COLA organizers occupied UC Santa Barbara’s Ortega Dining Commons from 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. today, offering students a swipe-free lunch meal as an extension of their “peaceful direct action” protest against the university.
As lunchtime attendees exited Ortega, organizers advertised the ongoing strikes and spoke about how undergraduates can help with the COLA movement. Sanya Kamidi / Daily Nexus
Organizers blocked Ortega’s front desk this morning on the eighth day of the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) wildcat strike, following organizing tactics used by COLA organizers at other UCs. Protesters who stood in Ortega’s foyer ushered students past the swipe station, encouraging them to eat for free and take food to go.
Organizers chanted “all smiles, no swipes” and offered students plastic cups, plates and utensils to reduce the workload of Ortega employees; they also handed out flyers and walked from table to table to talk to dining students.
The dining hall occupation was an expression of solidarity with UCSB undergraduate students, 44% of whom experience food insecurity, a COLA representative who declined to give their name said.
“We believe food is a right, and [that] no student should experience food insecurity — graduate or undergraduate,” the representative said. “This is how we demonstrate our movement is just as committed to [addressing food insecurity] as we are to [a] cost-of-living adjustment.”
While UCSB administrators and security personnel showed up to the dining commons during the takeover, they did not remove any COLA strikers and declined to comment on the ongoing situation. However, personnel managers were adamant that students follow dining hall protocol and not remove food from Ortega, leading to a brief confrontation with activists and students leaving with to-go plates.
However, as lines for food got longer and began to stretch around the building, organizers continued to encourage students to take food to go.
The decision to occupy Ortega was made to show how the UC “functions as a business rather than a school,” according to the COLA press release.
“By liberating this dining commons, we draw attention to how food insecurity functions daily on our campus, keeping us from being the students, teachers, and mentors we want to be. While graduate students are currently on a wildcat strike, this action demonstrates that our movement is not only dedicated to achieving fair pay but also to changing the priorities of the public university system to better fit the needs of all students,” the statement continued.
Most students who entered the building seemed to support the graduate students’ actions. One student, Kayla Katsuda, a fourth-year economics and accounting major, noted that she came for the free lunch.
“One of my friends told me about what was going on, and I came because I don’t have a meal plan,” Katsuda said.
One UCSB student and Ortega Dining Commons employee explained to the Nexus that he “didn’t know what was going on” at first.
“They seemed to be letting all people in, and the food is overpriced, so I would agree with that. You could easily go to Isla Vista and get a better meal … so I agree [with the strikes]. The food is very expensive,” he said.
UCSB did not respond to requests for comment regarding the Monday occupation.
As lunchtime attendees exited Ortega, organizers advertised the ongoing strikes and spoke about how undergraduates can help with the COLA movement.
“We’re on the picket line outside of Storke Tower from 8 to 5 every day,” one organizer told a student leaving with a to-go plate. “Hope to see you there!”
Megan Ramsey contributed reporting.
This movement is dumb.
It’s easy to give away other people’s stuff.
I’m so happy my tax dollars go to these people **sarcasm**
Your tax dollars actually go towards bloating Admin budgets as the UC spends a tiny percentage of money on its grad student workers and staff. Deans make six figures and also have benefits on top of that salary that are double a grad’s annual wages. When TAs have to take on extra part time jobs to make ends meet, undergrad education is negatively impacted
Where does tuition go if not to feed and house you? if not to those who teach you?
You are giving false equivalencies there are few deans and many many grad students. Even cutting admin salaries on this campus would not come close to covering what you are asking for. There are many campus services that tuition goes to. Are you really this stupid or being purposely obtuse?
Only 17% of UCSB’s budget comes from the state. And the UC is nonprofit by the way. Deans make bloated salaries because of the law of supply and demand (not saying this is good) and UCSB wants qualified experienced people running their campus. TAs are paid-interns. They have no experience–TAing is part of their training. Faculty do the lion’s share of teaching and grading on campus.
Where does tuition go? Hmm… let’s see, how about the people who clean and unclog your toilets and pick up after you all over campus, the people who process your paperwork for your degree, your pay, your records, the people who keep the grounds, the people who do any amount of work in the many services provided by the campus which all use. And oh, not to mention, the faculty, who are the ones to do the teaching of the students. You’re in for a rude surprise if the university were to decide to pay you realistically according to experience… Read more »
The salaries of deans are larger because they’re responsibilities are larger and more far-reaching than grad students, therefore they get paid more.
The deans also do fundraising on behalf of grad students too. Talk about biting the hand that feeds you…
Wouldn’t this just reflect poorly on COLA? Increasing the workload of the dining commons staff (who also have set wages) by creating more mess and consuming more food than they probably planned to make and use, seems wrong. Food insecurity is a big issue, but we do have a food bank and tables offering help applying to CalFresh in the UCEN which is literally right by Ortega.
The COLA strikers brought extra utensils/plates/cups/garbage bags and took out the traah go help ease the labor on the amazing dining hall staff! They also stayed to clean up the dining hall after students left. Staff are underpaid and not fairly compensated for their essential labor. If the COLA is won for grads then it is possible that staff too will be able to make their demands and use our strike as leverage. Solidarity with fellow workers, especially our custodial, dining hall, and grounds staff, is crucial to COLA. As for “other options” – student tuition should be going towards… Read more »
you’re nutz.
Take a look at the UCSB job board before making these groundless claims. You based your claim that custodial, dining, and grounds staff as being underpaid sheerly based on appearance and assumption that these jobs are not well paid. A majority of administrative staff are similarly paid with the exception of those who hold executive positions. With each passing generation, students of today’s time lack the level of initiative and maturity of students in the past and have significantly more trouble functioning within a working society despite the increase in resources available to them in the form of the internet.… Read more »
None of these grads know what a real movement is! This group lacks everything in class and intelligence! Why would anyone want them teaching anyone!
