In Photos | UCSB Rallies in Solidarity with UCSC Graduate Students
December 14, 2019 at 10:29 pm
On Friday, UC Santa Barbara students gathered in front of Cheadle Hall to rally in solidarity with UC Santa Cruz graduate students, who are striking indefinitely until the university agrees to a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) of an additional $1,412 a month.
The rally was organized by UCSB’s Graduate Student Association, which called upon UCSC to “immediately pay the Cost of Living Adjustment” in a Facebook event for the UCSB rally.
“Many of us at UC Santa Barbara share the experience of being paid poverty wages for our academic labor in the face of exorbitant, ever-skyrocketing rent, and thus also struggle to make ends meet,” the description of the Facebook event stated.
Dozens of UCSB students also signed a petition in support of the UCSC strike. The petition calls on the UCSC administration to pay the COLA and condemns “all attempts by the administration to intimidate striking student workers.”
A Twitter account run by the strikers, with the description “Pay us enough to live here,” has been posting nearly every hour about the strike; a thread posted about the strike explained that organizers have been calling for a COLA since Sept. 2019.
UCSC released a statement in response to the strike on Dec. 9, stating “Lack of affordable housing in Santa Cruz presents challenges for our students and for our community as a whole.”
“We are actively working on short- and long-term solutions to address our students’ housing needs,” the statement says.
Photos of the UCSB rally can be viewed below:
It is not “academic labor”. TA jobs (the rest of grad support consists in stipends) are most often disguised stipends. The student holds a review session once a week, 2 hours of office hours and grades papers. Some departments do abuse the students. Most do not.
You may struggle to survive on graduate support, but stop the BS. It is not money for “academic labor”. It is money to allow you to take courses and meet requirements without having to hold another job.
It is really quite simple. If you cannot live on the money you are given, do not come to the UC. If you are here and in good standing, transfer. Simple.
These strikers are hero’s they are standing up against this brutal capitalist system that has divided everyone up into a commodity and turned them into a profit you have administrators at this UC College making six figure incomes sitting behind a desk not doing shit the wasteful spending taking place on a police force that criminalizes students and gives them some bogus charges that ruins the rest of there chances of ever having a career THESE STRIKERS ARE NOT JUST STANDING UP FOR A COST OF LIVING ADJUSTMENT FOR THEMSELVES THEY ARE STANDING UP FOR EVERYONE IN THE COMMUNITY THAT’S… Read more »
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