iNarrate From the Margins: 03/23/10

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Students rally in Sacramento

March 22, 2010 | 5:44 pm

Thousands of college students and faculty rallied Monday in Sacramento in support of higher education, another in a series of recent actions throughout the state designed to highlight the effects of budget cuts.
The demonstration was organized by the Student Senate for California Community Colleges and drew about 5,000 participants who marched from a ballpark in West Sacramento to the north steps of the state Capitol to protest fee increases, canceled classes and employee layoffs at community colleges, California State University and the University of California.
Several legislators spoke to the crowd, as did community college Chancellor Jack Scott, who thanked the students for making their voices heard and encouraged them to continue lobbying the Legislature and governor to support education funding.
The state’s 112 community colleges — which make up the largest system of higher education in the nation — sustained about $520 million in budget cuts in 2009-10. Student speakers shared personal stories about the effect of budget cuts and vowed to continue putting pressure on lawmakers.
“The message was to invest in education; students will pull California out of this recession,” said Reid Milburn, a history major at Sacramento City College and president of the student senate group. “But our second message is that with almost 3.5 million students in all three segments of higher education, it’s up to us to continue to advocate for education and not just come up here for one day, for one big march.”
Earlier this month, students and faculty at more than 100 campuses in California and across the nation held mostly peaceful protests opposing education cuts.
In a statement after Monday’s rally, California Secretary of Education Bonnie Reiss said:
“At a time of difficult budget cuts, the governor’s budget proposal prioritizes education and protects higher education from further cuts and fee increases. We must do everything possible to ensure that every student wishing to pursue higher education has the access and the resources necessary to earn a degree and build a brighter future. I urge the Legislature to listen to these students and adopt a budget that shares the governor’s commitment to fully fund education in the state.”
-- Carla Rivera

Community college students protest at Capitol

Nanette Asimov, Chronicle Staff Writer

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

They converged on Sacramento on Monday from community colleges across California.
Among them were Iraq war veterans, people with disabilities, ex-prostitutes, students who are the first in their family to attend college and thousands more who believe their future depends on a public education system that is crumbling beneath them for lack of funding.
"We fought for our country, but when we get back here, we have to continue fighting," said Jordan Towers, 26, one of at least 26,000 returning veterans who are depending on California's two-year colleges to retrain them for the workforce.
A Marine veteran and student at City College of San Francisco, Towers feels the impact of deep budget cuts personally. Reduced staffing at the college means it takes months for GI benefits to reach him - so long that he had to sell his television set and computer keyboard last semester to pay his rent.
Courses, counseling, library hours, book assistance, summer school - all have been cut at community colleges statewide.
"Veterans have done all that's been asked of them, and now they're suffering as schools across California face cuts," Towers said.

Civil but pointed

On Monday morning, he joined a vast crowd at Raley Field in West Sacramento as they marched a couple miles past a gauntlet of mounted police to the Capitol. Carrying signs and banners, the protesters chanted, "No cuts! No fees! Education should be free!"
It's a familiar refrain. Students from public colleges and universities have been protesting since last fall, when courses were cut way back even as fees soared by 32 percent in response to the state's latest budget deficit, now at $20 billion.
To bridge that deficit, lawmakers will spend the next several months debating what state programs to cut and whether education will again be among them.

Seeking practical solutions

Unlike previous protests, which were organized largely by University of California students and often resulted in arrests for civil disobedience, Monday's rally on the Capitol steps was noisy but civil, the effort of generally older community college students standing side by side with administrators and lawmakers.
They emphasized practical solutions to the education funding dilemma: bypassing the gridlocked Legislature to place a measure on the statewide ballot for higher education funding; supporting Assembly Bill 656, an oil tax that would send proceeds to public colleges and universities; getting signatures for a ballot initiative to reduce to a simple majority the votes needed for the state to pass a budget or raise taxes.
Most of all, the students vowed, they would use their numbers to vote out politicians who fail to support their cause.
"This year at the ballot box, we are going to hit them hard, and hit them fast," said Jesse Cheng, an incoming student representative to UC's Board of Regents. "In November, like they made us pay, we will make them pay."
The crowd roared.

