, and to social equality and justice.

We are moved and inspired by your insight, energy, and vision.

Michael Omi
University of California, Berkeley

Howard Winant
University of California, Santa Barbara

Statement from Aretha Choi

It is 8.29am. On the day five that I wish I could have seen as a hunger striker. The fatigue from the 3:00 am return from the doctor is far from leaving me nor is the headache or the jello-like body, but I cannot stop thinking of those four days. In fact I have gotten used to the 8:30 am wake up call (often given by Crystal, David or the wonderful someone on duty) for the health service check up - I have gotten used to my life as a Hunger Striker.

So as I write this in the warmth of my dorm room, I regret over and over that I could not make it to today. And my disappointment increases as I remember the bitter tears that I forced down while being hauled out of the reading room in Butler library. That trip on the stretcher from room 209 to St. Luke's hospital was one of the longest rides of my life to say the least. Why? Because amidst the whispering voices of passersby, the asking of my date of birth and the flashing lights, I felt defeated. I felt utterly ashamed and I felt that I had let the four other strikers, the many supporters, and myself down. Only 4 days? Only 4 days? Only 4 days? That was the question plaguing me until I was laying with fluids running into my arm.

Lying in the starchy hospital bed, I was covered in self-disappointment. I could not help but wish God had given me more strength so that my body would have held out longer. I wanted to go back out to the tents. I felt like I had given up.

I must admit, I will never be content with the 4 days because I wanted to see demands made into realities. And no matter how much other strikers and supporters tell me not to feel this way, I am sorry but my selfish side will always wish that I could have made day five and the next and the next until needed.

Despite this feeling, however, I refuse to get lost or to linger too long in this feeling of "not enough." I refuse to because I still have demands I want. I refuse because I am mad that the adminsistration even waited long enough so I would be taken to the E.R. I refuse to because my family--my fellow students--are still out there and I WILL SUPPORT THEM.

Although I will not be able to be out at the tents right away, I do want to say that I will always be in Solidarity via thoughts and prayers until I go back to the tents as a supporter. And, I want everyone to know that although I am unsatisfied with 4 days, this is not the end. I want the adminstration to know that 4 days was obviously too long of a time for me to wait while they are on their little vacations to Cape Cod or wherever they go to escape their responsibilties. I want those students who taunt my fellow friends with nasty comments filled with disgusting ignorance, the member of the cava crew that mocked me and the entire hunger strike as I was hauled to the E.R, the unresponsive administration, and all those who just don't care because "it doesn't concern them" to know: I might have only made it to day 4 but WE, the students who care enough about Columbia University to want to change enough to starve and to hurt for it will remain strong.

With these words, I send my love and continual support for the students who actually care to do something because you are the change, you are my heroes, you are why I am here. I send my thanks for those who have given empathy, passion, and spirit to the cause.

Thanks for the four days...
4 days will always be too long--the adminstration should have responded before then
4 days will always be too short--I will always wish I could have lasted longer
4 days will always be with me to the end--I have learned to act and to love what I believe is Truth. I have learned that this University, this society, this world is a world worth caring about because the people who refuse to accept injustice as the norm and who take action to make change.
5 days, 6 days, and until the change: I am here to stay.

Solidarity, love, and justice
Yours always,

Aretha Choi

Statement from the strikers' support team

This evening, one hunger striker was admitted to St. Luke's hospital. She will not continue the strike for personal medical reasons.

Organizers, other strikers, and supporters are aware that risks to the body are inherent in the action of a hunger strike, and we greatly respect her commitment to doing what she and others feel is a necessary action to demand change at the university.

Her hunger strike is over, but her commitment to the demands — support for ethnic studies, an ethical expansion, reform of the Core, and an accountable and supportive administration — continues. We hope that members of the Columbia community who identify with these issues will challenge themselves and others to act for change.

-the strikers' support team

Prof. Dennis Dalton joins strike

As the Spec recently reported, Dennis Dalton, Professor of Political Science at Barnard and a Gandhian scholar, has joined the hunger strike in solidarity with the strikers and the demands, though he prefers the term "fast" to "hunger strike." He notes that he will be living off of water and orange juice, and will continue to teach classes.

We, of course, welcome Professor Dalton into our movement!

Ethnic Studies Strikes - 1996 Photos

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Statement of Solidarity: Mark Rudd

Mark Rudd was one of the leaders of the famous 1968 student strike and campus takeover at Columbia.

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Dear Striking Students and Supporters:

Once again students are forced to assume the role of mind and heart for this poor, sclerotic institution, Columbia University. The fight to bring fundamental fairness, equity, and concern for community to this elite university has been going on for generations, and will continue for generations more. Thank you for showing us all the heart of compassion through the courage of your action. You are a blessing that must be cherished.

Mark Rudd

Statement of Solidarity: Prof. Hamid Dabashi

I write this note in complete solidarity with all the crucial points that the students on hunger strike have courageously raised and have indeed plagued our university under its current administration. I very much hope the university administration will meet with these students and address their concerns in an enduring and meaningful way.

Hamid Dabashi
Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature

A Rally of Solidarity and Support

Pictures from the community rally:

At the Low Library steps -


Marching to Lee Bollinger's (President of Columbia) house -





In front of Bollinger's house -











Marching back to Columbia -


At the Columbia Sundial -

A Striker on the First Day of Negotiations

“We want the students out of their tents, back in the dorms and to the dining halls as soon as possible” – Provost Alan Brinkley at today’s negotiating meeting

Our university administrators offer such kind gestures displaying the Churchill-esque grandiosity of their sentiments. A sentiment that holds the health of the students as their primary concern, yet when told in that very meeting one of the strikers was wheelchaired away because of low blood sugar they only had blank stares to express their sentiment. So what is the sentiment of this university administration - is it to show face for our health, or another paternalistic statement without addressing the heart of the issue. Our health is not tied to our desire for the comfort of dorms and dining halls. Our health is tied to the willingness of Brinkley and the others in that room to respond to our demands, and reach a binding agreement in good faith with the negotiators. For so many in that room to tell the negotiators that their priority was to end the strike, while waiting through the weekend and until the 6th day to continue talks puts into question that priority. As the negotiators said, herein the contradiction lies: we are left to go longer without food while administrators attend weddings, benefits, and weekend relaxation from the uncomfortable work situation we are surely putting them in. We will wait. But the responsibility in the case of our concerns not being swiftly and consistently heard is not our own, but the situation we strike within and what we strike for: support Ethnic Studies with professors and hiring power, update Major Cultures with classes on colonialism and race, expand responsibly through community input, and increase administrative support.

