See Outreach Materials for April 17th National Day of Action flyers, and past March 17-20 Red 4 Ed and Feb 22nd Conference materials.

National Day of Action to Defend Higher Education

SF STATE April 17th action plan

Thursday, April 17th is a big day of action for all of us as SF State students and faculty to stop the proposed budget cuts, defend higher education and protect our students. Governor Newsom has proposed a devastating 8% cut across all CSU campuses. This Thursday, April 17th is a national day of action to defend higher education. Governor Newsom had proposed a devastating 8% cut across all CSU campuses which would have utterly destroyed our universities and led to campus closures and layoffs. 

Thanks to a lot of pressure by activists like you, we learned this weekend that the senate is now considering proposing a 5% increase to the CSU’s budget. While this potential good news is a testament to our power, to be clear, it is not guaranteed. 

Now we must keep up the pressure to make sure that we actually get this money (often state budgets are aspirational when they move into positive numbers). We also must demand that any proposed new monies be used to fund classroom instruction and core student services, not pay for administrative salaries and other neoliberal misuses. The state budget will be finalized next month. We have three weeks to show our elected representatives that we are watching and demand they stand with us: Vote NO CUTS and fully REINVEST in the CSU!

Our campus has already lost faculty, sports programs, and other essential student services. Our civil liberties and academic freedoms are under attack. Our students have been targeted and we know more threats, including to our budget, are yet to come. We need the 5% increase (at least) and a commitment to restore all that has been lost–rehire faculty, restore cut programs, and reinvest in students, faculty, and staff. 

On April 17, SFSU students, faculty, and staff are UNITED in calling on all of us to make our voices heard: NO CUTS, REINVEST! Our power is in our numbers. Below are details about actions you can take that day. Join us! Wear red!

Students, faculty, and staff: Join us! Now is the time to fight for the education and worker rights we all deserve!

9am-12pm: Faculty with morning classes: While the teach outs (below) are occurring, consider holding your regular classes outside on the Quad to make our labor and opposition to the cuts visible (tarps will be available to sit and teach your classes on the grass).

10am: TEACH OUT on Budget Cuts and Fight for Public Education on the QUAD: 

Student-led teach out on the links between the budget cuts, austerity, and capitalism. Come all to learn from fellow student organizers on the impact of these cuts, their origins, and what we can do about them!

11am: TEACH OUT on Defense of Civil Liberties and Democratic Rights on the QUAD: 

Faculty led teach out on the attacks to academic freedom, civil liberties and the targeting of our international, undocumented, queer and transgender students. How can we organize to make our campus a sanctuary for students to get a quality education from faculty whose labor is valued and respected? 

Faculty teaching at this time: If you want to bring your students, offer an alternative for those who do not want to attend. You can offer optional extra credit and cannot require students to attend. Even better - link the action with your class content. Students will get real world experience in public advocacy, speaking, and learn how our state budget is crafted and revised, who does it, and how we can influence it! 

12 NOON: FLASH SPEAK OUT & MASS PHONE BANK at MALCOLM X PLAZA 

Faculty on campus: Consider attending on your own or with your students. Students will learn about our demands and get real-time support for phone banking their representatives. No prior experience needed, we will help step by step. 

1PM: CATCH THE M TRAIN at 19th & Holloway 

Join us traveling by MUNI to Civic Center Plaza for a 2pm Rally and March! Invite your students, families, and community to come along. 

2PM: RALLY & MARCH AT CIVIC CENTER PLAZA (Grove & Polk Street across City Hall) 

We will gather at Civic Center Plaza (across Polk St. from City Hall) to make our voices heard to our elected State representatives! Wear red! This is a public rally for public higher ed! Bring everyone! Wear red!

Conference Recap & Ratified Platform

At the Statewide organizing conference on Saturday, February 22nd, approximately 180 students faculty and staff activists came to San Francisco State to organize to oppose the cuts, layoffs, program discontinuances and tuition hikes that the CSU is currently engaging in.  At the conference,  we endorsed the April 17th National Day of Action for Higher Education. We are planning to have mass actions across the CSU and targeting key decision-makers to oppose the devastating cuts, tuition hikes, and repression of students, civil liberties, and worker rights.  At that conference, we also adopted a collective platform that was ratified and amended by the entire delegation.  The platform can be found here. This lays out a basis by which we will continue to organize and fight back against false austerity and the ongoing privatization of public higher education in California. 

Statewide Organizing Conference (February 22, 2025)

Governor Newsom announced a new round of cuts to the UC and CSU systems for the coming academic year, while several CSU and UC campuses experience ongoing austerity measures, including lay-offs, and student fee increases. In addition, the new presidential administration has pledged opposition to funding public services, basic civil liberties and social justice oriented curricula. The organizations below call on fellow unionized and non-unionized faculty, student-worker and staff unions, and other students and unions interested in advocating for a fully funded CSU and other public education systems, and for the defense of civil liberties and academic freedom to attend this organizing conference on Saturday February 22nd. 

At the conference we will strategize how we stop the cuts to education, build mass support for redirecting CSU statewide funds to the classroom, defend academic freedom and civil liberties, and prioritize CA state funding for public education and social services instead of incarceration, deportation and occupation. 

The SFSU faculty union and student organizations have offered to host the Organizing Conference. SFSU has been a stronghold of social justice activism since the 1968 Third World Liberation Strike, and last academic year the faculty and students showed their combined power in two historic strikes, and Students for Gaza won divestment from weapons manufacturing companies and those who violate human rights. When we organize together, we can project the future we want and need, and be the best advocates for quality public education for working people in California. Let's organize, agitate and mobilize for public education this coming Spring!

Endorsers

Asian Student Union, SFSU

Associated Students of SFSU 

Bay Area Labor 4 Palestine

California Faculty Association (CFA) SEIU Local 1983

CFA Bakersfield

CFA Channel Islands

CFA East Bay

CFA Los Angeles

CFA Maritime Academy

CFA Monterey Bay

CFA Sacramento

CFA San Francisco

CFA San Jose

CFA Caucus of Rank & File Education Workers (CREW)

Faculty for Justice in Palestine, SFSU

General Union of Palestine Students (GUPS)

La Raza Student Organization

SFSU Student Union

UAW Local 4123

UCSC People's Aid

YDSA