COVID-19: More than ever, it's time to fight for free education

Manuel Rato

For many students, COVID-19 is synonymous with anxiety: anxiety about the accommodation they will probably no longer be able to afford at the end of the month, anxiety about their food and summer jobs so essential for making ends meet and paying higher and higher tuition fees.

Ryerson University's Attack on Student Democracy

By Ivan Byard

This article was initially published in People's Voice, Canada's leading socialist newspaper

On January 24 Ryerson University in Toronto broke its 1986 operating agreement with the Ryerson Students’ Union (RSU). The university’s justification was that a new operating agreement had not been finalized, following allegations of improper use of RSU funds by members of the 2018-2019 Executive. This is a thinly veiled excuse to attack the democratic rights of students. The RSU remained actively engaged in negotiations with the university to enter into a new operating agreement and remains willing to make concessions, but not at the risk of jeopardizing their autonomy and ability to effectively advocate for students. The union was in fact hours away from sending over a new draft of the agreement when they received the university’s statement terminating the agreement and derecognizing the RSU as representing students on campus. The RSU nonetheless provided the university with a draft agreement the same day.

A history for student sturggle for unity (2)

Divisions and current challenges

by Drew Garvie
To oppose the militancy of the CFS, the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations (CASA) was founded in June of 1995 with help from mainly the Liberal Party, but also from the Conservatives. Its tactics do not include any member mobilization and instead focus entirely on lobbying and photo opportunities with politicians. CASA and its provincial affiliates have distinguished themselves by frequently supporting rises in tuition fees over the last 25 years. Its capture by governments and the Liberal party remains and students cannot call it a truly independent student federation.

Student loans: Can’t pay? Don’t pay!

In Canada, the average student debt sums up to $30,000

By KH

This article is an essay of personal experience in avoiding repayment of student loans from the period of 2010-2019. Read on to learn how you might avoid repayment, as one act in a broader struggle for universal free tuition!

Growing up in a single-parent home where we often couldn’t afford the basics, how I was going to pay for university was the last thing to cross my mind. Upon high school graduation, I got accepted to university, ready to start my academic career. I signed the student loan application without even a thought and was loaned $8,000 for my first year at 7% interest. I was 17 years old. Each year the debt kept piling up. At 21 I owed $33,000, and before I was even handed my degree I received a bill for my first loan payment: $600 per month. I hadn’t even graduated yet, and I certainly had no job prospects.

I researched for weeks prior to graduation, knowing I would receive a bill I couldn’t pay. I had heard all the horror stories: harassment by collection agencies, garnished wages, parents still paying off their loans into their 40’s and 50’s. I knew it was an injustice and that I would do whatever it took to avoid 20+ years of debt repayment for an education that is a human right. Nine years later I have not made a single payment, and the debt is legally dissolved. I now have a Master’s degree and am starting a PhD in the fall. Here’s how I avoided paying, and if you’re looking for a way out, you can too.

Ontario Students March for Free Education and Against the ‘Student Choice Initiative’

By Ivan Byard - organiser of the Toronto YCL-LJC

While students are getting ready for an Ontario-wide rally against OSAP cuts on February 19th, here is a report on the last student demonstration that took place on January 25th in Toronto.

On January 25th thousands of students, faculty, organized labour members, and their community allies gathered in Toronto to demonstrate their outrage against the provincial tory attack on public education. The march was a spontaneous response to the January 17th announcement from the Doug Ford government that a 10% reduction in tuition fees was a ‘bait-and-switch’ swindle that would be paid for with devastating cuts to the Ontario Student Assistance Plan (OSAP) and universities and colleges institutional funding.

Unite for Free Education and Against Ford's Anti-Democratic Attacks

YCL-LJC at the Rally in Toronto on January 18th

By Peter Miller 

In light of the recent announcement from the Ford Government, which includes continued unregulated international tuition fee costs, cuts to student grants, cuts to public investment in Post-Secondary Education, and voluntary payment of fees for student-run organizations, there is no doubt the student movement needs to build as militant and united a student movement as possible.

It all started on Friday with a large contingent of people making their voices heard against Doug Ford’s attacks against students. The Canadian Federation of Students-Ontario organized the rally and took time out of their general meeting to protest with other students and labour allies.