We hope the talks continue well. Our people have come to the table, prepared to defend these issues yet another time after meetings in 2004 for CUCSC, 2006 for SHOCC and last spring for Ethnic Studies Now! The table has been closed however, we are only allowed a small number of observers, confined to the narrow definition of ‘student leaders.’ But when it comes to the title of ‘student leader,’ we have learned through our own actions that any students or people of conscious can lead in these times. We cannot settle on being told only some of us are ‘leaders,’ and as leaders we must wait.

Caring for ourselves through the first weekend,
And looking forward to the Marcus Garvey Park Drummers

A Hunger Striker

The first negotiation meeting: a report-back

Support has been flowing in from everywhere--sympathetic security guards have dropped off sleeping bags, and Dr. Vicky Gholson (a community organizer in Harlem and one of last night's panelists), dropped off a gigantic tent. Vigils have drawn together strikers, organizers, and supporters consistently, even in the pouring rain, and statements of support have been on the rise. I even hear rumblings that Dennis Dalton, Professor of Political Science at Barnard, is joining in on the strike (!?). I anticipate a strong showing of community support at today's rally as well.

Yesterday's negotiating meetings, however, were nothing less than frustrating. Here's a report back:
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At about 11:15AM, we met with Dean Ajay Nair (Associate Dean of Student Affairs, CC/SEAS) and Dean Chris Colombo (Dean of Student Affairs, CC/SEAS), who promptly informed us that the other administrative members whom we requested at the meeting refused to meet given our requested conditions: that the meeting be open to silent observation from the public. While we explained our position--that public meetings are a visual display of transparency and our efforts to change the typical and historically frustrating terms of negotiation behind closed doors-- we were informed by Colombo that the admin would not budge on this point. In the interest of moving forward, we as a negotiation team decided to a private meeting and would advocate therein for more open meetings in the future.

We met at 12:30PM in the Intercultural Resource Center (IRC); representing the admin were: Provost Alan Brinkley; Austin Quigley, Dean of Columbia College; Nicholas Dirks, Vice President of Arts & Sciences; Maxine Griffith, Executive Vice President for Government & Community Affairs; and Deans Colombo and Nair. We began the meeting by reading aloud a statement from the strikers, and the remainder of the one-hour meeting was to set the procedural terms for meetings in the future. They are, as follows:

-A capped number of students will be allowed to sit in on all meetings as private observers. We ourselves suggested this, as a way for a variety of students--student council reps, underclassmen (to better understand the process for the future), etc.--to be able to observe the ongoing debate. The number of students is currently up for debate; admin were reluctant to consider 20, and so we are currently drafting a proposal for 15, trying to find a proper balance of students whom we would wish to be there to witness the process. Moreover, it is our mandate that the lists be rotating, so that more than just 15 students overall will be able to take part.

-There will be two types of negotiation meetings: one on the expansion demands, one on the other 3 (the Core, Ethnic Studies, administrative support). Until issues are resolved, the two will receive equal time. Certain administrators, however, will be expected (and some have shown interest) to appear in both meetings.

-There will be a moderator at meetings, to make sure that no one side takes up the majority of the time and space during meetings. Both sides need to come to agreement on who the moderator would be, however.

-All administrators in meetings will be reached when we contact the admin, and thus all must be held accountable to such. This term rose out of a concern that certain administrators were automatically serving as the liaisons to the students; administrators promptly replied that they receive too many emails a day to reasonably and promptly respond in time, and thus the Deans of Student Affairs would continue to serve as the go-betweens. Our intent here was, again, to make the communications process more transparent.
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The next meetings are scheduled for Monday--admin responded that they would be away over the weekend, and thus not available en masse until the 6th day of the strike. Yet, thus is the fundamental contradiction, or puzzling element, to their arguments--while individual administrators repeatedly stressed their commitment to ending the strike as soon as possible, and in concern for the health of the strikers, this is certainly late in the process already. Moreover, when we were text messaged mid-meeting that one of the strikers had just been taken to Health Services in a wheelchair because of low blood pressure, not one admin responded vocally (and only one approached us on the matter afterwards. FYI, the individual in question is feeling better).

The administration might want to take the position that they ultimately can't be held accountable should the strike be prolonged and the health of the strikers put at risk--and that it would be our fault for not agreeing to call off the strike if we felt dissatisfied. The strikers have put their faith in those of us who advocate the demands for them, and it is highly problematic to assume that the onus is on the negotiators to see to the health and safety of the strikers--whose reason for striking in the first place was due to the failure of the administration to adequately hear and meet their concerns in times past.

Brinkley said in the meeting that the negotiations and meetings would stretch on further than the end of the strike. We are, of course, aware of this. But we are also aware of our lack of power, and the University's ability to not fulfill its promises--and it was only in the wake of student action that we were able to secure such a meeting in the first place.

-the negotiators

Statement of Solidarity: The 1996 hunger strikers & organizers for Ethnic Studies

Back to the future

Student strikers sleeping in tents outside of Butler. Rallies at the Sundial. Demands debated in articles and conversations. Conservatives joking about pizza and BBQs. In short, it's 1996 all over again.

Except it isn't. There are the amusing superficial differences, of course. Today's protesters all have cell phones; there is a strike blog and Facebook page. In 1996, we shared a single cell phone, and our virtual presence was limited to forwarded emails.

But there are also deeper differences. The strike in 1996 was about addressing a historical absurdity: the absence of Ethnic Studies at Columbia 25 years after most universities had recognized the importance of this field of study.

Today's strike is about having the University keep its promises.

