News

The Labor Education program at City College San Francisco is currently facing a crisis. The program is part of a larger group of programs called the CCSF Diversity Departments (Ethnic, Women's, Interdisciplinary, LGBT and Labor and Community Studies). These programs were created as a result of student struggles in the 1960's, and have been built and maintained by generations of further hard struggle since then.

Now, they are all threatened with cutbacks, consolidation and an end to democratic governance.

Supporters of the Diversity Departments have set up an online petition at:

https://www.change.org/petitions/interim-chancellor-support-the-diversity-collaborative-departments-don-t-eliminate-us

Out of town supporters are welcome to sign.

If you live in the San Francisco area, you can join their Rally on Thursday, November 15th at Noon. Meet at Ram Plaza on CCSF Ocean Campus.

For background information, keep reading

UALE member Bill Shields writes:

Friends,
   We need your help. Our program is a solid labor education program, built up by us and the local labor movement over the decades. It is now threatened as part of a wholesale attack on the CCSF Diversity Departments (Ethnic, Women's, Interdisciplinary, LGBT and Labor and Community Studies), part of a broader attack on City College as a whole. Those leading the attack are the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. These people are coming after our collective bargaining agreements, our democratic governance procedures and the power of the voters to elect a Board of Trustees with the power to represent our city, much as Rahm Emmanuel did in Chicago. They intend to cut us back further than they already have, a devastating attack on our students and the communities we serve.
   You can become part of the fightback. Help us by supporting our November 15th action. If you haven't already, you can also add your name to our petition. Signers from out of town are welcome. Here's the petition address:

https://www.change.org/petitions/interim-chancellor-support-the-diversity-collaborative-departments-don-t-eliminate-us

Thank you for anything and everything you can do to help us.
Solidarity Forever,
 Bill

Bill Shields
Chair, Labor and Community Studies
City College of San Francisco

Attachment:

(Please forward Widely)

Save CCSF's Diversity Departments! No to Cuts, No to Institutional Racism, Sexism and Homophobia!

Rally on Thursday, November 15th at Noon. Meet at Ram Plaza on CCSF Ocean Campus.

CCSF's Diversity Departments* are being threatened with "consolidation" under the pretext of the accreditation imposition. The autonomy of these programs was won through the hard-fought struggles of the 1960s to bring our marginalized histories out of isolation. The consolidation of these departments would be a huge step backwards, bringing down their quality and paving the way for their elimination. Teachers would be fired, and communities of color would be pushed out of representation.

But if students, faculty, and staff mobilize, we can save the Diversity Departments and build an historic movement capable of stopping these racist cuts and oppressive attacks by making the government financially bail out CCSF to prevent cuts to any classes and programs.

We are also hosting screenings of Precious Knowledge on Thursday, November 8th, and both screenings will be followed by a discussion. One screening will be at 12:30 pm on Ocean Campus and one will be at 7 pm at Mission Campus (exact locations TBD).

Initial Sponsors: Save CCSF Coalition and AFT 2121

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. "> This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

[* The Diversity Departments are African American Studies, Asian Studies, Asian American Studies, Interdisciplinary Studies, Labor and Community Studies, LGBT Studies, Philippine Studies, and Women's Studies]

Sign the petition:
https://www.change.org/petitions/interim-chancellor-support-the-diversity-collaborative-departments-don-t-eliminate-us

----

Save CCSF's Diversity Departments! No to Cuts and Institutional Racism!

In 1968, San Francisco State students organized to fight for the inclusion of ethnic, gender, cultural, and community studies in public schools. Consequently, a long student-led strike culminated in the establishment of an ethnic studies department at SF State while inspiring similar movements across the world. However, almost 45 years after the triumphant uprising of SF State students for the establishment of diversity and social justice departments, the WASC accreditation agency is vindictively ordering the CCSF Board of Trustees to phase financially disadvantaged, people of color out of City College and their respective communities. The Board of Trustees and the school's administrative body is planning to carry out this order by dumbing down diversity -- dumping all of the diversity and social justice departments into one pot and detaching us from our own unique histories. Yet another trick to enslave us to their privatized system of austerity measures and employment insecurity. We must rise against institutional racism, the extermination of poor and working-class communities, and the eradication of our past.

THEY CANNOT ERASE US!