Day of Action for Democracy on Campus is just the beginning

Banner drop on Nov. 29th in Windsor

By Peter Miller, coordinator of the YCL-LJC in Ontario and Chair of the Student Commission

YCL Ontario students and allies organized a Day of Action for Democracy on Campus on November 29th to protest against the implementation of Doug Ford's "free speech" directive on Ontario college and university campuses. We came together in opposition to this directive, which instead of encouraging free speech, has the goal to stifle it for marginalized and activist groups while emboldening the hate speech of far-right and fascist groups trying to increase their presence amongst youth.

Ford's directive attacks democracy on campus by forcing campuses which already follow academic freedom to include a free speech policy. Most outrageously, his policy attacks democracy by threatening student activists with discipline for organizing protests against hate groups speaking on campus.

Solidarité avec les Franco-Ontariens

Special to RY

Exceptionnally, to show our support to the Franco-Ontarien resistance movement that mobilized over 14,000 people on Saturday, December 1st, we publish an article in French. The English version of this YCL-LJC statement can be found here. Franco-Ontarians are mobilized since November 15th, "Francophonie's Black Thursday", when Doug Ford announced he would get rid of the French Language Services Commissioner and that his government would stop funding Ontario's French language university that was supposed to open in 2020. We encourage our readers to follow the developments as it is clear that the fight has just begun. Already, Franco-Ontarien students are working on a large demonstration after the holidays. 

Day of action against Doug Ford’s “Free Speech” directive: find out what is happening today

Today is the Ontario Day of Action for democracy on campus. This event is aimed at denouncing Doug Ford’s so-called ‘free speech’ directive, a directive that has nothing to do with free speech, but that is aimed at targeting progressive voices on campus, as explained in previous articles published on this blog.

For this occasion, actions are being held throughout the province, ranging from rallies, banner drops and information tables; but there should also be some activity online through the hashtag #SilencedbyFord dedicated to this Day of Action.

For the right to disruptive Protest

By Everett Newland 

We enter an age where far-right movements and overt fascism gain increasing traction within the public discourse. The Ontario government has sought to legitimize these movements on campuses through an underhanded “free speech” directive for Ontario campuses. Yet the rising visibility of reactionary and oppressive movements also gives us the opportunity to build a powerful fightback against them, and empower ourselves to pursue a socialist future. This opportunity begins with the Day of Action scheduled for this coming November 29, 2018!

"Free speech policy" is an attack against democracy, says the YCL-LJC Canada

Special to RY

The Young Communist League – Ligue de la jeunesse communiste (YCL-LJC) issued a statement last week, which denounces the so-called “free speech” directive passed by Doug Ford’s provincial government and urges all progressive and democratic students to oppose and resist this directive by all means possible. It also encourages young people and students across Canada to show support and solidarity with their Ontarian counterparts.

The Right to Education vs. Capitalism

Drew Garvie

We students have the “privilege” of going to school in capitalist Canada in 2016 – an imperialist country during an economic crisis. Globally and at home, Capital is trying to rollback the gains of working people, built up over the last century, in order to place the burden of the crisis on the backs of the vast majority.

“Austerity” currently defines the policies used by the capitalist state to restructure itself and the economy. Corporate lobby groups and bankers hired by governments to write reports all say the same thing: “we can’t continue with the welfare state.” The goal is to privatize everything – to commodify and increase direct corporate control over all aspects of our society, in order to extract the maximum amount of profit. “This is the only path to recovery.” A recovery for who is the question! Certainly not for the millions that will be denied access to health and education, to decent paying jobs, to housing, to a life of dignity. Also, as this process takes place domestically, the same class responsible for it expands their wars and environmental destruction. This bigger picture explains a lot of what we’re seeing in the attack on post-secondary education (PSE) today.

Student action ramping up for November 2nd

Peter Miller

This November 2nd, students from across Canada will be mobilizing for the Pan-Canadian “Student Day of Action” for free and accessible education initiated by the Canadian Federation of Students. As discussed in the statement from the YCL-LJC on the Day of Action, students are facing attacks across the country but are also fighting back.

"Fuck it all": Review of the Spring 2015 Quebec student strike

Marianne Breton Fontaine

We need to be careful not to underestimate the importance of ideology in shaping our strategies and our daily struggles. This is demonstrated by the latest attempted general strike, which the Quebec student movement initiated last spring. This strike was conducted primarily based on anarchist principles. It was also the result of dissatisfaction among activists from the Maple Spring which ended in 2012, a dissatisfaction that comes from an incorrect analysis of the transformative potential of a student strike.