Take expansion, for example. Columbia may need more space; it may even need to raze a neighborhood to build a brand-new campus (we are skeptical). Since 1968, however, the University has known that it cannot act like just another run-of-the-mill slum lord in its interactions with the surrounding community. Yet its draft environmental impact statement for the Manhattanville project downplays the direct displacement of 300 residents (a number that rises to 3,300 when it considers indirect displacements) and the loss of 880 jobs. Even if we set aside the important question of whether these are accurate estimates, this attempt at minimizing the human consequences of expansion is worrisome. The University must ensure that basic community needs--affordable housing and good jobs--are central to its expansion plans. We remember the redevelopment of the Audubon Ballroom. Where are the jobs Columbia promised the community then?

Or take Ethnic Studies, the issue with which we are most familiar. In 1996 one of the central issues was faculty hiring for Latino/a and Asian American Studies. We wanted the hires to be independent of the traditional departments, whose resistance to Ethnic Studies was (and is) well-documented. Instead, the University created lines to be shared between the Ethnic Studies programs and the departments. The result: a revolving door for promising junior Ethnic Studies faculty who are refused tenure by their "other" department, and a chronic inability to attract senior faculty who are put off by the University's complete lack of support for their field of study. Rather than becoming the leading Ethnic Studies center on the East Coast--given its location, a goal well within reach--the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race has spent a decade floundering. Another promise unmet.

In 1996, it took 15 days of striking, the overnight occupation of Low Library by several hundred students and subsequent arrest of 22 students by the NYPD, and a five day occupation of Hamilton Hall for the University administration to engage in meaningful discussions with student representatives. We can only hope that the current administration is prompter to listen this time around.

In solidarity,

Marcel Agüeros

Daniel Alarcón

Jane Sung E Bai

Michael Maldonado

Vivian Santiago

on behalf of the Ad-Hoc Coalition on Ethnic Studies and the Core Curriculum

Statement of Solidarity: Asian American Alliance Political Committee

We, members of the Asian American Alliance Political Committee, stand in solidarity with the hunger strikers and the demands that they have made, and extend our political, personal, and emotional support to the strikers and the movement for which they stand.

We deplore the acts of hatred and racism that have shocked and tainted our campus over the past several weeks, and, like the strikers, seek an administration that will better hear the concerns of student populations that are so easily and readily marginalized. We have been active participants in advocating the amelioration of Ethnic Studies programs for years, and see our intellectual and organizational endeavors as part of this collective campaign for student demands to be met. Moreover, we recognize the inextricable ties between the different issues and concerns that the strikers have put forth, and that any one matter cannot be abstracted from the others.

We celebrate a long-standing history of Asian American students’ participation in struggles for justice and equality, including in the student protests of 1996 at Columbia that led to the formation of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race and Asian American Studies as a discipline—-and similar efforts on campuses all across the country. We encourage all concerned students, Asian American or not, at Columbia or elsewhere, to also stand in support of the strikers, and for what they fight.

As famed Asian American activist Yuri Kochiyama once said, "I don't think there will ever be a time when people will stop wanting to bring about change." May this be the next chapter in that legacy of struggle.

-the Asian American Alliance Political Committee of Columbia University

Statement of Solidarity: Take Back the Night

We at Take Back the Night stand in solidarity with the hunger strikers at Columbia, because we recognize the connections between institutional racism and violence in our community and because we know how deeply interconnected racism, sexism, and homophobia are. We believe that in order to foster a safe, supportive, and inspiring community of minds and bodies, we must uproot all forms of institutionalized violence. Thus, the strikers demands are crucial for creating an equally safe and empowering environment for students and residents alike. By reclaiming and creating safe spaces, we begin to be powerful and can foster alliances between communities within and beyond the Gates.

-Take Back the Night

Statement of Solidarity: Nell Geiser

Nell Geiser is an alum of Columbia and a former member of SPEaK (Students Promoting Empowerment and Knowledge).

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The demands of CU Solidarity are not new. The power of this protest is that it demands a historical memory and legacy that Columbia administrators systematically deny to students by presenting the institution as always and already caring, inclusive, "diverse," and accountable. The power of this protest is that students have reclaimed the history of dissent and mobilization at Columbia and against Columbia. The administration cannot hide behind pleas of innocence and ignorance when it has dodged the same demands for President Bollinger's entire six year tenure, and for decades before that. Core reform, substantive support for Ethnic Studies, commitments to address institutional racism, and real accountability to the West Harlem community have been a very long time in coming.

During my time at Columbia we mobilized against racism in 2004 and won the Office of Multicultural Affairs, which has done important work but has little leverage in Low Library. In 2006 we fought to stop hate on Columbia's campus and we won very little. We drew on the legacy of 1968, 1985, 1996. This year, students are also drawing on the recent legacy of 2004 and 2006 to demonstrate the unmet promises and outstanding demands and they've harnessed momentum in a new way. I fully support the hunger strikers and the hundreds of students calling for a more just and accountable Columbia University.

-Nell Geiser, CC '06

Statement of Solidarity: Alexis Pauline Gumbs

These words of support come from a former Columbia student involved in the protests surrounding the hate crimes and bias incidents of 2004. This piece was originally read during her time here at CU.

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No Place Like... Living in a Small Brown Place Self, Space and Universe(city)

It comes as a great shock to discover that the country which is your birthplace and to which you owe your life and identity has not, in its whole system of reality evolved any place for you.
—James Baldwin (boldness mine)

Home. A small brown place.

Who would have thought standing up would be such a complex contortion, or that walking on brick would become such a frantic dance? I often wonder if I really have the nerve to be all at once black and woman and visible and here for even one more minute. The space that I am completely free in ends at (and too often because of) the barrier of my brown skin.

Home. A small brown place.

And even that barrier is at risk. I earn my keep at this university by embodying diversity. By being the one on the panel
heading the committee
writing the article
explainingexplaining breathing and explaining.

Home. A small brown place.

Columbia University, despite its lies to itself and you,
despite not paying taxes
despite real estate takeover
is in Harlem.

Home. A small brown place.

