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Rally against the LRDP - Wednesday, November 7th at UCSC
UC Santa Cruz's irresponsible plans for expansion have been made without the meaningful participation or consent of the student body, and in disregard of Santa Cruz residents' concerns. On November 7th, we will make visible our opposition to UCSC's Long Range Development Plan, while dialoguing with each other about the issues at hand. Come one, come all!
The rally, with tables and speakers, begins 11:00am at the Baytree Plaza, UCSC campus.
At around noon, we will begin the march.
November 7th - rain or shine.
For updates and more information:
LRDPresistance.org
UCSC's new Long Range Development Plan:
- Proposes unsustainable growth and disregards the concerns of Santa Cruz residents. The resource capacity to support this expansion simply doesn't exist. The addition of 4,500 new students and construction of associated infrastructure will result in overcrowded, unaffordable conditions, as housing, traffic and water resources are already critically stressed.
- Plans a rapid expansion of facilities in the midst of a serious lack of funding for existing programs, instead of planning in such a way that addresses this deficit and the deep seated structural problems that created it.
- Is the bulldozer clearing the path towards privatization, which will be justified by the intensifying budget crisis. Privatization increases tuition and changes academic priorities. Corporate-funded research and prestige-generating graduate programs are emphasized, to the detriment of undergraduate programs and unprofitable departments like the arts & humanities.
- Has been opposed by the Santa Cruz City Council and numerous prominent faculty members including Craig Rienarman (Sociology), Robert Meister (Politics) and John Isbister (Economics). The Santa Cruz Faculty Association has provided highly critical analysis of the expansion and many of its members oppose the LRDP.
- Would destroy 120 acres of beautiful redwood, chaparral and mixed evergreen forests in the currently undeveloped upper campus. Alternative, environmentally superior expansion options exist.
- Is accompanied by a flawed and spineless Environmental Impact Report that understates impacts and proposes inadequate mitigation measures. There was no outside review of the EIR, the UC Regents themselves are the certifying authority, and binding language has been consistently avoided, meaning that the UC has no legal obligation to perform expected mitigations.
For sources and further investigation, please visit:
At around noon, we will begin the march.
November 7th - rain or shine.
For updates and more information:
LRDPresistance.org
UCSC's new Long Range Development Plan:
- Proposes unsustainable growth and disregards the concerns of Santa Cruz residents. The resource capacity to support this expansion simply doesn't exist. The addition of 4,500 new students and construction of associated infrastructure will result in overcrowded, unaffordable conditions, as housing, traffic and water resources are already critically stressed.
- Plans a rapid expansion of facilities in the midst of a serious lack of funding for existing programs, instead of planning in such a way that addresses this deficit and the deep seated structural problems that created it.
- Is the bulldozer clearing the path towards privatization, which will be justified by the intensifying budget crisis. Privatization increases tuition and changes academic priorities. Corporate-funded research and prestige-generating graduate programs are emphasized, to the detriment of undergraduate programs and unprofitable departments like the arts & humanities.
- Has been opposed by the Santa Cruz City Council and numerous prominent faculty members including Craig Rienarman (Sociology), Robert Meister (Politics) and John Isbister (Economics). The Santa Cruz Faculty Association has provided highly critical analysis of the expansion and many of its members oppose the LRDP.
- Would destroy 120 acres of beautiful redwood, chaparral and mixed evergreen forests in the currently undeveloped upper campus. Alternative, environmentally superior expansion options exist.
- Is accompanied by a flawed and spineless Environmental Impact Report that understates impacts and proposes inadequate mitigation measures. There was no outside review of the EIR, the UC Regents themselves are the certifying authority, and binding language has been consistently avoided, meaning that the UC has no legal obligation to perform expected mitigations.
For sources and further investigation, please visit:
For more information:
http://lrdpresistance.org/
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As I see it, resistance to the LRDP is not just about UCSC, and it's not even just about the UC system. It's about defending our communities and wild ecosystems against the intrusion of market-based values (IE, profitability) in to every aspect of life and every corner of the earth. It is also about student's disenchantment with having little say and even less actual decisionmaking power at a public university which they are paying tens of thousands of dollars to attend. This rally may not seem like much, but what it represents is a beginning for a local grassroots resistance movement that has great potential to go beyond the immediate issues at hand.
