As tuition rates continue to rise, money lines the pockets of university executives as professors continue to be underpaid.
In March 2012 university students in Montreal reacted to a proposed tuition hike of $1,242 over six years.
A month later, around half of the student population was on strike. Smoke bombs disrupted 300,000 commuters on the Metro, and students were beaten and arrested at what started as peaceful demonstrations.
Their signs read: “For Sale: Our Education,” “Education is Not a Business,” “Education is a Right,” and “R.I.P. Democracy!” Students, professors, their families and, of course, topless women (J’adore les femmes du Québec!) marched in solidarity for months.
An entire movement sprang up, working side-by-side with political parties, teachers and workers unions. An emergency law was enacted to make the protests illegal, then repealed four months later. The opposing political party was elected, the tuition hikes frozen (as promised during the campaign), and classes resumed.
The protests are called the Printemps érable, or the “Maple Spring.” The name is a hat-tip to the 2010 “Arab Spring,” when young people across the Arab world, using the power of social media, tried to topple the governments they opposed.
According to the Tampa Bay Times, in 2012 the USF system prepared to raise tuition 11 percent. This followed what the paper called “several years of consistent 15 percent tuition hikes at every university in the state.”
While these steep tuition hikes in Florida have gone relatively unnoticed, students in Montreal shut down their city over a proposed tuition increase of 11.8 percent.
Tuition isn’t the only thing going up at USF.
USF President Judy Genshaft makes a six-figure salary, and last year a six-figure performance bonus on top. The Times reported in 2005 that, in her first four and a half years as president, Genshaft’s pay increased by nearly 50 percent.
Then in 2010 Genshaft signed a new contract that included a $75,000 annual raise and a $500,000 retention bonus, according to the Tampa Tribune.
“The raise will make Genshaft one of the highest paid public university executives in the country – at an institution where professor pay is near the bottom,” the Tribune reported.
Last spring saw more protests and demonstrations by university students in Montreal. These protests call for free education, rail against corporate and governmental corruption and – as the protests were met with pepper spray, rubber bullets, tear gas, attack dogs and batons – condemn police brutality.
Then last week, upper-elementary students in four Ontario schools organized a strike in response to proposed cuts to extracurricular programs. Reports say they used social media to organize over the weekend.
When asked how long the protests would go on, student spokesperson Peri Pickel told a local newspaper, “It depends if we make an impact on the (school) board today.”
And if they don’t? “Then we may strike back again.”
Meanwhile, university students in the U.S. casually accept loans, obediently accruing debt that will likely take decades to pay off – if they don’t drown in it first.