The Intercultural Resource Center is a never-been-big-enough brownstone. What I do here is called living. The floors and doors are me-colored wood, but if you look, the walls and ceilings are definitely white. I spend most of my time in here staining white paper and the walls themselves with words colored like hope.

Home. A small brown place.

I am convinced that constant movement in my legs, feet, arms, and hands will grant me infinity despite my less than 100 brown pounds. I am convinced that I have every right to stand on the sundial and scream for joy in the middle of the day, because I am the place where the sun makes her mark. I try harder to believe those engravings about the public good on Low Library every time I walk by. I think when those words change from stone and live and breathe they'll look a lot like me and you. Prove me right.

Statement of Solidarity: Dr. Carlos Muñoz, Jr.

Greetings of solidarity to all of you who have had the courage to go on hunger strike for social justice and for dramatically speaking truth to power. Those in power must learn that education is a human right. Whether you obtain all your specific worthy goals or not, you will be victorious because victory is in the struggle!

Love, peace, and justice,

Dr. Carlos Muñoz, Jr.
Professor Emeritus
Department of Ethnic Studies
University of California at Berkeley
http://ethnicstudies.berkeley.edu/faculty/munoz/

Statement of Solidarity: Rutgers Against the War

As fellow students, we look on with deep moral outrage as the administration of Columbia University callously harms the students, faculty and members of the community that the university is designed to help. Its goal of displacing thousands of Harlem residents and its inability to provide an atmosphere opposing bigotry has greatly saddened many onlookers across the country, defaming the school’s reputation and hurting its image. We are dismayed that the core curriculum lacks viewpoints suppressed by Western thought. We are also dismayed that the university took no stance against a noose being hung.

It is for this reason that we throw our full support behind the hunger strike being conducted at Columbia. The brave students sacrificing for a just university are not alone. We recognize that universities need the compliance of the students to function. As a result, it is the moral imperative of the students to tell their administration that their university will not function with their silence. We support the efforts of the Columbia Students who are voicing everyone’s concern at the present situation.

Members of Rutgers Against the War supported Columbia students in their protest against David Horowitz and his “Islamo-facism Awareness Week.” We stand with them now when they are sacrificing their bodies to send a message to the world that our universities will not be used as a tool of oppression, propaganda, and bigotry. We will continue to support the hunger strikers with information, solidarity rallies and whatever else is required until justice prevails at Columbia University.

Signed,
Rutgers Against the War

Day Three: A Striker's Report

A reminder that tomorrow (Sat 10/10) is the community protest, 12:30PM on Low Plaza. A Harlem contingent is meeting up at St. Mary's Church (126th St., between Broadway and Amsterdam) at 11:30 and will march down to meet the main event.

This is being posted on behalf of Aretha, one of the strikers:

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It is day three and my head is spinning. The dizziness does not seem to subside, but I still feel compelled to write and to voice out why I am striking. And why I refuse to STOP. Although I have already clearly stated why I am striking as an individual, let me clarify why I am hunger striking as a Barnard Student. I am addressing this question because I have been asked over and over again by friends, professors, and family why I am striking if almost all of the demands are specifically "Columbia University" based (especially the core reform and several aspects of ethnic studies) and if the Barnard administration seems to have it own way with changes in the curriculum. So for every one who is wondering why am I, a Barnard student, is starving let me explain:

First and foremost, I want to make it clear that one act of injustice is an act of injustice to all. Therefore when my fellow classmates and friends are not getting a nutritional education, I am affected. In fact, the reason I am who I am today is because of the knowledge and education that I have received from many of my fellow friends, many of which have taken the ethnic studies classes that exist thanks to the strike of 1996. It is by no means an understatement to say that I have often learned more from my friends than I have in the classroom. With that said, if those few ethnic studies classes did not exist, the "me" right now would not exist because my friends would not be able to teach me.

If this argument does not seem to convince you, think of the racist incidents of the noose and swatstica that have pervaded and created fear on Campus. It was made very clear that these hate crimes were directed towards very specific groups of people, but does that mean it didn't affect everyone? Does that mean you aren't supposed to care? I hope not. I know not.

So when people are confused and when people think my form of support as a Barnard student is extreme, I want to say: I think your lack of support is extreme. I am here in solidarity and because I AM starving when my friends are starving from the lack of true Knowledge. I am here in solidarity because I AM deeply affected by any hate crime on campus or in the community.

Every day, I remind myself I am here because I don't want Columbia University to become a part of the cycle of injustice and racism in the world. I would hope that as an Educational Institution, Columbia would be teaching True Knowledge so that whenever and whoever graduates can be the change that this world needs. My heart curdles at the thought of Columbia University being a money-making institution rather than a place to educate the self. What happens to the world when the people who are graduating are not provided with the opportunity to taste what a truly filling education is like?

Although I know that this hunger strike is not going to obliterate racism or injustice, and although I know that change does not happen in a day, I do know that every individual matters.

So, I will strike until the demands are met because my friends' demands are my demands too. And, I will strike although my family is not the family who is being kicked out of their home because of an expansion plan. And, I will strike because I have a right, not only as a Barnard student, but as an individual to want change and to want Justice. Until then, the support, the love, ,the empathy, and the solidarity is my fuel. It is my food.

Be the change you wish to see in the world

Day one, and evening two - an update

From the center of Butler Lawn. Day one gone. The evening of day two is approaching. The hunger strikers have slept their first night, outside and subsisting solely on water, electrolytes and the love of friends and adherents to the demands. We have had a number of questions over the past two days, and we write this letter to begin to answer some of those questions, and continue the conversation around these issues.

The question that most frequently arises is, “How are you feeling?” All of us are in different states but on the whole, there are the hunger pains, a slight light headedness and fatigue. All of us however are out and about, attending our classes and taking exams, talking with those who approach our tent. Also interacting with those who last night attended the first of the nightly vigils in support. Today again there was a rally at the sundial, and statements were shared in solidarity. These showings have been crucial for the other thing we are feeling is the cold of being outside, and it is the growing strength of the movement that keeps us warm.