I agree that it's important to look at the issue within the bigger picture perspective. The wildlands of California and beyond are being developed for by profit driven groups with little or no regard for the environment or surrounding human communities. You can see it here in Humboldt county with the Pacific Lumber issue, in Sonoma where a company wants to put in a bunch of vinyards on old logging lands. Inb Berkely with the oaks, in Santa Cruz and many others. I think we need a sort of environmental congress to gather and address the huge scale issues. Perhaps a larger coordinated effort can be made to bring this problem to the forefront. Irresponsible development is a social issue, an economic issue, an environmenal issue, a water quality/availability issue etc.
I'm struck by confusion and a sense of irony when I see kids getting into a University, and then immediately deciding that it's big enough, shouldn't be any bigger, and that to let it grow would be irresponsible.
I attended UCSC in the 70's, when it had 6,700 students. Had we endorsed the same mindset and tried to stop any further growth, more than half of the students currently enrolled (And ostensibly protesting the growth) wouldn't be students today.
Do people see the growth as evil simply because it's growth? I see the growth as an inevitable result of the state's population growth. The UC system is required, by a mandate set by CA residents, to have space for the top 12% of high school seniors graduating each year. The growth being proposed by UCSC and other campus's is to facilitate that mandate.
I also note that the original plan for UCSC called for 25,000 students and 24 colleges, as opposed to the current 15,000students/12 colleges.
I too love trees and the environment, but there seems to me something selfish and self-serving when a group of people who have attained the luxury of being in the school and getting an education there are trying to stop growth and effectively deny that same future to others.
I attended UCSC in the 70's, when it had 6,700 students. Had we endorsed the same mindset and tried to stop any further growth, more than half of the students currently enrolled (And ostensibly protesting the growth) wouldn't be students today.
Do people see the growth as evil simply because it's growth? I see the growth as an inevitable result of the state's population growth. The UC system is required, by a mandate set by CA residents, to have space for the top 12% of high school seniors graduating each year. The growth being proposed by UCSC and other campus's is to facilitate that mandate.
I also note that the original plan for UCSC called for 25,000 students and 24 colleges, as opposed to the current 15,000students/12 colleges.
I too love trees and the environment, but there seems to me something selfish and self-serving when a group of people who have attained the luxury of being in the school and getting an education there are trying to stop growth and effectively deny that same future to others.
It's no surprise that you're confused. The administration's rhetoric is powerful, as are the interests of their friends in Silicon Valley. The LRDP is not just about accommodating more students. Of course, more students will come, and good for them if they can afford the sky-rocketing tuition and insane housing costs. Good for them if they don't want to study literature or art or ethnic studies (there's more on that list!). Outreach and retention for students of color receives no funding from the university anymore. General academic support is harder and harder to find with increasing student-TA and student-faculty ratios. There's no confusion on my part, no selfishness. Yes, there will be more students, which would be good if they were getting what they deserve. Instead, they'll be paying more for less. The same education that you received is already being systematically denied to students; I don't really want to think about what it will be like by 2020. Students aren't the ones trying to deny a good university experience to other students; it's the Regents (rich, powerful, mostly white); it's the administration.
ps-It's not just about ecological concerns, but jesus! It's pretty sad how the logics of progress and development basically assume the inevitability of violent eco-destruction. Are unique species and habitats and eco-systems worth anything anymore? I'm glad you love the environment, but tell that to the red-legged frog and every other species you think it's selfish of us to not want to exterminate.
no insult intended, but really think about what you're advocating before you take it so lightly. someone might get offended.
ps-It's not just about ecological concerns, but jesus! It's pretty sad how the logics of progress and development basically assume the inevitability of violent eco-destruction. Are unique species and habitats and eco-systems worth anything anymore? I'm glad you love the environment, but tell that to the red-legged frog and every other species you think it's selfish of us to not want to exterminate.
no insult intended, but really think about what you're advocating before you take it so lightly. someone might get offended.
Think it's growing now? Just watch what happens when the whole UC system is privatized as the state is starting to propose. Think fees are high now? Try doubling the cost and size. And kiss any public input on anything goodbye since there won't be any funding from taxpayers. It's not out of the realm of reality that it could and very well may happen.
..I find equally filled with rhetoric.
I don't take lightly what I proposed, as you suggest. Instead, I view it with a different perspective than you apparently do.
Where you seem to see a University that has removed Lit. or Art programs for no apparent good reason, I see one that did so because it lacked the funds to keep them alive. The same lack of public funds that cause tuition to rise also cause some hard decisions, and I think they made a supply and demand decision. "What are most of the incoming students looking for in a major? Literature, or science?".