Not enough classes

Jack Scott, chancellor of the 3 million-student community college system, said that some 200,000 students will be unable to enroll next year because there aren't enough classes for them.
"The state doesn't give us enough money," said Scott. "We're not going to go away silently."
After the rally, some students coursed through the halls of the Legislature to tell their stories to any lawmaker who would listen.
Six yellow-shirted classmates from Mount San Antonio College in Walnut (Los Angeles County) knocked on the door of their assemblyman, Charles Calderon, D-Whittier (Los Angeles County).
He wasn't there, but the students told his aide, Vanessa Lugo, that without college, recovered addicts, prostitutes and hustlers would still be on the street.
That described some of them, they acknowledged.
"I know what it feels like to hustle on the street," said student Evelyn Vargas, tears welling in her eyes. "It's only because someone at school said I could do it that I'm succeeding."
Lugo nodded and promised to inform Calderon about the tutoring, book scholarships and low-income student grants at their school.
All had been cut.

College cuts fire students up

By Sarah Rohrs

Posted: 03/23/2010 01:00:15 AM PDT

Chanting "No more cuts!" and "Education should be free!" Solano Community College student Tara Norman joined a large crowd of college and university students Monday for a boisterous rally and protest in Sacramento against more cuts to higher education. More than 1,000 college students from across California converged on the Capitol to decry slashed budgets and rising fees at public universities and community colleges.
"I was excited to see so many people were there caring about higher education and we were all there for the same cause," Norman said.
The March on March for Higher Education included students walking from Raley Field in West Sacramento to the North Steps of the Capitol to demand more funding for public education.
Lasting several hours, it was the third such major protest this month.
Nearly 25 Solano College students took part, some carrying a large banner, and signs with such slogans as "Don't Kill My Education" and "No More Cuts. I Need My Education."
Nearly 30 students from Napa Valley College also participated, including Alex Shantz, who is worried about higher tuition and other fees.
"It was empowering to a lot of people," Shantz said. "People were demanding and were fired up. They are angry because the economy is bad and they are cutting so much for education."
Another student, Amoriah Hartley, 31, a sociology student at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, said she was worried her campus would stop providing

free tutoring and writing assistance to students because of budget cuts.Hartley, who hopes to transfer to a four-year university and become a social worker, urged Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature to consider raising taxes to protect education funding.
Cuts in state funding have led to class cutbacks, staff layoffs and sharp fee hikes at the 10-campus University of California, the 23-campus California State University system and 110 community colleges.
California Community Colleges Chancellor Jack Scott spoke, drawing attention to the $520 million in cuts the community college system sustained this year.
Scott said he hoped the strong showing would persuade state lawmakers to protect funding for two-year colleges that have seen funding cut by 8 percent this academic year despite record demand for classes.
"I hope legislators will understand how deep students care about their education," Scott told The Associated Press. "By denying students their education, we're going to hurt our state economically."
California Secretary of Education Bonnie Reiss issued a statement following the rally, urging state lawmakers to ensure higher education does not withstand further cuts.
"We must do everything possible to ensure that every student wishing to pursue higher education has the access and the resources necessary to earn a degree and build a brighter future," Reiss said.
Amoriah Hartley, 31, a sociology student at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, said she was worried her campus would stop providing free tutoring and writing assistance to students because of budget cuts.
Hartley urged Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature to consider raising taxes to protect education funding.
"If we are all a bunch of tightwads, we're not going to get anywhere as a country," she said.

