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Monday, November 14, 2011 Vol. 36, Iss. 12
Your school. Your voice.
University of Colorado Colorado Springs Weekly Campus Newspaper
‘Occupy Wall Street’ teach-in draws campus-wide attention Ryan Adams radams3@uccs.edu
Drawing attention all over the nation, the “Occupy Wall Street” movement finally made its way to the campus of UCCS. Organized by students Theo Holtwick, Kent Henderson and Kayley Blood, along with assistant professor of the sociology department Jeffrey Montez de Oca, an “Occupy Wall Street” teachin was brought to the El Pomar Plaza on Nov. 8. The teach-in was organized in an effort to gain the attention of the campus community. More than 70 members of the UCCS community gathered to participate in the teach-in and learn more about the event. Montez de Oca, who was asked by KKTV to talk about “Occupy Wall Street,” hoped that the teach-in provided a couple things for students. “The teach-in, I believe, has two primary purposes,” he said. “One is to provide the campus with information on the Occupy Wall Street movement, and two is to promote discussion amongst the students about the issue.”
According to the pamphlet handed out at the event, “Since the 1970s, vast inequalities have accelerated in the United States. This is in large part a result of the political and economic decisions of the leaders of this country, and it has cost the middle class.” The event on Nov. 8 consisted of four speakers: Joel Aigner, the organizer of “Occupy Colorado Springs” and Senior Manager of MDM, Inc. (mdminc.com), a local pump manufacturer; Joe Langston and Kent Henderson, graduate students in sociology; and Hossein Forouzandeh, a UCCS alumnus. Besides the teach-in at UCCS, the movement can also be felt in the Colorado Springs community at large. “Occupy Colorado Springs” is taking place at Acacia Park downtown. According to KKTV, although the protestors there are a part of the nation-wide movement, a lot of Colorado Springs residents still don’t understand what they are protesting for. Montez de Oca wants the teach-in to help with that and explain the movement’s basic goal. “Every movement
Photo by Robert Solis
The “Occupy Wall Street” teach-in aimed to educate the community about the national movement. around the nation wants to create awareness,” he said. “We want to allow people to have an understanding of what is going on and get them to talk about the issue.” The movement is mainly protesting what the occupiers term “contemporary inequality.” “When a country has this type of political breakdown that
we are experiencing today, movements like the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ help a lot and create real improvements in our lives,” he stated. The speakers of the teach-in brought different perspectives of the movement and also answered any questions that the campus may have on the issue.
The teach-in provided the campus with information including the shocking statistic from sociologist William Domhoff that the richest 1 percent of Americans now own 42 percent of the wealth in the country. The teach-in also provided information on the “why” of the protest and gave the attendees ques-
tions to ponder and discuss. “The teach-in is intended to be educational, which is consistent with the mission of the University,” stated Montez de Oca. “Our hope is that the “Occupy Wall Street” teach-in will also help add to the social and intellectual climate of the University, too.” S
Green Action Fund committee seeks to fund student-based projects Rachel Bradford
rbradford@uccs.edu The solar fee, which was started in 2008 by students’ initiative, was expanded by students in the SGA election last spring to include more than just solar projects, according to Nathanael Mooberry, SGA senator of sustainability. UCCS was “running out of options as far as putting [up] solar,” said Mooberry. Solar projects, such as “thin film” on the roof of the Osborne Center, were
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being implemented in newly built or renovated buildings; however, the cost of retrofitting other existing buildings would have been too costly, said Mooberry. In Professor Carole Huber’s “Changing Places” geography class last spring, Mooberry’s group came up with the idea to expand the solar fee to a general sustainability fee in order to create a wider variety of environmentally-related projects on campus. As part of the fee’s new purpose, Mooberry leads the UCCS Green Action
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Fund Committee to assess and help students implement qualifying projects. Mooberry said the committee consists of members from the sustainability-related clubs on campus, a second SGA member, a facilities staff member, a faculty sustainability committee member, various students-atlarge and Linda Kogan, director of the Office of Sustainability. Students that are not part of the sustainabilityrelated clubs can still find a space on this committee, said Mooberry. “A big part of our push was to have
students be the ones that are making the decisions on the money that is taken from the solar fee.” So far, students outside the clubs have not applied to be part of the studentsat-large group on the committee. According to Kevin Gilford, assistant director of the Office of Sustainability, this committee is working closely with the Office of Sustainability in an effort to keep the projects feasible both in scope and cost. The Green Action Fund Committee met for the first time on Nov. 3 and
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is in the beginning stages of developing the application process for students to submit their ideas for green projects, according to Mooberry. To help give students an idea of which green projects will qualify for implementation on campus, Mooberry gave tentative requirements, only one of which needs to be met. The committee is looking for green projects that will increase campus sustainability, efficiency, recycling, sustainable food service and/or education about sustainability.
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Additional projects are needed for decreasing the campus carbon emissions, waste, per-capita water usage, dependence on fossil fuels and overall ecological impact. “What we’re looking at right now is having different sizes of projects,” Mooberry explained. “A small project might be something we can approve on a monthly basis. A midsized project could be as often as once a month or semester; once a semester for large projects.” Continued on page 3...
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