Former SGPS President Andrew Stevens wrote an article about the proposed changes to the student code of conduct and resistance to the crackdown on political dissent on campus. This article was published in the current issue (No. 9, December 2007) by The Agitator. To see the article, click here

No Patriot Act Network
Interview Transcript with Amber Martin

Listen to this interview

Email: nopatriotact@gmail.com
Website: http://nopatriotact.wordpress.com

On November 26, 2007, Eric of the No Patriot Act Network caught up with Amber Martin, who was a graduate student at SUNY Albany under the principalship of Karen Hitchcock, and who in 1999 was involved in an occupation of the Principal’s office. She describes her experiences in the following interview.

Pull-quotes for solidarity media/publications:

The university claimed that they weren’t accountable for how the workers were treated or for their working conditions and took a hands off approach and said “this isn’t our problem.” So the students got together to say “yes, this is your problem,” these are workers on our campus and they needed to be treated with respect and dignity

I think what they were basically doing was using stall tactics on us. Like I said, we went around in circles for almost a year with them before we decided to do the occupation.

Throughout that day Karen Hitchcock never showed up. She was never a player, we never heard anything from her, we never heard her acknowledge that perhaps we can negotiate this, I mean it was just very sudden, they just moved in and took us out.

I mean really the only thing that we talked about was, “OK you guys are here, you’re not allowed to be here, you’re trespassing, now we’re going to arrest you.” “OK,” (laughs). I mean that was pretty much the interaction.

For there to be academic repercussions that would affect your status as a student is absolutely absurd, I mean when you told me that I couldn’t believe it… I’m not sure why she thinks that that is appropriate there, why she thinks that she can get away with that.

You may find yourself running into that wall and I think you can’t take away the option of civil disobedience. I think that that’s a really powerful tool that people have used in social movements for a long time

*Start of Interview*

 
NPAN: Could you give our listeners an introduction to the issues at the forefront of the eventual occupation?

 Amber Martin: Actually there were two key issues. The first issue was of sweatshop labour being used in the production of goods and products that have the SUNY Albany logo on them. At the time our university did have a code of conduct in terms of standards that were acceptable in factories where these clothes were produced, but the code of conduct really wasn’t adequate in terms of protecting workers’ rights. So things like gender discrimination in the work place, forced overtime, health and safety conditions, women’s rights… these types of things weren’t adequately protected, and we had several groups who were active in solidarity work who went over the code of conduct with us and sort of identified some of its main weaknesses. We also worked in conjunction with the Workers’ Rights Consortium which is something that is only US-based at this point, but they’re a student-led verification group that goes in and guarantees workers’ rights in factories that are making university clothing. Basically, schools can join on the Workers’ Rights Consortium and have this particular monitoring group that can make sure that conditions are what they should be. So one issue is that we wanted our school to join on to the Workers’ Rights Consortium.

The second issue was, at the time there was an effort going on to unionize the food service workers on campus and some of their issues were around, you know, benefits and wages and working conditions. We were actually approached by some of the workers and asked for student support and so we also began working on that campaign, and it was specifically connected to Sodexho-Marriott who was a subcontractor that was providing food service on campus. Basically, the university would just let them come in and do whatever they wanted, so while these workers had formerly been university workers, now they were Sodexho’s workers and the university claimed that they weren’t accountable for how the workers were treated or for their working conditions and took a hands off approach and said “this isn’t our problem.” So the students got together to say “yes, this is your problem,” these are workers on our campus and they needed to be treated with respect and dignity and have the same sorts of rights that campus workers should expect to have.

NPAN: Right, so the university was expecting the workers of Sodexho to be dealing directly with the Sodexho corporation and totally be invisible to the university?

AM: Yeah, they kind of said this really isn’t our issue, this isn’t our problem, if they want to have a union have to deal with Sodexho. I remember that we went to university dining services and they have an office that would be specifically addressing that issue and they kept saying “this isn’t our contact, this isn’t us” and that’s the stance they took on it.

NPAN: You mentioned the code of conduct didn’t include protection for workers’ rights and these general social issues that weren’t being addressed, so I mean, right now at Queen’s we have a code of conduct and it’s under review and it seems to be a purely disciplinary document, like there aren’t very many protections in there, I’m wondering how that document differs at SUNY Albany, or at least how it differed.

