Baton Rouge, LA – On September 14, a coalition of more than seven progressive student organizations at Louisiana State University (LSU) held a press conference to voice sharp opposition to the closing of several cultural centers over summer break. These included the African American Cultural Center, Women’s Center, Latinx Center, LGBTQ+ center, and Multicultural Center.

The press conference was held just hours after students’ representatives from Injustice Reform, Student for a Democratic Society (SDS), Feminists in Action, and the LSU chapter of NAACP met personally with Executive Vice President James Dalton and Senior Vice Chancellor Joseph Messina to discuss their demands. Their meeting was hard-won after students marched on Dalton's office to demand it and attended a board of supervisors meeting to publicly demand this meeting a second time.

“We went into the meeting to demand that all centers were reopened to their full capacity and original functioning. The reasons stated by James Dalton for these changes were ‘eliminating redundancy and cutting costs,’” said Gabi DeJean of SDS.

After meeting for over two hours, the administration refused to reverse these changes in any way. They also refused to send an email communication to the student body to explain what changes have been made to the cultural centers.

At the press conference, the Queer Graduate Student Alliance explained that the LGBTQ+ center has been closed for over a year now, and that this was one of the last places that LGBTQ students were safe on campus. Feminists in Action explained that LSU’s campus has also lost a lactation room, staffing to support victims of sexual assault, and funding for free Plan B and contraceptives for students.

“LSU cares about Black bodies and Black culture when it comes to football, but they don’t care about Black students who pay tuition to go to school here,” said Laketa Johnson. Johnson is the founder of A Belle La Femme, a nonprofit organization that helps get scholarships for oppressed nationality women in college. She is also a key community leader in the fight against the unconstitutional Louisiana redistricting map released earlier this year. Johnson touched on key parallels between Trump and Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry’s agenda and the changes that LSU’s administration is making on campus.

All of the student groups present expressed resolutely that they are opposed to the rollback of DEI and right-wing consolidation.

“We all know that these centers came into being as a result of tireless student protest and public pressure decades before us. So we’re sure as hell not going to let them take it away without that same fight!” said DeJean.

#BatonRougeLA #LA #StudentMovement #SDS #CulturalCenters

Fight Back! News is circulating the following statement from the New Students for a Democratic Society at the University of Illinois Chicago (New SDS at UIC).

New Students for a Democratic Society at UIC is proud to announce that we’ve successfully pushed UIC administration to commit to increasing funding for all seven cultural centers on campus! In the era of Trump 2.0, this is an important victory in the struggle to defend diversity, equity, and inclusion in higher education. When we dare to struggle, we dare to win!

There's no way around it – this victory is a result of the countless hours of organizing by the coalition of forces on campus fighting to defend the cultural centers. New SDS at UIC has been at the forefront of this fight since the launching of our campaign to increase funding for cultural centers earlier this Fall. We’ve maintained a strong pressure on UIC administration throughout the semester with days of action, protest rallies & marches, open-letter deliveries, petition signatures, coalition-building, speaking out at the Board of Trustees, meeting with administration, and much more.

We would like to salute the Centers for Cultural Understanding and Social Change (CCUSC) Student Workers Alliance, Anakbayan at UIC, Mexican Students de Aztlán (MeSA), Students for Justice in Palestine at UIC, and so many others for their solidarity with our campaign and outstanding organizing over the course of this semester. Without their efforts, this victory could not have been won as quickly as it was.

In a meeting with administrators a couple weeks ago called for by MeSA and attended by members of New SDS at UIC, Dr. Lionel Allen (Vice Chancellor for Equity and Diversity) and Dr. Michael Ginsburg (Special Advisor to the Chancellor for Student Affairs) acknowledged our organizing efforts and claimed that the seven cultural centers at UIC would be receiving increased funding sufficient to reverse the 5% budget cut previously carried out by UIC administration.

On top of this, Dr. Allen and Dr. Ginsburg promised a further increase in the operational budgets for the centers. This would secure the ability of the CCUSC to effectively operate the programming, events, space, and so much more that is near and dear to the UIC student body – something that was on the road to being slashed altogether by UIC administrators.

However, these UIC administrators were also strangely quiet on the details regarding the funding changes. So, we held a meeting with cultural center representatives. At this meeting, we confirmed the extent of our victory. While we know this is a clear win for our primary demand of the UIC administration to increase funding for our cultural centers, we also know that this fight is still ongoing.

We demand a clear statement from UIC administration that they will follow through with their promises! We will not stop fighting until all of our cultural centers – the Arab American Cultural Center, Asian American Resource Cultural Center, Black Cultural Center, Disability Cultural Center, Gender Sexuality Center, Latino Cultural Center, and the Women’s Leadership Resource Center – get what they deserve!

Join us this upcoming Spring as we continue this fight and bring our demands to the Board of Trustees meeting in Chicago on Thursday, January 15th! If you’d like to get involved with our campaign, please consider getting organized and attending one of our weekly meetings this winter break to help us secure this victory.

When Cultural Centers Are Under Attack – Stand up and Fight Back!

#StudentMovement #SDS #CulturalCenters #CCUSC #MeSA #SJPUIC #SWA #Anakbayan