SANTA CRUZ, Calif. -- Demonstrators at the University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC) blocked off all entrances to the Hahn Student Services Building early Monday morning, responding to a call from the Occupy University of California Davis group for a strike across the 10-campus system.
"I want my voice to be heard," said Bryan Mathewson, a UCSC undergraduate student. "One of the main things that I'm really disturbed by is the discouragement of any sort of dissent and the silencing of voices."
Mathewson said he joined the protest movement after he saw video of university police pepper spraying protesters who had linked arms in a plaza at UC Davis on November 18. The video, widely circulated online and on television, sparked nationwide outrage.
"This action is to call attention to the fact that money is going to militarizing our campuses rather than student services and education," said graduate student Erin Ellison.
Ellison and others said they have three main demands: the resignation of UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi, ridding campuses of university police and the rollback of exorbitant fees.
Protesters, made up mostly of graduate and undergraduate students and some from the local Occupy movement, blocked doors to the building and displayed signs that said "UC Death by Debt" and "Will Teach for Food." Demonstrators said they chose the student services building because it was the symbolic center of the school bureaucracy.
Less than an hour into their protest, students had seemingly succeeded in preventing anyone from entering the building. Associate Vice Chancellor Jean Marie Scott spoke with some protesters, telling them the university was redirecting the roughly 100 staff based there to other campus locations.
She asked for patience, telling the protesters they should send any staff trying to get into the building to the university bookstore.
The call for a system-wide strike coincides with a University of California Regents meeting held Monday. The Regents were meeting at four different campuses, including Davis, linked by teleconference after their November 16-17 meeting was canceled due to worries of violence and vandalism.
The Regents were expected to vote on a budget that asks for an 8% increase in funding from the state. Tuition was not on the agenda.
The budget acknowledges that, given the state's fiscal scenario, the increase may be a tough sell, but it argues the extra $411 million is necessary to maintain affordability, quality and access.
"Cutting UC support in three of the last four years, including a $650 million cut in 2011-12, State funding has dropped from $3.25 billion in 2007-08 to $2.37 billion in 2011-12," according to the budget document. It said this has translated directly to a corresponding rise in tuition and fees.
For the first time in the history of the University of California, the school is receiving more money from student tuition and fees than the state.
Protesters said the continued tuition and fee increases were crushing students, and they said they faced a lifetime of income inequality hobbled by student debt.
"I see success as getting more and more students aware of what's going on and demanding that students have a say in the way the university runs," said Ellison.
Demonstrators said they planned on holding a rally at Quarry Plaza later in the day. They said they would picket to encourage students to get involved, and some said they were going to set up an encampment at the plaza.