The Student Movement, Class & Revolution

Jenna Amirault & Drew Garvie

The upcoming school semester brings about renewed opportunities for student mobilization, solidarity with labour, and the creation of wider coalitions in the battle against austerity. The need to organize militant cross-Canada action has been made apparent by all the bourgeois political parties’ failure to take student issues seriously in this election and their failure, more generally, to represent the working class as a whole. In today’s economy students make up a new generation of debt owners with little prospects of getting a job upon graduation and insufficient social services to lessen their economic disparity in times of hardship. Colonialism and institutional sexism and racism create barriers to education that are left unaddressed by bourgeois politicians. It is pressing that students organize to challenge the limitations of the current education system and work with labour to overthrow capitalism itself. But what role can students play in revolutionary action? Why is the demand for access to education important, if it is not in itself revolutionary? And why is student-worker solidarity important?

UofT’s strike in retrospective: How students and labor pushed for unity

Zach Morgenstern

From February 27 to March 26 of 2015 UofT’s CUPE 3902 Unit 1, a union which represents UofT student-course-instructors (most prominently teaching assistants (TAs)) went on strike. The Union, which bargained with a strike-vote mandate it had held since November, ultimately settled for arbitration. Arbitrator William Kaplan has since ruled in UofT’s favor, allowing for a deal the union had previously voted down, which does not guarantee funding increases for individual graduate students, to be implemented.  Despite this being a far from perfect result for the month long campaign, it has to be said that CUPE 3902’s approach to the strike was commendable, at least when it came to student-TA relations.

Tuition fees: How students are getting it handed to them and what we can learn

Drew Garvie

We hear a lot about skyrocketing tuition fees, but one of the challenges in the student movement is high turnover and a lack of historical memory. Which government did what when? And the most important question, which governments are never truthful about; why did they do it? Here Rebel Youth examines some short histories of tuition fee increases in five provinces in order to help understand the attack we are facing and what we can do about it.

#IAmAStudent: the student fightback at UBC

Rebel Youth presents an interview with University of British Columbia student activist Kelly Gerlings

Interview by Rozh Armand

RY: What sparked the #IAMASTUDENT movement? How did it start?

KG: In early October 2014, the UBC Alma Mater Society (AMS) [the student union] leaked a proposed 10% increase to international tuition and a 20% increase to 8-month contracts for on-campus housing. Quickly students began organizing and speaking about the proposals. Just as quickly it was understood that if the students were going to be heard, they would need to organize outside of the AMS. And so within about a week of getting the news, a Teach-In was held for more information to be disseminated, and out of this, the group “I Am A Student” (IAAS) was 'born', in a sense.

Quebec Anti-Austerity Battle Heating Up

Johan Boyden

Reprinted from People's Voice Newspaper

Mobilizations to stop the austerity measures of Philippe Couillard’s Quebec Liberal government got a boost in late March, after a meeting of the Front Commun, the Common Front of Quebec public sector trade unions. Then the student movement brought over 70,000 protesters into the streets on April 2, its largest mobilization since the 2012 strike.

In late March, the Liberal budget presented by Couillard’s finance minister Carlos Leitao ended any illusions that negotiations could lead to a victory for public sector unions. Calling the budget “austerity at light speed,” and a gift to big business, the labour movement condemned the proposals including a two-year wage freeze. On March 31 the Front Commun concluded further negotiations would be a dead-end and began mobilizing for a strike.

From Ayotzinapa to Montreal: Overview of the Global Student Struggle

Special to RY

Student struggle week of action underway

Every November 17th, International Students’ Day, is commemorated by remembering the important role of students in fighting for a better world. In honour of this day, the World Federation of Democratic Youth’s Commission on Europe and North America has called for a student week of action against the current attacks on our education system taking place across the region. The week of action runs from November 17th-23rd.

In Canada, students are facing skyrocketing tuition fees, mounting debt, the privatization of education, cuts to student services, attacks on the living and working conditions of campus workers, the elimination of programs and classes, and the corporatization of research. More and more students now graduate without a future: either unemployment, or work in precarious, part-time, low-paid, non-unionized jobs. Students in Canada are fighting for free, accessible, quality and emancipatory education. They are fighting for a future!

Canada is not alone in this fight. The attack from governments and corporations is being resisted, at home and internationally. In recognition of this week of action, Rebel Youth Magazine takes a look at ongoing international student struggles: