As the semester winds down for students in Athens, an impromptu protest group has sprouted up in response to the ongoing budget crisis the University's budget crisis. Recently, a group using the moniker "OU Fun Facts" has been plastering flyers in almost every building on campus, noting rising tuition costs and faculty cuts, while spending for administrators and athletics has been exponentially increasing. The group also recently held a rally on College Green, attracting about 100-150 participants total, combined of both students, faculty and residents. Several students and faculty members spoke out about the budget and demanded that the school take action to protect those who rely on the University the most. The rally then culminated in a march to Cutler Hall, where the group demanded to speak to President Nellis (https://www.thepostathens.com/article/2019/11/ohio-fun-facts-rally-budget-protest).
After the President refused to meet with the group, a motion was made to continue the protests at a later date. Recently, a round table discussion was held by the group which laid out some of it's goals and plans, "including no more cuts to faculty or academic programs, an improved research and teaching balance for faculty members, no more replacing tenured faculty positions with instructional faculty positions and no more reduction of benefits of faculty and staff" (https://www.thepostathens.com/article/2019/12/ou-fun-facts-holds-round-table-meeting).
I believe this issue ties in quite well to our discussion of resistance and protest that we finished the semester with. We clearly have a group of people are protesting their "right to thrive", who feel as though this budget issue is going to threaten people's academic and personal careers, while on the other hand, you have an administration who seems as though they are unwilling to make some of the cuts necessary to save the budget. As a senior who is about to graduate, I will be a bit sad that I won't be able to see the issue play out first-hand, but I will definitely be keeping an eye on things from afar, and hope that the students and faculty will be able to get the things they want accomplished done.
I feel that this topic is one that Ohio University students can directly relate to due to it spatial proximity to us. I have seen flyers around campus over roughly the past month. At first, I just thought the flyers were trivia facts about OU. As time went on, I began to understand the true intentions of these flyers, and I started to hear talk around campus about the rally on College Green. I did not attend the rally, due to class, so I do not have any first-hand knowledge of what occurred.
ReplyDeleteThis is an example of geography of resistance, as you have said. It is a group of people resisting against another group who they feel are affecting them negatively. But I also think it is an example of geography of fear. This group of students are resisting out of fear of what might happen to their education if too many faculty members are forced to leave the university. They are afraid of what will happen to the quality and quantity of their classes if there are too few faculty members in their respective departments. This has a direct impact on the space that students occupy for 4-6 years of their lives, and could indirectly affect many years after that.
Yes, The student protest against budget cuts and tuition rise is a relevant example of “pro-active tactics” described by the article of Sailiba & Fenster (2012) “Tactics and Strategies of power.” Indeed, students by protesting in the street and posting flyers on the campus reclaimed public spaces to manifest their frustration and get their complaints heard and seen by the university administration. This was a good tactic since, after this protest, the president Nellis and the university administration accepted a round table discussion to open the dialogue with the student. Budget cut and tuition raise have been a concern for graduate students since I came to the university of OHIO in 2018. Many students individually complained about it and also about the increase in the health care cost. But, things started to be more visible and pressing when the student decided to unite and protest in town to show their frustration. As Mitchell (1995) stated in his article, “the end of public space?” “public space is a place within which a political movement can stake out the space; political organizations can represent themselves to a larger population. By claiming space in public, by creating public spaces, social groups themselves become public” (p115). Reclaiming space in public spaces allow political movements to be recognized publicly and subsequently acquire a social exitance. The social existence contributes to giving a certain legitimacy to any movements, which, therefore, cannot be easily ignored.
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