On the Spectrum -- California must invest in higher education

by Cynthia Parkhill -- Focus Pages Editor

Updated: 03/22/2010 05:20:33 PM PDT

My objective seemed simple enough: enroll in a California State University and earn a Master's degree. But what should have been a straightforward quest has instead been fraught with frustration and anxiety.
A complex online application process failed to disclose, up front, what documentation I would need in order to complete the form. I had to advance through multiple screens abruptly demanding information. If I left an answer blank or my answer made no sense, I was subjected to screen after screen of do-overs, highlighted in glaring red.
In the end, my effort was pointless because the cost of tuition is so far out of reach ... only, somehow, the Web site failed to make this clear until after I'd submitted a nonrefundable application fee.
Due to a limited amount of state support and a large number of students, the program that I wished to apply to was not admitting students into its state-supported program for fall 2010. Instead, the only option available is a so-called "special session," which is not supported financially by the state of California. The fees are "highly competitive" (I prefer the term "draconian") at $474 per unit.
So, for now, I've decided to give my business to a community college. It charges $26 per unit and I can take online courses in my field of study.
Maybe it won't be as prestigious as a master's degree but I believe these community college courses will be of benefit for the information that they provide me.
I think it bodes ill, however, for the state of California if it prices higher education so far out of reach. Some jobs require the completion of a master's degree: a librarian, for example. Will California have to do without librarians when those in the work force retire?
California must invest in higher education that is accessible to all, or else must suffer the consequence of failing to prepare its citizens to serve in positions that it needs. But instead, current events demonstrate a different trend.
The legislative analyst's office for the state of California states that Governor's Schwarzenegger's proposed investment of $11.5 billion in general fund support assumes that UC and CSU systems will enact fee increases and that access to financial aid will be reduced and restricted (http://www.lao.ca.gov/analysis_2009/highered/highered_anl09003002.aspx).
Discussing my problem with a professional in my field of study, she told me she had earned her master's degree in another state. The question then occurred to me: if people have to leave the state in order to attend colleges, what will entice them back to California to benefit our society?
Consider that during the course of study, these students may put down roots. You cannot assume that they will invariably live singly, unattached, in dorms. They may be in partnered relationships and raising families of their own.
How much easier and more convenient for themselves and for their families to seek employment close to the area that they have come to view as home: where their partner or spouse may go to work and their children may attend school.
Of course, for those blessed few who come from wealthy families, cost will not be an issue. They can go full-time to school in California or anywhere else.
But the rest of us will have to ask ourselves how our college education will be paid for. We'll have to jockey for available scholarships or take out exorbitant loans that leave us in debt for years after we've completed our course of study.
We may have to leave California and hope that other states place a wiser priority upon funding higher education.
Or we may take community college courses and hope that on-the-job experience helps offset the lack of a degree or hope that circumstances permit us to pursue a degree later on in life.
In any case, California will reap the consequences of the priority it fails to place on making higher education affordable. It will only serve us right.

Disastrous cuts

Published By Times Herald

Posted: 03/23/2010 01:02:55 AM PDT

The effects of fewer college graduates on California's economy will be far reaching and disastrous. For the past two decades, California's economy has increasingly changed from a "manufacturing economy" to a "service economy." The result has been a steady decrease in unskilled-labor jobs in exchange for an increase in the professional and skilled-job markets.This year, the California State University (CSU) was forced to cut 40,000 student spots of its normal starting freshman class. This means that, in about four years, there will be half as many professionals introduced into the job market by the CSU as are normally graduated and the same for each year thereafter.
Vis-à-vis, there will larger numbers of unskilled workers in California and fewer jobs for them.
Legislative perception is that higher education is an expense; but the CSU has proved, over and over, that for every dollar invested, the state receives a return of $4.41 -- that's a return-on-investment of more than 85 percent in four years! Cuts to higher education are cuts to one of the state's leading profit centers.
Peter J. Hayes
CFA Chapter President California Maritime Academy
Associate Professor Marine Transportation
Vallejo

Dan Walters: Protesters can't alter fiscal facts

By Dan Walters

Published: Tuesday, Mar. 23, 2010 - 12:00 am | Page 3A

Last Modified: Tuesday, Mar. 23, 2010 - 9:31 am

Thousands of public college students gathered at the Capitol on Monday to protest cutbacks in state aid to colleges and rising collegiate fees.
They joined an expanding club of those with stakes in the deficit-ridden state budget who dislike what's happening – furloughed state workers, home health care providers and recipients, doctors who serve the poor, teachers, even farmers whose open space subsidies have been eliminated.
Each stakeholder group makes its case with as much drama as it can muster, often with stories of horrendous effects, real or apocryphal. Surely, each argues, money can be found to avoid draconian cutbacks in its particular program. Surely something else – fill in the blank – is less important to the welfare of the state.
The simple fact, however, is that their demands, including those already in law, add up to tens of billions of dollars more than the state's recession-battered revenue system can muster, even with the temporary tax increases enacted a year ago.
The gap is likely to widen unless there is some very explosive recovery from the worst recession since the Great Depression. And chances of that happening are nil, even the most optimistic economists concede. It would take a decade of record-high economic growth to wipe out job losses from this recession.
More tax increases are politically impossible, as even the Legislature's pro-tax Democratic leaders acknowledge. Their most optimistic scenario is for revenues to pick up a little bit and for the federal government, whose budget deficits are proportionately bigger than California's, to give us a few extra billion dollars.
Even were the Democrats' rosy scenario to become reality, California would still be left with at least a $10 billion deficit, which would still require more of the cuts that the college students and other protesters abhor.
The larger public, meanwhile, just wants Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature to get on with it.
A new Field Poll says that the economy and the budget crisis are the two most important issues to voters in this election year – and there's almost nothing that the state can do about the economy, at least in the short run.
There are, in brief, no pain-free fixes to this crisis, one born of irresponsible fiscal decisionmaking earlier in the decade and compounded by the recession.
The short-term gimmicks that the governor and lawmakers have employed merely avoid the day of fiscal reckoning – and make it worse.
The crisis will continue for years and may even get worse as the temporary taxes expire, as shortfalls in public employee pensions and retiree health care bite, and as the new federal health insurance program kicks in, pressuring the state to pick up the tab for many low-income residents.
The aggrieved can protest all they want, but they cannot change that reality.

Students rally outside Capitol for increased education funding

By Laurel Rosenhall
lrosenhall@sacbee.com

Published: Tuesday, Mar. 23, 2010 - 12:00 am | Page 4A

Last Modified: Tuesday, Mar. 23, 2010 - 9:31 am

Demonstrations for increased education funding continued Monday as roughly 5,000 students and employees from community colleges and California State University descended on the state Capitol for a noisy but peaceful rally.
They came from around California, wearing shirts representing their campuses: Humboldt, Northridge, Fresno, West Los Angeles, San Jose, San Francisco. And they said cuts to education in recent years are hurting their odds for the future.
Lee Cha, 23, a student in Sacramento State's teaching credential program, said he's been hit two ways by cuts to education funding. It's become harder to get classes he needs to complete his university studies, while the demand for new teachers in K-12 school districts has fallen.
"I'm studying to be a teacher, and it's really looking tougher for me to get a job," Cha said.
Monday's demonstration was the latest in a string of protests that began in early March with students up and down the state speaking out against rising fees and reduced courses at California's colleges and universities.
Community college Chancellor Jack Scott said the state could make money by spending more on education. For every dollar the state spends on education, it gets $3 back in increased tax revenue, Scott said, because educated workers earn bigger salaries.
"Education is not a cost, it's an investment," Scott said. "And it's California's best investment."
Many demonstrators spoke out in favor of raising taxes. "Close loopholes, not schools," read some signs they carried. Others said, "Tax oil, not students" – a reference to Assembly Bill 656, which would tax oil extraction to pay for higher education. The bill is sponsored by the California Faculty Association, the union that represents CSU professors.
As demonstrators rallied outside, legislators inside the Capitol held a hearing on the state's Master Plan for Higher Education, which is being reviewed this year on its 50th anniversary.
"Fifty years ago in this very building, California set a standard for the whole world," Assemblyman Warren Furutani, D-Gardena, said to the crowd on the north steps of the Capitol. "We have to find new revenue for higher education."
Last year, the Legislature cut higher education spending by 20 percent. The universities responded by raising fees for students, slashing courses and furloughing workers.
This year, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proposed increasing higher-education spending by 12 percent – restoring some of the money lost in last year's historic budget cuts but still giving colleges less than they received in 2007-08.
The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office has suggested more modest increases to higher education to offset proposed cuts in other areas of state government.
In response to Monday's demonstration, Schwarzenegger's secretary of education put the burden of budget decisions on lawmakers. In a statement, Bonnie Reiss said:
"I urge the Legislature to listen to these students and adopt a budget that shares the Governor's commitment to fully fund education in the state."

Students protest budget cuts

CNN iReport on the SJSU education protest

Update: As students leave, announcement of a March 22 bus ride from SJSU to Sacramento for another rally at 1:05 p.m.

Update: SJSU student Mitchell Colbert burned his transcript on-stage to close the protest at 1:02 p.m.

Update: Mitch Colbert, the final speaker and SJSU Students for Quality Education member begins at 12:54 p.m.

Update: President of DeAnza Foothill Community College Association speaking now at SJSU rally at 12:50 p.m.

Update: A brief audio problem interrupted San Jose Teacher Association President at 12:47 p.m.

Update: San Jose Teacher Association President and SJSU graduate begins speaking at 12:43 p.m.

Update: SJSU student activist performs sketch at 12:31 p.m.

Update: Faculty President begins series of speakers at Cesar Chavez Memorial Arch at 12:29 p.m.

Update: Large crowd in Paseo de San Carlos for SJSU march speakers at 12:27 p.m.

Update: March circling Tower Hall at 12:22 p.m.

Update: March going through Paseo de San Antonio and back to campus at 12:19 p.m.

Update: Some SJSU students handing slips to State Sen. Abel Maldonado at 12:15 p.m.

