The national observance of a “Day of Action to Defend Public Education” started a week early at the University at Albany with a forum examining the many threats to public education.

The UUP Albany Chapter was one of several co-sponsors of the forum, along with the Peace and Justice Committee of the Capital District Area Labor Federation; HERE Local 471; the New York Public Interest Research Group; and the Solidarity Committee of the Capital District.

Campuses around the country, including UAlbany, held rallies Oct. 7 to mark the national day of action. A coalition of labor, social justice and student groups organized the observances. For more on this, go to www.defendeducation.org.

Albany Chapter executive board members Bret Benjamin and Jim Collins moderated the forum, which described the growing pressures on public education to justify its existence based on market values.

Panelists included Fernando Leiva, a UAlbany faculty member in the department of Latino, Caribbean and U.S. Latino studies; Cathy Corbo, a NYSUT member and president of the Albany Public School Teachers Association; and Latin American studies graduate student Jackie Hayes.

The forum took place four days before UAlbany announced devastating cutbacks, including the potential loss of 160 full-time positions and the elimination of majors in the classics, French, Italian, Russian and theater.

The discussion at the “Day of Action” forum included the push within SUNY for the Public Higher Education Empowerment and Innovation Act, which the Legislature turned aside. The act would have allowed campuses to set their own tuition, set differential tuition among programs, and expand their public/private partnerships.

UUP opposed the act, on the grounds that it would have removed the Legislature’s historic oversight of SUNY and encourage potentially risky business ventures on campuses. The union remains watchful in case lawmakers or SUNY administrators try to revive the idea.

Leiva described the innovation act as an example of the “neoliberal” movement in higher education, which embraces a results-driven corporate model.

“When we talk about what’s happening to the SUNY system, we need to put it in the broader spectrum,” Leiva told his audience. Under the corporate model, he said, “education becomes a commodity, not a public good or a university right. We’ll see the demise of the university community as a community of scholars.”

— Darryl McGrath