AM: Yeah, I haven’t seen the code of conduct in a while actually, but I think that there was a concern particularly about enforcement, which is also a major thing I didn’t mention before, I mean once you have these codes how do you ensure that they be enforced. One thing the Workers’ Rights Consortium did is they had a mechanism that workers could go through, and they would have the code of conduct in the workplace in their language, and they would do an inspection and have them follow through on complaints and do interviews to find out what’s really going on, and then pressure the university and say, this code of conduct is being violated, and the university will take the appropriate actions. So it’s a channel directly for workers to get to the university and put pressure on that way. I think the other protections just simply weren’t strong enough, I mean I can’t remember the exact ones and the problems that we identified, but I think the main issues were those of worker health and safety, forced overtime, long hours, and pregnancy testing for women, sexual harassment on the job, and even sounder things like lack of a bathroom break, times to go to the bathroom per day, and things like that.

NPAN: So what steps were taken to try to get the university to sign on to this Consortium and with the other issue as well, with sweatshop labour?

AM: Well, we kind of went around in circles with them for a really long time. I mean, we were sent to various different administrative offices, including I remember at what point the VP of Finance was really involved with us, and then they basically made the argument to us that the reason they couldn’t sign on to the Worker’s Rights Consortium is that they had certain state purchasing laws they had to follow as a public institution, and because of those laws they wouldn’t be able to impose a different code of conduct. They have to go with the lowest ‘responsible bidder’ or something like that. They were directing us to the state legislature, but that was an argument that to us just wasn’t valid because there were other state schools at the time in the SUNY system that were either, I don’t recall if they had actually signed on to the Worker’s Rights Consortium or were in the process of doing so. We looked into that a bit and, I think what they were basically doing was using stall tactics on us. Like I said, we went around in circles for almost a year with them before we decided to do the occupation.

NPAN: What were the factors that led to that decision to take that action and occupy the office?

AM: Well one of the things that we did was we did a lot of campus education, we had a student labour conference where we had workers come in who were actually workers in sweatshop and talked about their experiences, we had cafeteria workers speak, we had a forum about the food service on campus to get students to come and talk about what some of the other issues are in terms of having Sodexho-Marriott on campus, in terms of their connections with private prisons. So we did a lot of consciousness raising and awareness building and there was also a student labour day of action that we participated in, in which we went to the administrative offices and we were fasting, so we had a protest in the administration’s offices, and I think it was just the fact that the administration was unwilling to budge. They just said, “we can’t do this, there’s no way we can do this,” and there just really wasn’t a way to continue negotiating with them at that point.

NPAN: What year was this?

AM: 1999.

NPAN: So can you go over a step-by-step account of what you remember happening the day of the occupation?

AM: I believe we were maybe 13 or 14 of us that were on the inside, and we came in through the administration building, and we asked to meet with Karen Hitchcock, and you know of course they said “no, she’s not here,” etc., so we basically just went into her office and sat down and said, “OK, we’ll wait for her” (laughs). We had people outside who were carrying signs and were giving out information outside the administration building and I would say that there were maybe about 50 or 60 supporters outside throughout the day. We were only in there for about 2 hours, maybe a little bit more than that. We were holding our signs out the windows, and we had a bullhorn so we were chanting slogans out the window (laughs), and things like that, and the administration asked us to leave, and it sort of escalated to the point where we heard that the police were going to be called in and that we were going to be arrested. We said, “OK” (laughs). We had all gone into the action knowing that we could be arrested. So they sent in the police and with they way the police came in, they had to go past the crowd of protestors that were outside, and so at one point they either pushed or shoved or, I don’t know exactly what happened to one of the female protestors, and another protestor tried to defend her, and he ended up with some kind of assault charge because of it. They were being kind of rough with her and I think the idea of the protestors was that if the police were going to come in and get us out of there, they wanted to be present, they wanted to be witnesses to it. So they were trying to come in and the police were trying to stop them, and there was that incident where somebody was thrown down the stairs, and so [the police] were rough. Then they came in to where we were, and basically they handcuffed us and they took us out of the building, and I think everybody walked except one of the protestors who refused to walk, so they actually ended up putting her on a stretcher and carrying her out. They took us to the campus police department and we were processed, and I think that’s pretty much what happened, it was just a matter of fact, the chief of police was there, he said “you know you guys can’t be in here,” and you’re violating blah-blah-blah, you’re trespassing, and we said “yeah, we know” (laughs).

Throughout that day Karen Hitchcock never showed up. She was never a player, we never heard anything from her, we never heard her acknowledge that perhaps we can negotiate this, I mean it was just very sudden, they just moved in and took us out.