As for outreach to students of color? With all due respect, you are wrong. Although the University's legal ability to engage in recruiting students of color was indeed drastically curtailed by the citizens of CA. (You remember prop. 209, right? Where the population voted and forced the University to stop aff. action recruitment?), the Uni. does still have programs.
Summer Bridge, for one. The Educational Partnership Center, for another. Both are specifically designed to recruit and retain students of color. And harkening back to my point about desired majors? Do some research on what first generation students of color are taking as majors. Very few are looking for lit. or art. They're looking for science, business, and engineering.
And so, I'll have to propose that your rhetoric is as powerful as theirs.....because you seem to be offering up as much as you contend they do.
I don't take lightly what I proposed, as you suggest. Instead, I view it with a different perspective than you apparently do.
Where you seem to see a University that has removed Lit. or Art programs for no apparent good reason, I see one that did so because it lacked the funds to keep them alive. The same lack of public funds that cause tuition to rise also cause some hard decisions, and I think they made a supply and demand decision. "What are most of the incoming students looking for in a major? Literature, or science?".
As for outreach to students of color? With all due respect, you are wrong. Although the University's legal ability to engage in recruiting students of color was indeed drastically curtailed by the citizens of CA. (You remember prop. 209, right? Where the population voted and forced the University to stop aff. action recruitment?), the Uni. does still have programs.
Summer Bridge, for one. The Educational Partnership Center, for another. Both are specifically designed to recruit and retain students of color. And harkening back to my point about desired majors? Do some research on what first generation students of color are taking as majors. Very few are looking for lit. or art. They're looking for science, business, and engineering.
And so, I'll have to propose that your rhetoric is as powerful as theirs.....because you seem to be offering up as much as you contend they do.
i don't wanna get in to more pointless net wars. there's just no effective way to point out the factual inadequacies of each other's arguments in this forum. the preponderance of misunderstandings is simply overwhelming.
thanks for noting my powerful rhetoric though. i think it's pretty strong too. someone's gotta counter the corporate-university PR machine. clearly that's not you.
i'm not sorry for you though. you got the best ucsc had to offer. i'm sorry for everyone else whose values don't match the supply/demand curve. and there's a lot of us despite your neo-lib techniques. so go whine to some suits and leave us alone.
thanks for noting my powerful rhetoric though. i think it's pretty strong too. someone's gotta counter the corporate-university PR machine. clearly that's not you.
i'm not sorry for you though. you got the best ucsc had to offer. i'm sorry for everyone else whose values don't match the supply/demand curve. and there's a lot of us despite your neo-lib techniques. so go whine to some suits and leave us alone.
by the way: do your own research before you make yourself look bad. listing summerbridge et al makes no sense in response to my argument. my whole point, which you clearly don't get because you did not respond to it--maybe your ucsc education wasn't so great after all...--my whole point is that UCSC (not the people like me who've worked for summerbridge outside of the university) is not supporting outreach and retention--especially for students of color. go to the E2 building and ask the folks there who does all the work. concerned students, not the U. why are there so many cats coming up in here looking for sci-tech degrees? cuz those jobs are the only ones that pay off loans. great answer: let the public education system ignore wholistic education in order to subordinate yet another sector to the motivation of profit.
god you people suck. go write for the Silicon Valley Business Review. and if you love the trees so much, then get a real analysis of systemic causes of destruction.
god you people suck. go write for the Silicon Valley Business Review. and if you love the trees so much, then get a real analysis of systemic causes of destruction.
Your point, as stated in your own words, was that the University is doing nothing to attract and support and retain studnets of color. And your contention, in your own words, is that "Outreach and retention for students of color receives no funding from the university anymore.".
As such, you sound ignorant and uniformed when you try to contend that EPC and Summer Bridge support neither of those goals.
When I mention Summer Bridge and EPC, I mention two programs that exist specifically for those purposes. And two programs that are funded by UC.
And your response to that is that I don't understand your point?
You were blowing bombastic rhetoric, I countered it with factual examples which clearly prove you to be incorrect or lying...so you're now attempting to hide with "you don't understand me and I don't want to engage in a posting war.
That's hilarious! You don't want to play because you can't set the rules and then change them when you're losing the game. *lol*
I do agree with you on one point though: I got the best UC had to offer...whereas you apparently didn't.
Now go google Summer Bridge and EPC before you post again and embarrass yourself further.
As for "leave you alone"? Junior, you're the one who's whining now, not me. You don't like it when someone disagrees with you? Easy solution: shut up and keep your opinions to yourself. Otherwise, deal with dissenting opinion. That's sort of what the idea of free speech in a democracy is all about. (You REALLY should have paid more attention in those classes you claim to have attended.).