They may think they have an income problem, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they had spending problems too, like most financial illiterates. I wonder how many of these grads have iPhones and new tech gadgets and go out to eat and buy booze or coffee at Starbucks multiple times per week.
Hey COLA! You care so much about the staff??? Why are COLA protesters following staff to the bathrooms calling them “PIGS” and “SCABS”? What about the mess you make in buildings where custodians are called in and expected to clean up your messes! You don’t give a damn about the staff! What about the staff you yell at because they have to go to work. We don’t get paid to strike, as you all do! We have lives to support too!!! We have rights and your violating them!!! It’s not right you put other’s lives in jeopardy because of your… Read more »
Following staff to the bathroom? Wow, nothing is sacred with these people.
They argued broke the rule of the dining commons and made these poor people lives more difficult. Every Ortega dining common went home angry and frustrated that the grad students decide to ruin their day
“eat for free” – that’s just straight up stealing
They should all be fired and arrested.
If fired, then undergrad education will be severely impacted and many undergrads will not be able to graduate. That is just one of many reasons COLA is an issue that impacts both grads and undergrads. The entire movement began because grads noticed how their not being paid a living wage started to threaten the quality of undergrad education. Most TAs work 2-3 jobs on top of teaching. research, writing the dissertation, and more. When TAs have to take on endless part time jobs to pay for rent, food, and medical care then their time spent lesson planning and grading for… Read more »
So that’s a very long way of saying, yeah, we stole but blah blah blah….
They are really good about the blah blah blah… No accountability!
Our university will thrive without grads like you!
1) Even if TAs don’t turn in their grades, undergrad education will not be “severely impacted” and everyone will graduate. Faculty will just pick up the slack and assign rubber stamp As. TAs have grossly overestimated their value and position in the university hierarchy. They are nothing more than paid interns. 2) Grad students and TAs have no idea about labor organizing if this is what they call a strike. Striking means foregoing pay, but the TAs are still getting their money while the undertake these actions. They’re in a privileged position and fail to recognize it. This whole movement… Read more »
Yes, they’re getting paid, and yet they’re stopping staff from being able to work! WTH???
Yeah, they love justifying their behavior. If anybody else did the same things they did, they’d be sitting in jail now.
Nope- tuition should pay for food. Where does tuition go for if it doesn’t go to the costs of feeding and housing undergrads? It’s not going to the people who teach, or to staff who are also underpaid and understaffed. The UC began as a tuition free institution. The UC has the money … if it didn’t go to bloated six figure salaries for endless administrators who cut services to students there would be enough money for free food. This fight is with all students and UCOP/Janet Napolitano.
Tuition goes for the costs of educating the student. Never has it gone for housing or feeding the students, not even in the days when the State paid for educating the students. Educate yourself about the long term trend in declining state funding for the University, which lead to the increases in tuition. Your bogeyman of 6 figure salaries, yada, yada, yada is just pitiful.
Seriously, why spend a few seconds doing a search when you can straight up LIE about the past as long as it makes their point? This is the logic of the people who are, supposedly, “adults” pursuing higher degrees.
Fees pay for services associated with classroom fees for technology in the classroom etc. Part of living in a democratic society is having access to quality higher education and part of that “quality” is affordable access to food. You cannot learn properly when you struggle to make ends and when you struggle to meet the basic needs for survival. No student should go hungry.Tuition is money a student pays for an education, a service that grad student provides. Especially as many of us also serve as Instructors of Record. Without food a student cannot hope to have a proper education.… Read more »
So yes, you just confirmed that the cost of tuition was never used to house or feed students. And tuition doesn’t just pay for services grad students give. Groundskeepers maintain the campus, custodial staff clean up after students (and some staff!) who must think their trash somehow disappears magically the way they leave public spaces, administrative staff whose job is inundated with their usual tasks but on top of that are expected to send reminder emails to students about things they should independently keep track of which are largely ignored until it’s too late and they incur some late fee… Read more »
Yes, the amount of “babysitting” is insane! It’s like nobody takes pride in being self-sufficient anymore?
what I said in no way conflicted with that? due to neoliberal austerity measures and loss of state funding admin increased tuition and admin salaries and implemented austerity measures to keep their salaries increasing while the cost of living increased
They need to be arrested!
liberate aka steal
What a joke movement
So theft is OK?
It’s only OK because it comes out of someone else’s pocket, not their own. Typical.
“We believe food is a right, and [that] no student should experience food insecurity — graduate or undergraduate,” the representative said.
This is utterly ridiculous. So everyone should get free food? Who pays for it then?
Filet Mignon and lobster for all!
Sounds good to me – and make sure the filet is a 16 oz. bone in, and it has to be USDA prime.
Anything for you ruling aristocracy!
“We believe food is a right, and [that] no student should experience food insecurity”
Remember, as soon as they get security for themselves, they will elevate themselves. Remember Animal Farm, “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” Those is control will always want more. These folks are for the people now, but will get resources for themselves and leave others behind. Human nature.
Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This does not mean anything and everything I want is my right. You have the right to work hard and get ahead, or to be a freeloading bum. This does not mean you have the right to go into the dinning commons and steal resources. Those who did this should be arrested and charged for the food they helped steal. This was theft not civil disobedience.
Well put – along with ‘Moby Dick’, Herman Melville was a genius.
Wonderful move. Came to check it out and ate free for the day. These people understand food insecurity, and are fighting for a better university. Go COLA!
Ah, a thief who enjoys free things supports these rabid grad students. Not surprising as thieves don’t care how they get their loot only that they get it.