Another question we often get is, “What do you need?” So many have kindly offered blankets, sleeping bags, tea and other material needs. We have appreciated every offer, and feel that our material needs are being well looked to. One level of support that can be extended is providing inspiration for us to continue – think art, music, good conversation, does anyone have a boombox? With that we want people to also know we need your support around these demands. So we would like to turn around the question of “what do you need”, as instead a question of “what can I do, for the hunger strikers and myself?” It will be the creativity of others who want to see these changes amongst themselves and in relation with this administration that will support us the most, and get us eating again.

Which leads to the question, “what are the plans of the hunger strikers?” We plan to strike until the demands are met. If change comes slowly (which unfortunately it often has on the watch of this university) we will hold out, until change is made or doctors say we can go no longer. If change is moving slowly we ask one thing of our supporters and believers in these demands - take action.

But how can we ask you to take action if you are not totally clear on what we are depriving ourselves of food for? This is one comment, and very valid critique we have gotten from sympathizers and skeptics alike. Our demands seem too many, our demands seem too broad, our demands seem unachievable. We do believe our demands are very simple things, which can be achieved, in a timely fashion. What they require however is a different orientation of the university, and its community. This is exactly what we are calling attention to: that addressing one of these issues alone does not reveal the systematic nature of the problem. The question is not “why do you have so many demands?” but “why has the university left so much to be demanded?” We ask those who see our demands as not specific enough, or too broad, or too many, to take a look again at the detailed version (core, expansion, ethnic studies, admin reform - we know it may appear verbose, apologies are expected from the bureaucracy making it complicated) and not try to weigh each individual demand on its own but instead look behind these demands. Look to what they stand for, a beginning of the end of repeated marginalization, exclusion and silencing of students within this community.

So once again, tonight there is a vigil at 9pm as there will be every night the strike lasts. We ask people to also take the time to sign our petition, come by the tents, and talk to a friend about what’s going on. Saturday look forward to a community rally, with Harlem residents and people from throughout New York.

Finally discussions with the administration will begin tomorrow at noon. Wish us luck, and ohh... dont forget to come out. We want students there to hear for themselves what is on the table. Expect an update later tonight on where that meeting will be.

New online petition!

I'm posting outside the tents at 3:30AM as the strikers sleep. It's freezing out here... but the strikers seem to be well-protected.

A new online petition can be found here. Please sign it, and tell your friends!

Ryan

Statement from the Strikers

Why We Strike...

We are on hunger strike because we want change and because we believe that change is worth sacrifice. We strike against a university that seems not to care for the well-being of its students or of its community. We strike because we feel the urgency of a student voice that is continually being marginalized. We strike because we don’t want students in the future to have to resort to drastic measures to affect change in this institution.

We strike because student input on these issues in meetings, through protests, and through other avenues of vocalization has been ignored or patronized, and the response to our demands for change has been woefully insufficient. We strike because we abhor, viscerally, the failure of current administrators to address student concerns on these issues and because this failure constitutes violence against our intellect. We strike because these are not matters that will, nor can, wait.

We have no more words for this university administration. Hunger striking is an ideal course of action because it does not inflict harm on others; moreover, it offers strikers the opportunity for introspection and self-examination. We strike for the opportunity to reflect. We are peaceful.

We strike because we have inherited a world in which racist, gendered, and sexualized hierarchies dominate the way power flows. We strike because the administration consistently resists implementing structural changes that will allow us to challenge these hierarchies. We strike because the university does not recognize that the lack of space for the critical study of race through Ethnic Studies, the lack of administrative support for minority students and their concerns, the lack of engagement with the community in West Harlem, and the lack of true reform of the Core Curriculum are harmful to the intellectual life of its students. We strike because we want the administration to understand that these needs are as fundamental to students’ intellectual lives as food is to the human body.

We strike to reimagine the university as a more democratic place, where individuals are not isolated until communities are attacked, where we are at school in the City of New York, not making New York City more like this school, where students have a deciding say in this university, and where we are not called to a civilizing mission, but rather, to a process of liberation.

We are not striking to be martyrs for anyone or for any cause. We know that some may misunderstand our actions, but we strike with the faith that students questioning, challenging, and taking their own actions to shift the dangerous path that this university is pursuing should serve more to unite us than to divide us.

There has been tremendous unrest on campus this semester, these past few years, this past decade. And people here feel psychically hurt by Columbia’s indifference to our heartache, to our struggle, to our rumbling need for a better university. With luck, Columbia will see the starvation of our bodies as a bellwether of our growing desperation on this campus. It’s a shame that Columbia was not more alarmed when we said our minds, hearts, and spirits were starving, too.

Frequently Asked Questions

1.) Why now?

The recent acts of hate on this campus have lent urgency to a long-existing effort to address this university’s climate of marginalization. Furthermore, we coordinate our efforts around the City Planning’s decision on Columbia’s rezoning proposal for West Harlem, which is due in less than two months. Lastly, we act in solidarity with the students that recently mobilized around the Jena Six case, which we see as a larger struggle against racism and injustice.

2.) How do acts of hate affect and relate to campus climate?

On September 24, controversial Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited campus, and Columbia President Lee Bollinger delivered polarizing introductory remarks, dividing the world between "civilized" and "ignorant," and feeding into a national drumbeat to war. Less than two days later, racist and anti-Muslim graffiti appeared in SIPA. Within the weeks that followed, a Black Teacher's College professor found a noose hanging from her office door, and anti-Semitic graffiti defaced Lewisohn Hall and the office door of a Jewish professor at Teacher's College.

That the University’s policies and structures inadequately reflect a commitment to understanding and thinking critically about race, gender, culture, and power only mirrors and reinforces the atmosphere stirred by the recent acts of hate.

The Office of Multicultural Affairs lacks the staffing and space to sufficiently handle the scope of its responsibilities. The Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race and the Institute for Research in African American Studies are understaffed, underfunded, and have little autonomous power with which to extend their programming. The Core Curriculum marginalizes issues of racialization, colonialism, sexuality, and gender in a way that further marginalizes students themselves. And Columbia's current expansion plan would displace at least 5,000 people (according to the University's own estimate) and bulldoze almost every structure in the area. The cumulative effects of the Universities’ action and inaction send devastating messages about its notion of community, power, and cultural understanding.