As such, you sound ignorant and uniformed when you try to contend that EPC and Summer Bridge support neither of those goals.
When I mention Summer Bridge and EPC, I mention two programs that exist specifically for those purposes. And two programs that are funded by UC.
And your response to that is that I don't understand your point?
You were blowing bombastic rhetoric, I countered it with factual examples which clearly prove you to be incorrect or lying...so you're now attempting to hide with "you don't understand me and I don't want to engage in a posting war.
That's hilarious! You don't want to play because you can't set the rules and then change them when you're losing the game. *lol*
I do agree with you on one point though: I got the best UC had to offer...whereas you apparently didn't.
Now go google Summer Bridge and EPC before you post again and embarrass yourself further.
As for "leave you alone"? Junior, you're the one who's whining now, not me. You don't like it when someone disagrees with you? Easy solution: shut up and keep your opinions to yourself. Otherwise, deal with dissenting opinion. That's sort of what the idea of free speech in a democracy is all about. (You REALLY should have paid more attention in those classes you claim to have attended.).
dude--if you're gonna quote me then fucking quote me in context. i said the university doesn't fund outreach and retention anymore. the context there was the UCSC LRDP, meaning that UCSC has cut the funding to all the outreach and retention programs on its campus. clearly there's a misunderstanding here, but a willful one. i tell you to bounce off to the biz sector cuz there's already a place for you: the soul-sucking sycophantic world of suits. quit going for the 'clarification' arguments that you can't even fucking win and respond to the overall logic or don't respond at all.
ps--really, this is my last post because i'd like to avoid puking all over my computer.
pps--if you wanna actually continue this, then let's meet or have a public debate. i could use a confidence booster. militantpoet101 [at] hotmail.com
ps--really, this is my last post because i'd like to avoid puking all over my computer.
pps--if you wanna actually continue this, then let's meet or have a public debate. i could use a confidence booster. militantpoet101 [at] hotmail.com
We have tree sitters in the parking lot of the Physical Sciences building! Yeah to the Tree People!
...but I'll try a final time. Direct quotes of your own words might help you to recall what you said.
For starters, your OP didn't say " the university doesn't fund outreach and retention anymore.", as you're now posting.
Your OP said "Outreach and retention for students of color receives no funding from the university anymore."; and that's the post I contested and continue to refute.
And I contradicted that as inaccurate by giving the examples of Summer Bridge as a vehicle for retention, and EPC as a means of recruitment for students of color.
You then tried to weakly sidestep that by not directly addressing my post. You alluded to your having worked with bridge, and claimed that the Uni. doesn't care, and that only the students do the work in those programs.
To which I say, laughable and egocentric B.S. Those programs are funded by the UC. Staff work in those programs. Outreach work is conducted by UC funded staff in the EPC program.
Is that clear enough?
As for your last post, wherein your know trying to obscure your proven inaccurate statement by clouding it with context of the LRDP, I'm happy to debate and clarify that too. Really clear:
LRDP has NOTHING to do with your imagined cessation of reduced funding for outreach and retention of students of color. Those reductions were a direct result of the passage of Prop. 209 in 2004, when the population of CA. mandated that the UC stop affirmative action based recruiting/admissions. If anything, the UC has done an admirable job of finding ways to sidestep that racist propostion by enacting programs like EPC. The funds being used to build a new facilty are not funds that were taken away from recruiting of students; you're fabricating facts to suit your argument. Show me those facts if you have them.
Why do you want to email privately instead of here? To reduce the number of people viewing your poor debating tactics?
For starters, your OP didn't say " the university doesn't fund outreach and retention anymore.", as you're now posting.
Your OP said "Outreach and retention for students of color receives no funding from the university anymore."; and that's the post I contested and continue to refute.
And I contradicted that as inaccurate by giving the examples of Summer Bridge as a vehicle for retention, and EPC as a means of recruitment for students of color.
You then tried to weakly sidestep that by not directly addressing my post. You alluded to your having worked with bridge, and claimed that the Uni. doesn't care, and that only the students do the work in those programs.
To which I say, laughable and egocentric B.S. Those programs are funded by the UC. Staff work in those programs. Outreach work is conducted by UC funded staff in the EPC program.
Is that clear enough?
