CSUN calls for student action

Student Body Vice President Vik Sehdev stressed the importance of students’ voicing their concern for the tuition hikes at Thursday’s Board of Regents meeting, at the Nov. 24 Town Hall. Photo by Devin Loretz

Tuesday’s town hall began as a meeting of skeptical strangers but the thrill and determination it excited will have students united and fired up over the budget cuts facing the Nevada System of Higher Education for as long as it takes to effect change.

News that tuition could be increased by 25 percent brought a sharp increase in what seems to have been limited student awareness of the crisis when Student Body President Adam Cronis announced the increase could take effect, “not next spring, not next fall, but this spring – next semester.”

The strongest call issued at the event was for students to meet at the Stan Fulton building at 1 p.m. on Dec. 4, wearing Rebel Red to protest the budget cuts at the upcoming Board of Regents meeting.

“We can say everything, but if we don’t have that sea of red, that army of Rebels behind us, it won’t mean anything,” said Student Body Vice President Vik Sehdev.

CSUN also promoted its budget cut rally, set to take place in the Alumni Amphitheater on Jan. 22, 2009.

CSUN Urban Affairs senators Jason Ontiveros and Jay Romo expressed their views on the proposed tuition hikes at CSUN’s Town Hall meeting Nov. 24. Photo by Devin Loretz

“Things are beginning to progress, and they’re not progressing in a good manner,” said Cronis, pressing students to realize the urgency with which they must act if change is to be made.

CSUN representatives explained that since attempts at mediation have failed to mitigate the budget crisis effecting UNLV, the emphasis of student activities must be shifted to attracting media attention.

A professor who attended the town hall spoke in favor of protest, stating, “You want media?  If you get 800 people in red at the Board of Regents meeting, you’ll get media.”

The focus of the town hall was to inform students, and it accomplished just that.

Waiting for the event to begin, UNLV college of sciences students Daniella Sandoval and Quincy Saena expressed their expectations for the town hall. 

“I heard there was something going on with budget cuts,” Saena said, adding that he thought many science students have a vague idea of what is happening, but, like him, nothing concrete on which to act.

“We’re here to see what we can do,” Sandoval said.

Sandoval, Saena and about 70 others were informed by student leaders about the ways the NSHE financial problems could effect them in the coming months.

Michael Ulrich contributed statistics about losses in the college of sciences.  He said from the audience, “[The college] has lost two tenured professors and two PhD professors already,” in addition to many of the teaching assistants that sciences Sen. Leshelle Perez said are crucial to the functioning of many courses.

Dozens of sections of common prerequisite classes have been cut.  CSUN officers and audience members alike voiced concerns about the extension of graduation time owing to inability to get into basic courses.

But class sections are not the only things that have been changed already as a result of the budget shortfall.  University studies Sen. Jon Goldman reminded students that the university studies major is not the only course of study being phased out.

In spite of reports that entire colleges could be eliminated from UNLV, Goldman said, “All of us [senators] have been fighting just as loud and proud as ever.”

Sehdev explained that part of the budget problem stems from what is known as the “funding formula.”  The effect of the formula basically amounts to Nevada students getting only 82 percent of the money they put into the higher education system. 

CSUN hopes that with student support they can effectively advocate changes to the funding process that will make the equation more student-friendly.

Students that had been silent for most of the town hall meeting began voicing their ideas near the end, seemingly spurred into action by the rising sense that that the NSHE’s financial issues are increasingly pressing.

Megan Frisk was one of those who supported the fervent action CSUN called for.