NPAN: So the immediate response to this, I mean you said it was a few hours, was just to call the cops and get you out of there. There weren’t any kinds of negotiations or talks that occurred beforehand?

AM: No, I mean really the only thing that we talked about was, “OK you guys are here, you’re not allowed to be here, you’re trespassing, now we’re going to arrest you.” “OK,” (laughs). I mean that was pretty much the interaction.

NPAN: So what was the fallout of being arrested, academically and legally for you folks?

AM: Well we did have trespassing charges that we had to follow up on, so it wasn’t just like we were arrested by the campus police, it was like if you were arrested by the city police, so we had to go through the city court system and we had hearings. I think what ended up happening was we all got ACD’s which is ‘adjournment in contemplation of dismissal,’ which means that you behave yourself for six months and the charges eventually disappear. So that’s what happened to us. As I recall, I don’t think there was any further action taken against the student who had assault charges, I think we eventually negotiated it down so that he had the same charges as us, and we had a lawyer who was working Pro Bono for us. I think he was really instrumental in making that happen. As far as the code of conduct was concerned, we never heard anything else from the administration about it, although Sodexho-Marriott was subsequently kicked off campus, which was I think definitely a huge result of our efforts that year, not just the sit-in but the organizing that we had done around the whole issue and the protests that we’d had, and the forums and educational work. In terms of the sweatshop issue, I don’t know if they ever signed on, I graduated and moved on, I think other students took up the issue but it wasn’t something they were willing to budge on.

NPAN: Was there ever an official statement made after the occupation, given that it was a big event and obviously incidents that had occurred, from the administration offices on the events of that day?

AM: I don’t recall what was said, I mean it was a huge issue in the local news and the papers. As far as I know, their line was that they [the students] were out of order, they were trespassing and breaking the law. If you’re asking if there was analysis of the issues involved, not from the administration’s part, that’s for sure.

NPAN: Were there any academic ramifications for any of you in terms of notations on your transcript or, I don’t know if you had non-academic discipline systems at SUNY Albany, because we have them here. This is the issue that we’re addressing right now, attempts to circumvent the Canadian legal system and be able to, through lower standards of evidence, be able to kick students out of school for perceived ‘disruptions and disorderly conduct,’ which is specifically the clause that we’re targeting. Is there anything like that which opened you up to getting kicked out?

AM: Not that I know of. As far as I know, all the students who were involved graduated, at least in terms of people who were in the occupation on the inside, I didn’t suffer any academic repercussion because of that. But I can’t speak for everybody else. I’m not really sure if they were after somebody who might’ve been more vulnerable. Luckily, we didn’t have any international students or anyone like that taking part in the occupation, because obviously I think international students can be a target, especially because of their immigration status. But as far as I know, I don’t think any of that happened. I don’t think we had any sort of disciplinary code like what you’re talking about. If it existed, it’s possible, but if it did we didn’t know about it.

NPAN: One of the main arguments that we come up against in the No Patriot Act Network is a faith in the administration to be given extraordinary powers to expel students for fairly broad stipulations in the code of conduct, and that faith is a belief in an enlightened administration that will be reasonable and not try to clamp down on political dissent and not doing these things that we’re saying they are going to do. So part of the reason we’re looking for people like you that have engaged specifically with administrators that currently work at Queen’s is to try to give a historical perspective on how that happens. So what would you say to a student that says these kinds of things?

AM: I would say that just in my experience with Karen Hitchcock, she’s someone who is not willing to meet with students or to address these issues that may be of concern with student. I know that with us, she tried to look concerned, and set up committee meetings, and you could go to a million committee meetings, and she wouldn’t be at them but she would try to find people. So yes there were a lot of repercussions the day of the occupation, but also just a lot of stall tactics and a lot of ways to make you run around in circles, and I’m not sure what your experience has been with her, but it could be something similar if you’re trying to work with her on this or any other issue. I don’t know what other issues are big on campus for you, but you may find yourself running into that wall and I think you can’t take away the option of civil disobedience. I think that that’s a really powerful tool that people have used in social movements for a long time, certainly in this country, and I don’t know much about Canada’s history, but certainly here. It’s a right that students should insist upon. For there to be academic repercussions that would affect your status as a student is absolutely absurd, I mean when you told me that I couldn’t believe it. I mean, I don’t think that that is something that happened in our case, and I’m not sure why she thinks that that is appropriate there, why she thinks that she can get away with that.