3.) What's a noose at Teachers College got to do with institutional change at Columbia?

The Teacher’s College is a part of the university community and bureaucracy should not distance our neighbors. The noose is not an isolated incident and what happens at Teacher’s College effects and contributes to the atmosphere on our campus. Vital is our ability to respond and understand as a unified community.

4.) What are we demanding?

We demand that Columbia expand ethically, support Ethnic Studies, reform the Core Curriculum, and improve administrative support for students of color, students of faith, and LGBTQ students:

Because our cause is multi-faceted, our demands call for change on all levels and ask for a spectrum of responsibility:

• a more systematic response to hate crimes from Public Safety
• a more collaborative expansion effort from the administration
• a revision of the Core that encourages critical engagement with issues of racism and colonialism
• more resources and support for the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race (CSER), the Institute for Research in African-American Studies (IRAAS), and the Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA).

We don't just want new programs or changes and improvements to existing programs. We want lasting changes in the power dynamics between the university, its students, and its community.

For a more detailed list of demands, see http://cu-strike.blogspot.com/.

5.) Why so many demands?

Why shouldn't students want more say in their life at the University?

Not one thing will change an institutional culture and not just Bollinger is responsible. Students experience life at Columbia in a number of spaces and ways, and only looking across issues will make a substantive change. We are looking toward not just Bollinger, but the Trustees, the Committee on the Core, and the Vice President of Arts and Sciences to help us in our efforts. Administrative reform, the Core, Ethnic Studies and the expansion are just the beginning of the problems with this university, but at least these four concerns begin to question the roots of them.

6.) Why this tactic?

We strike because student input on these issues in meetings, through protests, and through other avenues of vocalization has been ignored or patronized, and the response to our demands for change has been woefully insufficient. Hunger striking does not induce harm on others, and it offers strikers the opportunity for reflection, introspection, and self-examination. A hunger strike is also a physical symbol of our intellectual and spiritual starvation under the university administration's current policies.

7.) Who are we?

We're not a campus group. We identify with the past four, twelve, twenty and forty years of student struggle. We know these issues are not new, but we know these issues well. We experience these issues in our daily lives on campus. We're here for the future generations on this campus – students of color, queer students, allies. We are the students who searched for safe spaces after the visit of Ahmadinejad, the harassment of an Asian-American student by the NYPD, the scrawling of graffiti in SIPA, the hanging of a noose on a Teacher's College professor's door, the spray-painting of a swastikas and anti-Semitic caricatures. We're students who've heard too often the anti-democratic platitudes of the administration. We stand in solidarity with each other, and we stand in solidarity with other students who identify with these issues.

8.) What are ways to help?

• Tell a friend
• Tell your family
• Tell the institution how you feel
• Come out to the tents any time during the day
• Join the vigils 9pm every night at the sundial
• Visit our site for more ideas, updates and information:
http://cu-strike.blogspot.com/

Student Activism Timeline

FALL 2007 -- Columbia announces the largest Capital Campaign of its time, with a goal of raising $4 billion. Students from a number of campus organizations come together an in attempt to create student input in where these fund go.

APR 15, 2007 -- Students in Ethnic Studies release a report on the state of the programs at Columbia and how they compare with peer institutions, recommending a department for Ethnic Studies.

FEB 15, 2007 – The Columbia Coalition Against the War 300 students walk out and hold a teach-in against the continued war in Iraq and future U.S. military aggression.

OCT 4, 2006 -- The Columbia College Republics invites the founder and head of the Minutemen Project, Jim Gilcrhist to speak on campus. The group is a vigilante organization that ‘patrols’ the Mexico/US border harassing, detaining, and shooting migrants. He was meet by protesters from throughout the city and inside Roone Arledge several students went on stage to unfurl a banner where they were responded to by blows from the Minutemen. Several censures were dealt out by the University, only to Latino students who were involved.

SPRING 2006 -- A student returned to her dorm in Ruggles to anti-homophobic, racist and anti-semetic graffiti. Students organized a response under the adhoc group Stop Hate on Columbia’s Campus, with demands for the university’s response to hate crimes, funding for intercultural programming, and university advisors for the queer community.

SPRING 2006 -- Students organizing Financial Aid Reform (FAiR), culminating in a week long demonstration that guaranteed the elimination of loans for students from families earning under $50,000 a year.

SPRING 2005 -- A film, Columbia Unbecoming, released by the David Project levels accusations against professors in the Middle East Asian Language and Culture department. The professors were found not at fault, but this causes the leave of several faculty and silencing of the debate on the Israel/Palestine conflict.

SPRING 2004 -- A comic strip, “Blacky Fun Whitey” released in the Fed during Black Heritage Month sparks a week of protest against racism on campus. The Columbia Concerned Students of Color demand what becomes the Office of Multicultural Affairs.

FALL 2003 -- Columbia announces plans to create a 17 acre campus expanding into West Harlem. The plan is meet with opposition from the community who worked for the previous 15 years on their own development plan for the neighborhood.

SPRING 2003 -- 500 students walk out against the war in Iraq. The largest anti-war showing since the first gulf war began. A university professor who spoke out against the war was meet with death threats and national outcry against his criticisms.

APRIL 1, 1996 -- Four students pitch a tent in the center of campus and begin a hunger strike, demanding that Columbia University establish a department of Ethnic Studies and reorganize its Western-oriented core curriculum. These protest led to the creation of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race, majors in Asian American, Latino, more funding for African American studies and the list C Major Cultures option.

DEC. 14, 1992 -- About 150 students demonstrate at Hamilton Hall to protest the university's plans to turn the Audubon Ballroom, where Malcolm X was assassinated, into a biomedical research center. These protest lead to negotiations for a Malcolm X memorial and employment opportunities for Harlem residents.

APRIL 6, 1990 -- Several Columbia Law School Students end an overnight sit-in at the dean's office to protest a lack of racial minorities, women and homosexuals on the faculty. Gaining more women, LGBTQ and faculty of color.

