Facebook
Fark
Digg
Reddit
Stumble
Wednesday, Feb. 10, 2010 | 2 a.m.
Raw video of rally
State of the State
Viewing video requires the latest version of Adobe's Flash Player
Gov. Jim Gibbons gave an emergency State of the State address at 6 p.m. Monday, Feb. 8. Video is courtesy KVBC Channel 3.
Related Stories
- Hundreds rally to protest governor’s proposed budget cuts (2-9-2010)
- Governor sounds like the GOP candidate he is, observers say (2-9-2010)
- The bleeding of education: Gibbons faults ‘whining’ about school funding (2-9-2010)
- Cuts would dramatically shrink Nevada safety net (2-9-2010)
- Gibbons: No battle expected over taxes during special session (2-8-2010)
- Governor plans emergency address on Nevada budget (2-7-10)
- Governor’s speech will lay out state’s budget problems (2-7-10)
- State budget comes up $800 million short (1-22-10)
Sitting on a bench inside UNLV’s Student Union, Jennifer Cruz watched as several hundred other Rebels — many carrying banners and signs — hurried to a rally in protest of proposed budget cuts to higher education.
Cruz stayed inside.
Seeking a spot in the university’s highly competitive nursing program, Cruz said she couldn’t afford to skip a review session for an upcoming anatomy test.
Although she wasn’t waving a banner, the 31-year-old Cruz is well aware of the crisis facing the state’s public education system, at all grade levels.
With four children in grade school, Cruz said her sympathies extend beyond UNLV. In addition to the $110 million cuts proposed for higher ed, the Clark County School District faces upward of $87 million in budget cuts. Local schools have already lost a quarter-billion dollars in state funding since 2007.
“I’m worried about my children’s education and my education,” Cruz said. “How far is this going to go?”
Even though she’s a full-time student, she finds time to volunteer weekly at her children’s schools, helping out teachers and doing small office chores.
“If we could get more parents involved in their kids’ educations, so much work wouldn’t fall on the schools,” Cruz said. “Right now we put so much pressure on teachers.”
How, she wondered, can their pay be cut on top of that?
Outside at Tuesday’s rally, participants cheered, chanted and sang UNLV’s fight song as a student band played. Many students said they had walked out of class with the permission of their professors, some of whom were in the crowd.
Also participating: UNLV President Neal Smatresk, who stood with Nevada System of Higher Education Chancellor Dan Klaich and James Dean Leavitt, chairman of the Board of Regents.
Students gathered around Smatresk and posed for pictures snapped with cell phones.
“It means a lot, you being here,” one young woman told Smatresk. “You’re like the head of the whole place.”
Smatresk shook her hand, telling her, “Your being here means even more.”
Still, some UNLV faculty discouraged the walkout.
One business major says his professor sent out an e-mail, warning that she wouldn’t excuse absences from Tuesday’s class. He didn’t want to risk making her angry, so he planned to skip the post-rally caravan to the Sawyer State Office Building to protest at the Legislature’s Interim Finance Committee.
A few nontenured faculty told the Sun they supported the walkout, but decided to teach classes as usual to not rile superiors who hold sway over their professional fate.
Art student Anthony McIntosh said his professor told him it would be OK if he skipped class Tuesday, but he probably would have done it, anyway. He’s worried that UNLV will become the first university in the nation to declare what’s known a financial exigency, which means there isn’t enough money in the system to meet expenditures, and that might raise concerns about accreditation.
“What’s my degree going to be worth?” said McIntosh, who will graduate in December. “What happens when I apply to (graduate) school and they won’t accept my diploma from UNLV?”
UNLV has seen its faculty trimmed by 100, and the support staff by more than double that number. University officials say forced furlough days will severely hurt the quality of education, and put an even heavier burden on overworked faculty and staff.
At the same time, there are worries that some students at state colleges and universities will be priced out of the higher ed market, at least locally, if tuition or fees are sharply increased.
That’s a fear shared by Cruz.
“If I can’t afford to go to school here, I don’t have the money to just pick up and move out of state,” Cruz said. “Where do I go from here? I’m trying to better myself, and better my kids’ lives.”
GIBBON won't listen to student.the only they will be heard is VOTE. all student must register and VOTE. VOTE against any1 who cut education.
There is nothing in the constitution that states I as a tax payer has to pay for higher education. In my day we paid our own way or we didn't go to college. These kids today think they are entitled to an education, you need to earn it. Government is to blame for our troubles today and it is all of the entitlement programs that have put us where we are now. If there is no money there is no money so buck up, grow up and try to be the solution and not the problem. We need to cut spending that is the bottom line. A huge majority of our higher education system is run by socialists, they push a socialist agenda, and as a conservative I don't have any desire to have my tax dollars pay for their agenda, which is to indoctrinate!!!
What's up pawns? Nice to see that you feel comfortable skipping class! Too bad you don't realize that you are a bunch of monkeys that are being played!