Update: Students filling up San Jose City Hall Plaza at 3rd Street State Building at 12:04 p.m.

Students start budget cuts at San Jose City Hall Plaza.

Read raw and live coverage of the budget protests around California.

Thousands Of College Students Protest Budget Cuts

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Thousands of college students

from across California converged on the state Capitol Monday for the latest protest against slashed budgets and rising fees at public universities and community colleges. ....... rest of article at http://www.ktvu.com/news/22908388/detail.html

California college students protest budget cuts

BY BRETT WILKISON

THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

SACRAMENTO - More than 175 students and staff from Santa Rosa Junior College joined thousands of others from across California at the Capitol in Sacramento Monday in a vocal protest and rally against cuts to education.

Organizers planned the “March in March” event to take aim at college fee hikes, reduced class offerings and cuts in programs for lower income and disabled students.

“With the economy like it is, the cuts are just going to continue,” said Amanda Swan, a Santa Rosa Junior College student leader who helped organize the school's contingent traveling to the Capitol.

Among those making the trip from Santa Rosa were students who said they have taken on extra work to meet higher fees, staff who have taken salary cuts or seen vacant positions go unfilled and instructors who've dealt with class sizes that have doubled in the past year.

“Community colleges are supposed to be for people who don't have a lot of money,” said Santa Rosa student Margo Van Venn, 63. Van Venn said she has taken exercise and creative writing classes at the junior college since the early 1980s, but she said recent funding cuts have led to dramatic reductions in the courses offered.

“Students can't get the classes they need to move on,” she said.

The day began at 6:30 a.m. for the Santa Rosa group as participants gathered in the junior college's Lawrence Bertolini Student Services Center, where they picked up blue and red armbands, hand-written protest signs and bag lunches.

Five buses were paid for by the local SEIU, which represents some campus workers, and the All Faculty Association, made up of instructors, to take supporters on the two-hour bus trip to the Capitol.

The rally itself was organized by the Student Senate for California Community Colleges and the California State Student Association and began with a high-spirited 20-minute march from Raley Field to the Capitol.

Students took in nearly two hours of speeches from student and state education leaders, and a half-dozen state legislators.

Some speeches directly tackled the state's difficult spending choices.

Assembly majority leader Alberto Torrico, D-Fremont, took aim at the state's multibillion dollar spending on prisons, saying more money needed to go to schools.

“Instead of opening our doors to college education, we're closing (doors) every day,” Torrico said.

Most remarks to the crowd, which organizers estimated at about 7,000 to 9,000 were fired-up calls to action, tailored to a younger generation of voters.

At one point, a student leader asked audience members to take out their cell phones and send a text message opposing further funding cuts to an allied student group, a sort of impromptu digital petition drive to support the day's campaign.

At another point, a student speaker from California State University Dominguez Hills brought popular culture into the crowd's chants to lawmakers.

“In the famous words of (rapper) Ludacris, if you can't do the job, ‘Move! Move! Move out the way!'” she said.

The audience erupted in an echo: “Move! Move! Move out the way!”

Later, Swan, the Santa Rosa Junior College student leader, urged the crowd on with her own impassioned speech from the Capitol steps.

“How many of you are working two jobs or more to put yourself through college?” she asked. Many students nodded or shouted out in affirmation.

“Sacramento, are you listening? We are here now and we're not going away!” she said.

Several Santa Rosa students said the day made them hopeful about their ability to lobby for more state support of higher education.

“I'm really happy with the way this all worked out,” said Karla Lara, 19, a psychology student from Rohnert Park. She carried a Spanish-language sign that read “La educación es un derecho humano.” Education is a human right.

Santa Rosa Junior College adjunct instructor Dan Walsh joined students at the rally. He said he recently took a 10 percent pay cut and has seen one class, an introductory environmental course, shoot from 40 students to 80 this year.

“It's hard not to be frustrated,” Walsh said. “Our connection to the students has been minimized (by the cuts)...and for them trying to graduate on time is really difficult.”

“I'm just hoping this (demonstration) ripples out,” he said. “It's a conversation that needs to continue.”

