International Student Movement

For some backgroup information on the situation at UPR go here.
The following text was mailed to the ISM contact:

University of Puerto Rico Strike
and the New Year

by Alejandro C., on Saturday, December 11, 2010 at 19:41

The president of the University of Puerto Rico said that the institution is at risk of closing. He added that refuses to negotiate with the Student Representative Committee, rejects the presence of a mediator, and rejects the latest proposal "The University: Adding won All." Both rejection must be in context, and opens the door to a number of questions.

Why run the risk of closing? What do the police at the University? What the University is closed? What malicious beings want to close? What tactics can be used to avoid the fee without closing the university?

The first two questions are urgent. Guadalupe says the chancellor requested the entry of the police in Rio Piedras Campus "because the priority is to maintain the accreditation of the premises." To avoid losing accreditation, must have police presence. In the past, the police presence on campus caused death and violence, therefore, to give a vote in good faith to the rector, the keyword must be "accredited." Without accreditation, the University closes.

The University of Puerto Rico is accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools, which operates under the Department of Education of the United States. They are the ones credited. After his visit in September 2010, the Middle States issued a report in which (and I read his 13 pages and six times) does not suggest that the fact that students protesting and going on strike could result in decertification. I may be wrong in my reading, and leave the link to help me someone: http://recend.apextech.netdnacdn.com/static/docs/editor/20101102_informefinalmiddle.pdf

In fact, the Middle States approves the work of teachers and students in meeting academic requirements the semester (stopped by a strike) meant: "Each institution is Commended for putting in place Opportunities for students to complete their studies" (p.12). While the text suggested an obvious concern for the possibility that not complied with the standard of educational offerings, finally satisfied with the evidence presented to him. The UPR adopted on this issue.

However, Middle States does not believe that the University complies with the standard of governance and leadership. In the Middle States (which, again, is under the federal State Department), the administration of the UPR is closed to dialogue, manage your funds so dark, it seems nominate their presidents as political rewards and may even jeopardize security members of the university. All this black and white appears in the document I quote.It is easy to cite (to endorse it or make fun of him) Ema Rodriguez rants on the radio, but the paper-to only have 13 pages, reread it deserves.

For example, Rodriguez Ema says that the university administration has never refused to talk to the students. The Middle States disagrees: "UPR Central Administration Does Not Give Evidence of HAVING an Effective Means of Communicating with ITS constituencies. We saw no Evidence of Ongoing, Meaningful dialog with faculty or students "(p. 8). The governor, the president of the UPR and the directors discussed in El Nuevo Dia that are consistently available to talk, to which the document responds elegantly to the Middle States: "Simply stating an open door policy Truly not does make it open" (p. 7).

Regarding the standard of management of the economy, the Middle States is left with the desire to know what happened exactly in the university. "The Lack of current data Means That the Team is Unable to confirm compliance with Standard 3" (p. 5). There was no information available, so that neither the Middle States and no one will know soon as the finances of the UPR.

The selection process of several university leaders is unclear. In the report: "The process of Selecting members is Unclear" (p. 8).He thought he saw, in addition, "evidence of Difficult relations entre members." The Middle States required, recommended and suggested. Required: "Evidence That Have Been steps taken to Assure Continuity and Stability of Institutional leadership Governmental Particularly in times of transition" (p. 10). Particularly is an understatement. Recommended: "that a formal process of succession planning Mil" (p. 9). He suggested: "fixed terms for the UPR President, Chancellors, and Other senior leaders" (p. 10).

We read in the press that the President justified the horrible vandalism that received our gates, pulled to "ensure the accreditation of a university campus and encourage open and operational." The Middle States, meanwhile, confides: "the Team found no campuses Evidence That Were Involved in the discussions or That decision created the Open University program of Removing the gates and fences at campuses; Indeed, Several campuses [...] Concerns raised about if the campus safety gates and fences Are removed "(p. 8).

Because our management point by point contradicts the observations of the Middle States, the question remains what is to regard the president to "take all necessary measures to protect the heritage of the people [and] accreditation institution. " The key word here is protected. I make an analogy. In the gangster movies, the mob goes where the owner of a shop and says something like "I have a friend of mine Who Wants to harm you bad" and charge your victim a protection money. Protection amounts to extortion, here. To say that a strike will result in decertification of the University is a deliberate perversion of the facts.