On Wednesday, November 28th as part of the Surveillance Awareness Week, there will be a talk on “Privacy and Security: How is Queen’s Striking a Balance?” (if it is). Andrew Stevens will be speaking about the draft Student Code of Conduct and how this relates to surveillance. He will be also including in his discussion the issue of resistance to the proposed changes, and in particular the No Patriot Act Network. Come out and learn/speak out/enjoy!

2:30 – 4:00 pm: Privacy and Security: How is Queen’s University Striking a Balance?
Panel discussion featuring David Patterson, Director of Campus Security;
Andrew Stevens, past president of the Society of Graduate and Professional Students;
George Farrah, ITS, and more. Held in the McLaughlin Room, JDUC (upstairs).

Quebec students to continue fight against tuition hike
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
CBC News

Students in Quebec say they’ll continue to protest tuition fee increases despite what they call unprecedented police repression.

Pepper spray and Taser guns won’t stop students from fighting the province’s $50-a-semester tuition fee hike, said the association representing college and university students (ASSE), which is spearheading widespread strikes this week.

More than 100 students who barricaded themselves inside post-secondary institution CEGEP Vieux-Montréal on Tuesday night to protest tuition hikes were arrested despite what ASSE said was a peaceful action.

Students built a towering barricade in front of the Ontario Street college with chairs, plywood, vending machines and a toilet, but refused to leave the premises until police arrived.

ASSE spokesman Hubert Gendron-Blais said police called to the scene used cayenne pepper spray and Taser guns to break up the demonstration, even though students were not acting violently.

Officers arrested 102 students, who were booked on charges, including public mischief, assault and battery, and armed assault, before being released.

No one was injured during the overnight protest, but police said the CEGEP property was damaged.

CEGEPs and university students are planning widespread protests across the province this week to protest a tuition fee increase.

Students in Montreal, Quebec City and Sherbrooke plan to take part in a three-day strike.

Education Minister Michelle Courchesne said the $50-a-semester tuition increase is non-negotiable.

On Wednesday, she called it a very reasonable increase, adding the government topped up student financial aid programs to offset the rise in tuition.

Students should be in class, not on strike, Courchesne said.

On Monday, police was called twice to the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQÀM) to break up strikers who barricaded themselves inside the school around 11:30 p.m.

Video:
http://lcn.canoe.ca/cgi-bin/player/video.cgi?file=/lcn/actualite/faits_divers/20071114_couturier.wmvAr

The University Senate (who will be making the final decision on this in February) will be meeting on November 15th, 2007. On the agenda is an informal discussion regarding specific questions surrounding the draft code of conduct. If you want to attend and/or make a statement, which would be really helpful, the University requires that you register at the registrar office. (If you want to just show up and try to get in, all the more power to ya). The registrar’s office is located in Mac Corry building, level B400. The agenda for the meeting will be posted on the Senate website. If you would like to coordinate your attendance at this meeting with others in the network, send us an email.

NO PATRIOT ACT NETWORK MEETING
Friday, November 16th, 2007
3:00pm - Co-op Space (397 Brock St.)

Anyone and everyone who shares the position of the network is welcome to come to this assembly of the No Patriot Act Network. The meeting will include updates on the current situation with the Code, plans for future actions, general strategy, and anything else people bring to the table. Mark your calendars now and don’t miss out on this important assembly! Feel free to print and distribute the poster below.

NPAN Meeting Poster

California State University cannot use its civility policy to investigate or discipline students, a federal magistrate ruled last week.

The case stemmed from an incident in which members of the College Republicans at San Francisco State University stomped on flags representing Hamas and Hezbollah during an anti-terrorism rally in October 2006. Later, another student complained to the university that the Republican group had committed “actions of incivility,” thereby violating San Francisco State’s policy manual.

The university investigated, and while nobody got in trouble, the College Republicans sued, hoping to ensure that the university could not use the civility code to discipline students in the future. The university’s lawyers contended the policy was a goal — not a rule.

