ALSO IN THIS ISSUE
Ceramics
From manufacturing to medicine to the mundane, ceramics are all around us

Turning Back the Clock
Jeffrey Wheat helps his older adult students stay young and limber

Plane Speaking
Aviation maintenance instructors build their own planes

Verbal Volleys
Larry Weiss coaches Mesa College debate team to lob the winning argument

Left Brain, Right Brain
Herald Kane is equally adept at analytical and creative pursuits

To Protect and To Serve
Police officer Diana Medero enthusiastically serves her college community

Online Biology
Cooking up experiments at home

Taking to the Streets
Faculty, staff and students march to protest governor's budget cuts to colleges

Chancellor’s Page
Chancellor and trustees wage battle for fair funding

Development News
Concerts fund music scholarships; Miramar College Foundation forms subcommittees

Factoids
Miscellaneous tidbits of information

NewsMakers
Faculty and staff accomplishments

Taking to the Streets

It was a scene out of the ’60s, but this time students in bell bottoms marched shoulder to shoulder with college faculty and administrators in Dockers and business suits. Ten thousand strong they marched on the state Capitol March 17 to protest Gov. Gray Davis’ proposals to disproportionately cut community college funding and raise fees.

“Most political demonstrations at the state Capitol are either contrived or irrelevant — but Monday’s massive outpouring of community college students to protest state budget cutbacks was neither,” wrote Sacramento Bee political columnist Dan Walters.

Dozens of district students and administrators flew to Sacramento to join the march. Those who couldn’t make the trip north massed at City College to march to the governor’s local office, where Chancellor Augie Gallego, board president Marty Block and AFT president Jim Mahler went inside to speak personally to the governor’s staff. Similar “satellite” demonstrations took place elsewhere in the state, and more are planned.

“The budgets of California’s community colleges have been shafted for so long that one might expect the colleges to submit meekly to the lastest proposed cuts. But they should not,” said the March 21 editorial, “Governor short-changes community colleges” in the San Diego Union Tribune.

Since early 2002, when the governor started his dissection of community college funding, local districts began to complain loudly and publicly — a kind of dissent virtually unheard of from the community colleges despite years of fiscal neglect when the more prestigious and politically connected universities have enjoyed the lion’s share of budget rewards.

Editorial writers up and down the state have come out solidly in support of the colleges.

“It’s shameful enough that community colleges have routinely been shortchanged by the Legislature…[but] most also get clipped by an unfair funding formula.” said the Union Tribune editorial of Jan. 23, 2003. “Community colleges understand the need for belt-tightening during tough economic times. And they are willing to bear their fair share of the budget cuts. But what Davis is asking them to accept is mutilation.”

Some legislators have heard the message. “Your fight is my fight,” shouted Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, himself a product of community colleges, to the demonstrators at the Capitol.

But will that be enough? Visit www.keepthedoorsopen.org to follow what’s happening in Sacramento. There is also a place for you to send your comments to your legislators.

CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW? Protesters, angry at Gov. Davis, for decimating community college budgets statewide, march from City College down Park Boulevard, waving their handmade signs.