As for your last post, wherein your know trying to obscure your proven inaccurate statement by clouding it with context of the LRDP, I'm happy to debate and clarify that too. Really clear:
LRDP has NOTHING to do with your imagined cessation of reduced funding for outreach and retention of students of color. Those reductions were a direct result of the passage of Prop. 209 in 2004, when the population of CA. mandated that the UC stop affirmative action based recruiting/admissions. If anything, the UC has done an admirable job of finding ways to sidestep that racist propostion by enacting programs like EPC. The funds being used to build a new facilty are not funds that were taken away from recruiting of students; you're fabricating facts to suit your argument. Show me those facts if you have them.
Why do you want to email privately instead of here? To reduce the number of people viewing your poor debating tactics?
"Mayor Bersamin described the Educational Partnership Center as an "engine of educational attainment" and recognized UCSC and EPC for assisting the youth and larger community of Watsonville to "greater economic, social, and educational advancement." The Educational Partnership Center has had a direct impact on the economic development of Watsonville and its future growth potential. <b>Programs such as the Early Academic Outreach Program (EAOP), GEAR UP, and MESA Schools program act as a "catalyst for students..... provide opportunities [for students] to explore options beyond high school," </b>said Mayor Bersamin"
http://epc.ucsc.edu/site/Latest_News/46/#anc106
The Educational Partnership Center was recently awarded a two-year, $180,000 UC-Community College Joint Transfer Initiative for Access and Success grant from the UC Office of the President for the “Bridge to Transfer Partnerships” initiative. The new project will address the need to create more effective, efficient pathways for community college students through early identification of high school students moving on to community college and collaborative partnerships between K-12 and higher education institutions. Working with four regional community colleges—Evergreen Valley College, Hartnell College, Monterey Peninsula College, and San Jose City College—<b>the EPC will work with its high school and UC partners to increase matriculation and enrollment among educationally disadvantaged students in community college and increase community college transfer rates to the UC system.</b>
Nahh, no outreach or assistance to POC goin on from the UC.
http://epc.ucsc.edu/site/Latest_News/46/#anc106
The Educational Partnership Center was recently awarded a two-year, $180,000 UC-Community College Joint Transfer Initiative for Access and Success grant from the UC Office of the President for the “Bridge to Transfer Partnerships” initiative. The new project will address the need to create more effective, efficient pathways for community college students through early identification of high school students moving on to community college and collaborative partnerships between K-12 and higher education institutions. Working with four regional community colleges—Evergreen Valley College, Hartnell College, Monterey Peninsula College, and San Jose City College—<b>the EPC will work with its high school and UC partners to increase matriculation and enrollment among educationally disadvantaged students in community college and increase community college transfer rates to the UC system.</b>
Nahh, no outreach or assistance to POC goin on from the UC.
terribly tragically humorous that the debate between campus growth or not comes down to the typical characterizations of spoiled misinformed kids and ecocidal ucsc supporter who can quote a few documents...i'm going to of course side with the purported spoiled kids, but perhaps in a different way, cuz you know what, i did go to ucsc and i did all i could to protect the forest when i lived up there and the forest is way more beautiful than another science lab and that's the fact, you can look it up. somebody definitely wrote that somewhere. it should be park land. and i'm not going to protect the rights of people who go to ucsc who don't even give 2 shits about this town or the effect their university has on the local ecosystem. as for the watsonville outreach. build in watsonville if that's such a desire. watsonville would fucking love it and honestly could probably use it. but santa cruz doesn't and the forest doesn't and i've read the lrdp numerous occasions over the past 15 years so stick that us your ass please mr. confusion. there is scant amounts said in there about the effects of the university on the ecosystem and the city by the university except for some islands of wilderness that are a bunch of bullshite. wilderness don't work like that. take an ecology class or better still spend a night or two up in the forest drinking that in. maybe the treesitters up there now will let you bury their shit if you document the experience. by the way, i'm not part of that group, i don't speak for them and wish them well and i know their hearts are in the right place and WE WILL FUCKING WIN. and by we i do you mean you too confusion. amor y rabia
It was okay for you to go, and for the UC to take care of your needs, but now that you got what you want from it, you're arrogant enough to say no more?
Yer like a hungry man going through a charity food line who eats his fill and then decides that he's had enough, so they can shut down the food line. Screw the needs of the people behind you, you've already stuffed your mouth.
You're like someone driving their SUV to a workshop to tell me how I shouldn't use gasoline; total hypocrite nimby.
Yer like a hungry man going through a charity food line who eats his fill and then decides that he's had enough, so they can shut down the food line. Screw the needs of the people behind you, you've already stuffed your mouth.
You're like someone driving their SUV to a workshop to tell me how I shouldn't use gasoline; total hypocrite nimby.
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