Student uprisings

Guess who’s getting all worked up about higher education these days? Believe it or not, it’s college kids.

There’s a new kind of activism – enthusiasm, even – that 18-to-22 year-olds are showing for their homes away from home that’s not been all that obvious in decades past. They’re not just complaining about professor shortages, over-crowded classes, and outdated libraries – they’re doing something about it. They’re organizing.

Last year, the University of Virginia student council invited nearly a dozen state legislators to a student-run forum focusing on higher education. Republican and Democratic delegates and senators traveled from all over Virginia and subjected themselves to what often were tough questions about what the policymakers were – or were not – doing to support the state’s 15 four-year and 24 two-year schools. The student council’s second annual forum was held last week, and again a bunch of legislators trekked to Hooville for a two-hour give-and-take with more than 200 assembled students. Both yearly forums were organized by Alex Stolar, now a fourth-year student at the university.

Also last year, perhaps coincidentally, perhaps not, there sprang to life a new students-on-the-move kind of organization, Virginia21. More than 20,000 university students are now on its rolls, all electronically linked and ready to be pushed into political action whenever prompted by their just-graduated leader, Jesse Ferguson (William and Mary, ’03).

Virginia21’s roots are in the 2002 statewide promotion of the $1 billion bond referendum for higher ed, museums and state parks. It was then that Ferguson and a band of W&M students organized – as did students at a few other universities – and joined an even broader coalition of business, education, and civic activists campaigning in support of the referendum’s passage. The W&M group itself raised about $20,000 for radio ads and other promotional materials to supplement a much larger overall effort. Voters approved the bond referendum by a wide margin, earmarking nearly $850 million for capital projects on campuses all over the state.

Surprised a bit by their own success, the W&M band held together and with the help from a few like-minded students at Virginia Tech and George Mason University founded Virginia21 in the summer of ’03 to push even harder the many interests of students and higher education. And their primary audience was no less than the Virginia General Assembly.

In its first year, Virginia21’s budget was about $100,000. This year, it’s twice that. They’re backed by some of the most prominent CEOs and businesses in the state.

Ferguson is ever-present in the halls of the legislature. It’s not unusual to see him lunching one-on-one with legislators at some of the capitol’s nearby eateries, even months after the assembly’s adjournment. He knows the higher ed policy issues as well as the state budget’s impact on most every college and university in the state. In the historic ’04 budget impasse between the House of Delegates and Senate, Virginia21 and its thousands of members were front-and-center pushing for the tax-reform and budget compromise that ultimately provided more than $260 million of new money for faculty and staff salaries, instruction, and operations.

Virginia21 now has student coordinators at every publicly supported four-year school across the state, and this year they’re focusing considerable energies on organizing community college students. Just moderate success there could easily double their rolls. It’s not at all unreasonable to believe that by this time next year they’ll have strung together 40,000-50,000 of the nearly 300,000 undergraduate students at the state’s two- and four-year colleges and universities.

What’s nifty about Virginia21 is that these kids have learned the ways of the political world. UVa.’s Stolar, Ferguson and others are speaking the language pols understand best – votes – by turning out hundreds at a time for rallies and forums and getting tens of thousands organized for action.

In recent months, Virginia21 has registered more than 3,000 new voters and processed some 12,000 absentee ballots – all in time for next month’s presidential election. You can bet the group will stay in touch with every new voter it signs up.

What’s also good for the schools is that these students’ early, active involvement will most certainly stick for years to come. As they become middle-aged and older, when called to arms by their alma maters to promote this or that higher ed cause in Richmond, they’re more likely rise to the occasion and call, write, or visit their legislator.

In the meantime, keep an eye on this new, savvy, high-tech student uprising. And don’t be surprised if during primaries and general elections you see college students in greater numbers in the voting booths beside you.