But, just in case, the federal magistrate judge, Wayne D. Brazil, said he would issue a preliminary injunction barring the university from invoking the policy in a disciplinary hearing, according to today’s San
Francisco Chronicle. —Eric Hoover

http://chronicle.com/news/article/3393/federal-court-strikes-down-universitys-civility-policy-as-basis-for-discipline

Scores of Students Face Expulsion Due to Sit-in
Berwyn, IL

Over 70 students participated in a sit-in against the Iraq War on All Saint’s Day, Thursday, November 1st. It began third hour when dozens of student gathered quietly in the lunchroom at Morton West High School and refused to leave. Administrators and police became involved immediately and locked down the school for a half hour after class ended. Students report that they were promised that there would be no consequences besides cutting classes if they took their protest outside so as not to disturb the school day. The students agreed and were led to a corner outside the cafeteria where they sang songs and held signs while classes resumed. “At first they tried to make us like leave the school, ” said Jerry Petrack, who was with the protest from the beginning. Petracek referred to the massive walk-out for immigrant rights in 2006 that guided their decisions that morning. (chicago.indymedia.org/newswire/display/71540/index.php) “They were like, ‘march the streets’ or whatever and we were like ‘no we don’t wanna leave the school because last time there was a protest outside the school and kids got arrested,’ and we remembered that.”

Despite the caution tape and a police line set up between the protestors and the student body, many other students joined the demonstration. Organizers say they chose November first because it is the Christian All Saints holy day and a national day of peace. They wrote a letter and delivered it to Superintendent, Dr. Ben Nowakowski who was present at the time, stating the reason for their protest.

John Acevedo, a junior says he has been thinking about the world since he was a freshman. ” I’ve noticed that there are many students that do not really notice anything that is going on in the world. They focus on themselves or their music and I really wanted to show and lead them on to these ideas that what really is happening in the world.”

Adam Swarek says that a lot of people thought they just wanted to cut classes. “It was a lot more spiritual than that.” “Bascially, you know the school has people in military uniforms that you know stand out there and they give away prizes for doing pull-ups and doing this and that and what they’re basically representing and trying to put out there is murder and killing. That’s all that basically represents when it comes down to war, you know. Like, what else is there?
So we were just trying to do something opposite, like peaceful and they took it as insubordinant.”

Deans, counselors and even the Superintendent tried to change the minds of a few, mainly those students with higher GPA scores to abandon the protest. The school called the homes of many of the protestors. Those whose parents arrived before the end of school and took their students home, or left before the protest ended at the final bell, received 3-5 days suspension. All others, an estimated 37 received 10 days suspension and expulsion papers. Parents report that Nowakowski stated those who are seventeen will also face police charges.

Parents who are frantically trying to spare their child’s expulsion flooded the school yesterday to file appeals on the matter. So far, Superintendent Nowakowski has held firm on the punishments. They are expected to find out the results of the appeals on Tuesday. Parents and students report and the school’s videotape shown to some of the parents confirms that the students were non-violent in their action and there was no damage to property.

The protest came on the heels of a recent incident on October 15th, when a student reported hearing that another student had a gun on campus. The story of the eyewitness was deemed unreliable and the school was not locked down. Later that week (October 19), the Berwyn police, acting on a tip arrested one of the youths originally questioned for gun possession and he allegedly confessed to carrying an unloaded semi-automatic handgun that day. All these issues, plus the expected announcement of whether uniforms will be established in the school should make the next Board of Education meeting on Wednesday at 7:00pm at the Morton East campus very well-attended.

See the link below for the Superintendent’s statement on the matter:
www.jsmortonhs.com/news/contentview.asp

For letters or phone calls of support, please see information below:

Dr. Ben Nowakowski, Superintendent
District 201
2423 South Austin, Cicero, IL 60804
bnowakowski (at) jsmorton.org

(70 222-5702

Mr. Lucas, Principal
Morton West High School
2400 S. Home Ave.
Berwyn, IL 60402
jlucas (at) west.jsmorton.org

708-222-5901

Mr. Jeffry Pesek, President
Board of Education, District 201
3145 South 55th Avenue
Cicero, IL 60804

708-802-1863

For the rest of the Board Members see:
www.jsmortonhs.com/board/default.asp

For parent contact:
Pam Winstead 708-749-3163, serp (at) comcast.net

Alma Moran 708-717-4202, qtalmita (at) yahoo.com

Adam Szwarek 847-587-8849, tsq9743 (at) aol.com

We are pleased to announce that the Society of Graduate and Professional Students (SGPS) has endorsed the Joint Statement opposing sections of the draft Student Code of Conduct. This adds to the growing list of campus organizations that are opposed to this document in its current form. We will continue to campaign against these clauses until they have been pulled from the draft… spread the word!