Minneapolis, MN – About 500 students participated in a sit-in at of South High School to protest the grand jury verdict that failed to indict the cop who killed Mike Brown. The sit-in wrapped around the corridors of the entire first floor of the building.
St. Paul, MN – On March 25 Welfare Rights Committee (WRC) members sat in at Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton’s office throughout the morning to demand welfare grant increases for poor families in Minnesota. The sit-in was timed to coincide with a Senate hearing on bills pushed by the Welfare Rights Committee.
Los Angeles, CA – The fight for public education at UCLA began early this morning, March 4. By sunrise the campus had transformed. A walkout and rally is planned for 11:30 a.m. this morning where students, workers and faculty will join together at Bruin Plaza to denounce the budget cuts. Picket lines led by the unions, AFSCME, UPTE and UWA have sprung up all over and their chants can be heard all from almost everywhere on campus, “Whose university? Our university!” The administration will not be allowed to lay off workers and raise tuition without a fight! Things are expected to heat up as the day goes on, with teach-ins and marches and sit-ins.
Chapel Hill, NC – A 16-day sit-in at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) administration building came to a dramatic close on Friday May 2, when Chancellor Moeser ordered UNC police to arrest five of the protesters. It was the longest sit-in protest in UNC’s history. Dozens of students had occupied the lobby of South Building, the administrative headquarters at UNC, in a protest against the university’s use of sweatshops for the manufacture of UNC apparel (Sit-in at administration building demands end to UNC sweatshop clothing, Fight Back!, April 2008).
Chapel Hill, NC – Six students were arrested at Congressman David Price’s office Feb. 17 for holding a sit-in against the Iraq war. 40 people held a picket line outside while the students locked arms and occupied the office, demanding that Price vote against Bush’s Iraq war supplemental funding bill and oppose any aggression, including military action or sanctions, against Iran. Similar actions are taking place across the country in a campaign of pressure on Congress to end the U.S. occupation of Iraq.