Refreshing to see our youth expressing their right to assemble. I love how many people gripe about how they had to pay their own way, and walked up hills both ways in the snow, blah, blah, blah. Reality check, there are many of us that have paid all our tuition as well. No free hand-me-outs here.
"Organized walkout of classes joined by president, chancellor . . ."
Students, please hear me out.
Of COURSE, the president and chancellor joined the protest. Their worst nightmare is that they lose customers--oops, students--who suddenly undergo a transformation and realize that they can become self-reliant and self-sufficient without a piece of-- increasingly--meaningless paper called a "diploma." Anymore, universities are businesses like any other, and they are bending over backwards to develop state-of-the-art dorms, recreational facilities, and the like to woo future customers, instead of prioritizing undergraduate learning.
No wonder Gandhi was so suspicious of higher education; in his eyes, a truly educated individual was one who learned to live simply, be as self-sufficient as possible, and give back selflessly to others. All of these virtues can--and increasingly must--be cultivated beyond the boundaries of the increasingly corporatized university.
It's great that students want to be heard but they need to keep in mind that there are two sides to this coin and one side is short $900 dollars and most of these students will graduate and leave Vegas.
Would the students support reduction in administrative staff/salaries, athletic programs, and other non-teaching roles or raise tuition in order to get their degrees?
UNLV should just concentrate on teaching.
universities should focus on teaching, but research is what subsidizes faculty income, provides funding for graduate students, and increase the recognition of unlv for producing new ideas...but in NV...we don't appreciate smart people.
http://planning.unlv.edu/oiapstats/Peer%...
Graduation rates (after six years!) are just 39% according to UNLV.
Too much taxpayer money is being wasted on students who will never graduate. College dropouts don't earn great incomes.
Raising standards and tuition is the best way to improve the budget at UNLV. Heavily subsidized tuition is attracting teenagers who are looking for "educated day care."
I bet most of those UNLV students who protested coming tuition hikes never earn their degree.
gsnicols- that is the smartest post i have seen on this sight.Fantastic.
This is an example of a lack of creative thinking. Tell them that we're cutting the budget and what do they do? Skip class. That's fine and dandy but after tomorrow this story will fade and be irrelevant.
What the students should have done is to stage a "study in" and refuse to leave the campus until their message was sent. The university would be up in arms, they'd have to pay extra overtime for the campus police, the news media would be camped out and they'd eventually be dragged out, arrested and charged with trespassing. Now that's what we call "civil disobedience."
The process would last several months and would guarantee continuing media coverage. Whoever thought up this travesty of a mockery of a sham of a protest just wanted a day off. If you want your money you have to fight for it not walk out. One could draw the conclusion that this is an example of the quality of education these students receive in our institutions of learning.
bbt, you are forgetting that these kids are a joke and that they are monkeys that didn't realize that they are being used. I don't think that they would have the ambition or motivation to actually do anything that involves hard work, so this little temper tantrum, I mean protest, that won't make a difference is the best that they could do. It's too bad.
bbt + appleslices = idiots
GSNICOLS, I can tell that you have not had any higher education. Don't you realize how crucial UNLV and all those other higher education places are to this economy? You think things are bad now, wait and see what happens when the TAX REVENUE dramatically drops due to the fact that UNLV is failing and if WE (yes, I am a student there) lose our accreditation. All those little businesses all along Maryland Parkway will fail. Unemployment will go up. Oh, by the way, crime will increase because those kids that feel that they are entitled to an education won't be worried about an education anymore, they will be looking for rich snobs like you to rob. And I hope that you own your home and when you see that your property value goes down dramatically because the Las Vegas Valley is not a good place to invest because they do not have an accredited university. Have fun selling your property. I take it that the retired population here in Las Vegas are the ones that do not support their tax dollars going to education. Well, I don't support my paychecks going to Social Security. I have my own retirement savings, own my own home (paid in full), and do not see myself having to rely on Social Security in the future (if it will be there). We all should be able to choose where our tax dollars go, but we don't have that right. You don't want to support higher education and I don't want to support the older population. We both lose. Let's just live with it and quit hatin' on the kids of Nevada.
Those of you that propose raising the tuition at UNLV to weed out the students that are there for "educated day care" amongst other outlandish ideas don't have a clue. With higher tuition costs, as a student, I will take my desire for an education and migrate elsewhere. I go to UNLV and stay in Las Vegas for family reasons, as well as trying to obtain a higher education. With tuition going up along with the quality of the learning environment stagnating, and even going down. I will end up cutting my loses, going to an out of state school where the amount I pay is in balance to the education I receive.
I know there are other students who see things this way in one form or another as well. Which would be a shame for Southern Nevada to fall farther behind.
Then again we are a blue collar city where you can earn big bucks with a GED. So I'm sure as I have seen most of you do not give a damn about higher education.