Against this backdrop of lies and abuse, talk of "two sides" is already going on one side. The police presence at the university, in this light, does not deserve comment.

Puerto Rico is not the only scene of student struggles so far this weekend. The New York Times article on student protests in England is a good antidote to the false and longstanding insistence of wanting to frame the strike Puerto Rican with nomenclature of the Cold War (which ended 21 years ago oficialísimamente). Even the British (who invented capitalism) are overwhelmed by the excesses of their leaders, who use economic crisis to justify its policies. In the case of British universities, resulting in an increase of up to three times the price of tuition and cutting academic resources.

Given the notion that students plan to sabotage and criminal acts indiscriminately, the report quoted a student leader, who said: "Nonviolence is essential - once we resort to Violence it's the only thing the half picks up." Given the repeated claim that students only want money to get high and drunk, respond coherently to fear that the education be directed toward a "completely privatize education system." This is not a small group of "drop of socialism", but a conglomerate composed of tens of thousands of citizens: "Many of the London protesters Were still in high school."

In Greece there were also clashes between students and police this week, leaving five wounded and 85 arrested. The Greek scene is much more critical than the British, and riots have involved more violence, unfortunately.

We must insist, as the antagonists of the University insists on repeating that it is "tiny groups of nationalists who want to destroy the university." More or less for the same week that Romero Barceló expectorated his unfortunate views on Puerto Rican students, about 25,000 citizens of the state of New Jersey protesting against cuts in public education system of the state, courtesy of Gov. Chris Christie, Fortuño equally Republican. The 25,000 neojerseyanos have succumbed to the tentacles of FUPI, according to the outdated theory that we hear in the mouths of our leaders.

Discussing the rise in California public system enrollment, compared with Mexican university system, Chomsky writes: "The Recent cut-backs in Higher Education seen in much of the world Simply Can not Be Traced to Economic problems. Rather, They Reflect Choices about the fundamental nature of the Society in Which we will live. "

Puerto Rican students, English, Greek and American, then, fighting for public education and against the "completely privatize education system" proposed by our respective governments. Who, then, is struggling to close the University?

Although it seems we've hit bottom, the UPR has a long history of presidents pestiferous. Dr. Joseph M. Saldaña, with that mixture of honesty and barbarism which distinguishes it proposes that "close option is probably the most appropriate and necessary to rethink the top down to the place in which most of the time appears to have gone out of its bed and be unmanageable. " The words of this former president's actions are consistent with the current president.

Certainly the UPR is ungovernable if our definition of unruly deviates from the most basic standards of democracy. To understand the concept of governance of the presidents of the UPR, to quote George W. Bush (just as Republican Fortuño), who once joked: "If This Were A Dictatorship Would Be it a heck of a lot cutting easier, just so long as I'm the dictator." From this viewpoint, the UPR is ungovernable. Needless to say that the Middle States criticized precisely under the standard University of Leadership and Governance.

But it's certainly more practical to create a nonexistent enemy and blame him. Saldana argues that the protests were incited by "activists from left-wing political tendency, particularly in the faculties of Social Sciences, Humanities, Communication and Education." This is false in more ways than one. On the one hand, takes up again the vocabulary of the Cold War, which explains the world as the confrontation between communism and democracy.But the comment is also false in a more obvious sense. In the last video of the APPU, professors of all faculties (including natural and Business Administration, which in the imagination of Saldaña would be "less of the left") have supported the student struggle (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1FMXF3V63I), the text "The university we want", however, severely criticizing the strike, belongs primarily to teachers of the faculties of Humanities and Social Sciences. Our president, in fact, was for years a professor of Hispanic Literature.

One of the mechanisms of propaganda that Orwell described in 1984 is called a term things exactly opposite of its true function.The Ministry of Peace, in the novel, not in charge of peace but of war, and likewise, our Department of Defense is responsible for the attack. Not surprisingly, the statements of President De la Torre and Guadalupe lead just after hiring a company bouncers to silence students insist they want to "protect and guarantee the right of all who want to protest" ( says the president four times in five minutes.)