APRIL 13, 1989 -- About 200 students occupy part of the law school's main building to protest the feared closure of a clinic that offers free legal help to the victims of AIDS discrimination and practical experience for credit to the students who represent them.

APRIL 21, 1987 -- Fifty people, including an assistant professor and two alumni, are arrested during a daylong demonstration to protest racism. Nine arrests occur when almost 70 people chain themselves to the doors of two of the three main entrances to Hamilton Hall. The protest stemmed from complaints by black students about the university's inaction in disciplining four white students accused of attacking black students and shouting racial epithets. These protest lead to the creation of the Intercultural Resource Center.

APRIL 25, 1985 -- Students, along with some faculty and staff members, end a three-week sit-in on the front steps of Hamilton Hall, demonstrating against the university's holdings in companies that do business in South Africa. These protest succeed in making the university divest its stock holdings in the South Africa.

APRIL 21, 1979 -- Several Columbia University students demonstrate to demand that a nuclear reactor on campus be dismantled.

APRIL 21, 1978 -- About 300 students demonstrate against the university's investments in corporations that do business in South Africa.

FALL 1972 – Students of Gay People at Columbia sit in on an unused lounge space in Furnald hall demanding the recognition of what is now known as the Stephen Donaldson lounge.

MARCH 21, 1975 -- Fifteen members of the Revolutionary Student Brigade, protesting the arrest of six Iranian students who were passing out leaflets against the Shah of Iran on campus, are arrested after locking themselves in the deans's office.

MAY 12, 1972 -- Black and latino students end a 17-day takeover of several university buildings. This leads to changes to increase admissions of black and latino students.

MAY 2, 1972 -- Campus police clear Hamilton Hall of student anti-war demonstrators who held the building and several others for a week.

APRIL 21, 1972 – Black students sit in on the NROTC office in Hartley Hall, creating the Malcolm X Liberation Center.

MAY 22, 1968 -- A month-long occupation of the president's office and several other buildings ends. Complaints include racism and links to defense-related research. About 1200 are arrested as trespassers, and 30 are injured in scuffles. Strikers shut down the university for the semester.

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For more history and resources on student activism, take a look at the OMA/IRC archive project – housed in the basement of the IRC at 552. W. 114^th st.

Demands: Core Curriculum

Columbia's Core Curriculum has been criticized for decades for not only its Eurocentrism, but its marginalization of nonwhite peoples within the West, and the issues of racialization and colonialism. While there have been additions throughout the years of a Major Cultures requirement, and individual texts such as The Souls of Black Folk, The Wretched of the Earth, and the Haitian Revolutionary Constitution, these efforts to remedy the Core have been insufficient in concept and execution. The Major Cultures requirements often take place in large lectures, where contrasting to the intimate seminars of other Core classes, content mastery can take priority over critical thinking, and the texts and themes that have been inserted into CC, Lit Hum, and Music Hum often seem to be tokenized additions rather than incorporated into a transformed conception of the Core. As such, we call for continued reassessment of all Core requirements, not as simply a matter of representation, but in developing a Core Curriculum that does not marginalize critical thinking about racialization, colonialism, sexuality, and gender. The Core Curriculum is not only out of step with Columbia's students, but does not even tap into the resources of the intellectual work done by faculty who address the issues marginalized by the Core in their own work. The inadequacies of the Core Curriculum are not only intellectual problems, however. As the Core is one of the central pillars of a Columbia education, its marginalization of the issues of racialization, colonialism, sexuality and gender further marginalizes and traumatizes students themselves.

In this state of affairs, the University must work with greater urgency and consideration of the decades of dedication by students, alumni, and faculty to reshape the antiquated Core Curriculum into one that represents the values of a diverse, global, intellectually vibrant and just University. Towards that end, we recommend:

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1. The reformation of the Major Cultures requirement to contain a course in a seminar format which challenges students to think critically about the issues of racialization and colonialism, global phenomena which also are at the Core of the "Western" experience.

Given that these recommendations have been on the table for decades, we realize that we are saying nothing new, and that more than simply asking is required for their execution. Therefore, we also call for further measures of accountability to students. Given that every Columbia student is required to take the Core Curriculum, we feel that the limited student participation in the Committee on the Core, the Committee on Instruction, and their various subcommittees is evidence of inadequate use of the resources of the student body. We call for:

2. More student voice and seats within these committees, and that their process of selection be better publicized, so that students' passions for changing the Core do not have to flare up in moments of spectacle, but can be incorporated into the constant process of developing the Core Curriculum.

Furthermore, we would like to point out that many Barnard students have similar concerns about the 9 Ways of Knowing and have been involved in changing the curriculum both at Columbia and Barnard. However, we are cautiously optimistic about the initiative shown by Barnard's faculty and administration to address our concerns. We hope that Columbia faculty and administration can look to and communicate with Barnard to think about the ways to best be accountable to student needs, as we all belong to a larger community.

Demands: West Harlem Expansion & Community Accountability

As students of Columbia University, we find it impossible not to take a stand when our university is actively ignoring the rights of the West Harlem community. Instead of engaging the community in respectful and open negotiation, Columbia is pursuing an expansion plan of disruption and displacement. We believe that the community has a right to affordable housing, living wage jobs, and a prominent voice in any development plan for its neighborhood. We believe that Columbia's plan must recognize the rights of all people regardless of their economic background or race.

The problems with Columbia’s plan are as extreme as they are abundant. According to Columbia’s own statistics, five thousand people would be placed at risk of displacement due to rent pressures engendered by the addition of university affiliates to the area – and this number is likely low. The plan seeks to bulldoze almost every structure in the area – including the current location of the Cotton Club and other community institutions – in order to create a 7-story underground "bathtub" upon which its structures would be supported. The university is planning to create buildings that are very tall, contextually out of place with the surrounding community. The university is also pursuing the use of eminent domain against property-owners who refuse to sell their buildings. While it claims to desire a productive relationship with Harlem, it is functionally colonizing a community and remaking the neighborhood in its own image.