Students Face Civil Penalties After Education Protest


By Alex Garcia of the Sun

On March 24, Anthony Garcia will show up for a hearing at the San Fernando Courthouse to respond to an arrest and citation for not disbanding at the end of a protest over education cuts held at California State University Northridge [CSUN].
The demonstration, called a "Day of Action", was held up and down the state. "This is not an issue just of education funding. We're representing everyone who is affected by the economic crisis across the state. We look to officials to protect us and help us, but what is happening right now is the opposite," said the student who majors in literature.
Garcia is not the only one facing disorderly charges after a confrontation with police and students who were participating in a march last week. Nearly 3,000 students and faculty members demonstrated at the school as part of protests held throughout the state in opposition to cuts in public education. At colleges, the cuts would mean fewer classes, professor layoffs and less funding for financial aid. On Thursday evening, some 25 demonstrators broke off from the larger group and sat in the middle of Reseda Blvd., near Prairie Street and refused to move. In total, seven people, including 73-year-old Native American studies professor Karren Baird-Olson, whose arm was broken in the altercation, were arrested and face charges.
A Los Angeles Police Department spokesperson said officers had been on the scene since noon, but things changed when "protesters derailed from their path.'' Police said they had to break up the demonstration because the students blocked traffic and did not heed orders to leave the street.
CSUN President Jolene Koester criticized the students' actions. "Large numbers of students, faculty and staff at Cal State University Northridge participated in peaceful demonstrations on campus and expressed in a highly positive way their concerns and deeply held beliefs about the importance of access to higher education.
"Unfortunately, a smaller group chose to use tactics off campus that were disruptive to our neighbors and to the larger community.
"As a university, we hold as core values open dialogue and the free and respectful expression of differing points of view. I am heartened that on this day, so many members of our campus community found positive expression for the value of higher education. But I'm also disturbed and saddened by the less responsible actions of a few.''
Thousands of students across the state participated in different actions as part of a "Day of Action" to protest cuts in education funding. The rallies were meant to show their displeasure with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the state legislature which seeks to cut billions from public education in response to an ever increasing budget deficit in California that stands at more than $20 billion. Apart from cuts, students also are protesting tuition increases and cuts in classes that they say will make it harder and longer to graduate.
Despite his arrest, Garcia said he has no regrets about his actions and would do it again willingly to show what he considers is an unfair issue.
"[I would do it] As many times as it takes in the future," he said.
Justin Marks, another of the CSUN students facing charges, agreed and opined "the issue is not a lack of money, but a misappropriation of funds.
"How can California be first in prisons and 48th in education? That's not acceptable," he said, calling on students to "keep this momentum going."

Students read their demands to CSUN Provost Harry Hellenbrand a day after an altercation led to seven of them being arrested.

Meanwhile, Baird-Olson remained in the hospital late last week as she recuperated from a broken arm and other injuries. In a YouTube video showing the clash between students and police, Baird-Olson is seen laying on the ground and someone is heard calling for an ambulance after LAPD and California Highway Patrol officers show up at the scene to remove the protesters sitting in the middle of Reseda Blvd.
On Friday, a day after the altercation, students once again rallied in front of the Oviatt Library at CSUN and then marched towards University Hall, where they presented several demands to school provost Harry Hellenbrand who came out to meet them at the entrance to the building. Among those demands were that Baird-Olson not be charged and that her medical fees be paid. They also asked for a meeting with CSUN president Koester to challenge her criticism of their actions. In addition, they requested that no disciplinary actions be taken against the students who were arrested and participated in the protest.
Hellenbrand said this last request was granted and told the students the school stands with them in opposition to the cuts.
"We share your sentiment. This battle is a long one. If they [students] would all turn out and vote as you came out to protest, then you can change the state," said Hellenbrand, who called the education cuts a "great moral failure."
However, he said that once the students leave the campus grounds, "you leave the legal umbrella of the university and you're exposed to the laws of the city."
"Towards the end, it [the protest] got a little ragged, which is understandable given the issue," the provost told the students adding that while the school supports their disagreement over the education funding, they do not agree with all of their actions.
"We'd likely disappoint you on that respect," said Hellenbrand. "We're not going to support everything you do."
"Ideally, I'd like everybody to disperse peacefully, but the police is the police and they are professionals and have to do their job," added Hellenbrand. "When you cross the line and go into the middle of the street, that's risky business."
Students said they have secured a lawyer to represent them at the upcoming hearing and are confident will beat the charges because their demonstration was peaceful and within their rights to express themselves. Regardless of the outcome, they added that they were right in their actions because the education cuts and the fee hikes impact them directly and all those who seek higher education in the state, currently and in the future.
"We will fight until we are successful," vowed Jannae Thompson, another of the students arrested.
Their next fight will be on March 22, when students from across California will convene at the state capitol for a major demonstration.