President sets up a dichotomy between those who want to protest and those who want to study. The separation is malicious and implies that no protesters want to study. After all, it does not matter. The student protest is not an issue of freedom of expression is a matter of social struggle. Establish specific areas to protest those who want to protest is an act of unprecedented cynicism.

Social justice is carried out to protest in places where not allowed to protest. African-American seamstress Rosa Parks sat 55 years ago in a bus seat in which he could not sit. It was an act of freedom of expression, but social control. It was an act of disobedience that led to fines and imprisonment, but that led to a lower state of injustice.

The administration that demarcate a space for catharsis is not an effort to discuss and solve problems, especially when even the Middle States recognizes that "we saw no Evidence of Ongoing, Meaningful dialog with faculty or students."

What options are, therefore, to fight the fee without resorting to gangster friend of mine Who Wants to harm you bad? The academic literature about the strike widens, ranging from articulated militant language texts (Rafael Bernabe) to reflections curling (Bernat Tort); of modest proposals (Rubén Ríos) a vulgar and manipulative propaganda (Madeline Roman). I read and reread the insistence that it should seek "other methods" than the suspension of classes, but not everyone proposes what would be the "other methods".

Each proposal has its pros and cons. For example, violence is presented as an option run over. Shooting the president would prevent the closing of the UPR, but not someone else's closed, and is worth remembering that there is a row of doctors expecting to inherit the post of political puppet. Going against the police and national guard with clubs and guns is nonsense for more than one reason, and the mere possibility of articulating this has involved the public is planned to open police stations within the precincts.

The administration and the government act as if they wanted to close the UPR, as if that was his goal. If students react to provocations with violence, the University will be serving on a silver platter to Fortuño and company. A sad our government's interest that there is violence, to accelerate what appears to be their goals. The altercation last week served as an excuse to restructure (violating) the policy of confrontation that had no successful decades in force.

On the other hand, dressed in mourning and request waivers produce nothing. It is not about free speech, but social control.

Large sectors of the students are tired and disillusioned. The administration has thrown them all: the police, the impact force, expensive advertising in all media, academic sanctions, civil, Chicky Starr, you name it. If anything, we can not accuse our government is inept opponents. It is not unreasonable that students begin to see the strike as something that does not work.

For my part, because the argument that the strike will result in decertification of the UPR is an intentional distortion, disapprove not continue with it, albeit evolved. The student organizers are much more knowledgeable than me in the history of civil strife, and know how to protest without engaging in violence, either by using the Barbosa and University avenues as parking hundreds of cars, interminable meetings convened to suspend classes declaring a number of 24-hour strikes, agreeing with the unions, etc. All these actions lead to sanctions and fines. A Rosa Parks was arrested and fined fourteen dollars.

It is also important to strengthen ties with our allies in the U.S..The administration of the UPR is playing with public funds and federal, and is contrary to the provisions of an emissary of the Department of Education. This is not all volcanic chump change.While it is true that our governor's party (the Republicans) are in control of the House of Representatives, are there any other major player that already has expressed solidarity with Puerto Rican students.

On the other hand, 2012 is approaching. Enormous damage to the university and the country have received at the hands of fortunes could be reversed to some extent. Frankly, I doubt that the Popular Party has the best intentions of the PNP, but this tiny extent as less aggressive softens somewhat social justice processes. It would be unfortunate, with a popular administration, the students lose the sense of organization and struggle has distinguished him, I take a look at the world and, hopefully, I suspect that this would not happen. The Times They Are A-changing.

 

One thing is clear: violence is the weapon of the powerful. It is because the powerful assaulted first and then use the other's aggression to justify the violence itself. There can be no violence of any kind (even verbal violence). Protest, let us withdraw when the police arrive. Let us at shift changes or whenever. Let us withdraw again. So he fought, more or less, Achilles. The teachers (most) are on the side of students and do not cross picket lines. Resist the last minutes of the fight, the bell is ready to fold, and will not be his song a requiem for the students.