The most basic problem with Columbia’s plan, however, is its wanton disregard for the basic principle of local democracy, something that the university’s humanistic ideals should hold as sacrosanct. Community Board 9 undertook a democratic, transparent process of many years to create a framework for development that took into considerations the needs of its residents. This plan conflicts directly with the expansion plan, which the university has stubbornly refused to revise. Despite the nearly unanimous rejection of the plan by the Community Board this August, the university is using its political muscle to push the plan through the approval process. The university’s basic principles should not be sacrificed on the altar of profit. We believe that Columbia must concretely apply the principles of the community's 197-A plan to its planned expansion.

As informed and active members of this institution, we refuse to allow the current expansion plan to go forward in our name. We stand in solidarity with the 10 demands made by the Community Board in August and therefore demand that:

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1. Columbia withdraw its 197-C proposal to rezone Manhattanville immediately.

2. After withdrawing its proposal from the review process, Columbia submit its proposal to Community Board 9 for revision in line with the principles of the 197-a plan.

3. After making the relevant changes to its rezoning plan, Columbia negotiate a substantive community benefits agreement which serves to mitigate displacement created by the university’s presence and addresses job creation, environmental problems and university-community relations.

Demands: Ethnic Studies

Ethnic Studies examines race as a social construction that has been shaped throughout United States history at the hands of forces such as policy, violence, law, and media. It includes an analysis of the influences of gender, sexuality, nationality, and class, as well as a critical look at the power structures that have been prevalent in joining together the elements in the formation of race and ethnicity as we understand it today. Especially given Columbia's Eurocentric Core Curriculum, Ethnic Studies plays a crucial role in providing students with tools critical to understanding the formations of race and ethnicity in the United States and provides us with the necessary knowledge to understand the position of ethnicity and race as projects of power.

The state of Ethnic Studies at Columbia is in a critical condition. The Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race (CSER) and the Institute for Research in African American Studies (IRAAS) are understaffed, underfunded, and have little autonomous power with which to extend its programming. This program has been denied the crucial resources that it needs to sustain itself. The risk of even further decline will become an even bigger threat unless the power to hire faculty and offer a full curriculum in the University is granted to the Center.

Following its institutionalization, student voices become powerless in determining the direction of CSER. As a result of the 1996 protests that led to creation of Ethnic Studies at Columbia, students were afforded special positions on the hiring committees of CSER. However, in practice, these positions have had no voting power and little influence, and are wholly symbolic in nature.

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1. Given the inadequate number of core faculty present next semester, we demand the completion of 2 core faculty hires per year for both CSER and IRAAS until each has 12 core junior and senior professors, which must be maintained indefinitely.

2. The academic review of CSER and IRAAS must begin in Summer 2008 where the board must include only ethnic studies scholars from outside institutions as well as Columbia ethnic studies majors. The academic review must also research the steps necessary for the creation of Queer Studies, which has historically been placed under Ethnic Studies at other institutions, as well as Native American Studies which must be considered by the university following the review's completion.

3. Interested Ethnic Studies majors collectively, shown through a vote, must be given 1 or 2 votes (depending on committee size) which will be delivered by the current student positions on all hiring committees for junior and senior faculty to increase student presence and determination of CSER's direction.

4. To maintain the integrity of Ethnic Studies and the very possibility of its sustained growth, the CSER and IRAAS must be granted the ability to make hires autonomously. This is not a call for the immediate departmentalization of Ethnic Studies. Rather it is a call for the Ethnic Studies programs to make hiring decision on their own accord, without the need of outside departments to lead the hire. We recognize that this is unprecedented for centers and institutes throughout the University, but see it as a necessary step in creating Ethnic Studies classes and research initiatives that are accountable to the field and on par with peer institutions.

Demands: Administrative Reform

Columbia University has failed to demonstrate its commitment to providing safe spaces for all members of our campus community. The administration has yet to fulfill its avowed goals of making the long-term, institutional changes necessary in stemming the rising tide of hate incidents aimed at students of color, students of faith, LGBTQ students, and other oppressed groups. We demand that the following changes be enacted so that students may hold the University accountable to its purported anti-discriminatory values.

The Office of Multicultural Affairs is an integral part of our community. From student group advising to programming, to building a support network for individual students, the OMA's range of operation requires more resources than that which is granted by this school. The OMA is grossly understaffed and housed in a space that is simply inadequate considering the scope of its responsibilities. Furthermore, the OMA has only a limited purview in working with Columbia College and the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. The OMA must have administrative support and a means of inter-school collaboration in order to address issues of diversity on a campus-wide level.

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1. We demand more advisors and counselors for cultural groups, students of color, the LGBTQ community and communities of faith, with student involvement in the hiring process of said personnel. We ask that that the Office of Multicultural Affairs be expanded physically and responsibly, and that more support for collaboration between the Office of Multicultural Affairs at Columbia and the Multicultural Affairs Office at Barnard be given by the University administration.

The University administration has failed to facilitate inter-school communication between faculty, administrators, staff, and students alike, resulting in inconsistent responses to bias incidents and hate crimes. The introduction of a Vice Provost for Multicultural Affairs would greatly improve channels of communication between schools and the campus community on issues of diversity. This Vice Provost would be able to facilitate the connections between various schools and implement campus-wide initiatives.

The creation of this position would ensure a level of consistency and accountability in the way that the administration addresses bias incidents and hate crimes as well as other student concerns, and would encourage the university to be proactive in addressing issues of campus climate. Columbia would be able to respond to such issues preemptively, rather than reacting to incendiary incidents that reflect badly on our school as a whole. The Vice Provost should be responsible for providing incentives for certain policy changes that will encourage greater communication and interaction between faculty and students, communication and initiatives across schools, and lend continued support for anti-oppression training for incoming students, as well as for incoming faculty and public safety.

2. We demand a Vice Provost for Multicultural Affairs to administer and direct the University's policies affecting students within all the schools of the University.

3. We demand institutionalized, mandatory, full day workshops on issues of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, power and privilege for all incoming faculty, and public safety; and that the training focus on anti-oppression, rather than sensitivity and diversity.

4. We demand that Columbia's Public Safety announce instances of hate crimes when they are reported and issue an annual report of reported bias incidents and hate crimes and how they have been addressed.