From:
The list is open to women faculty at York who are members of YUFA
[YUFA-W@YorkU.CA]
on behalf of Lorna Erwin [lerwin@YorkU.CA]
Sent:
March 1, 2001 7:15 PM
To:
YUFA-W@YORKU.CA
Subject:
Students Arrested at Trent
A
very serious situation has developed at Trent.
YUFA has sent a letter
and
will be making a donation help offset legal costs. Please consider
writing
to the Trent Administration protesting this event.
Charmaine
Eddy wrote:
>
>
> I am forwarding to you a
message from one of our students to let
you
>
> know what happened last night at Trent.
Students here had been
engaged
>
> in political protest, occupying the VP Academic's Office, and police
>
> raided the offices in the middle of the night, arresting 8 female
>
> students. Students have occupied
administrative offices in the
past,
>
> but never before has such force been used. We are witnessing the
>
> continuation of the tactics used at the WTO Protest in Seattle and
at
>
> the OCAP Protest this summer.
>
> I have written to our union
asking them for a strong and loud
>
> protest against this kind of action.
Given the kinds of activism
you
>
> have been involved with in the recent past, I would appreciate any
>
> advice you might have.
>
> Sincerely,
>
>
>
> Charmaine Eddy
>
>
>
> --
>
> ********************************************************************
>
> Professor Charmaine Eddy
>
> Chair, Women's Studies Program
>
> Associate Professor,
>
> Department of English Literature
>
> Lady Eaton College, S111
>
> Trent University,
>
> Peterborough, Ontario, Canada K9J 7B8
>
> telephone: 705-748-1515
>
> fax: 705-748-1630
>
>
>
>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
>
> Subject: URGENT - Letter from Students
>
> Date: Thu, 01 Mar 2001 09:30:22 -0500
>
> From: David Tough <dtough@trentu.ca>
>
> To: fulltime@trentu.ca, parttime@trentu.ca
>
>
>
> To all full and part-time faculty:
>
>
>
> We write to notify you that eight Trent students are presently in
jail.
>
> Twenty-five police officers raided Lady Eaton College last night at
>
> 3:00am, arresting the eight students occupying the Vice President’s
>
> office as well as the students supporting them outside. The eight
>
> occupying students have been charged; the remaining seventeen were
>
> detained and later released.
>
>
>
> At the time of the raid, the students were engaged in an ongoing
>
> dialogue with police, which they were led to believe would result in
a
>
> peaceful resolution.
>
>
>
> Students were occupying the Vice President’s office in the hope of
>
> pressuring the administration to negotiate, or simply acknowledge a
>
> number of University-wide concerns. Some of these include corporate
>
> advertising on campus, increased threat of privatization, the threat
to
>
> the college system, and encroachment of private interests, and most
>
> importantly administrative accountability and transparency. The fond
>
> hope of these students has always been to restore and re-empower the
>
> legitimate elected decision-making bodies of the University that
have
>
> been systematically silenced and ignored by the current
administration.
>
>
>
> These events mark the first time in the long history of Trent
student
>
> protests, that an administration has opted to use force instead of
>
> dialogue in dealing with student concerns. It is to be noted that at
no
>
> time has Bonnie Patterson offered a gesture of negotiation for a
>
> peaceful resolution. From the first day of the occupation, Patterson
>
> behaved in an obstinate and vindictive manner, clearly stating her
>
> personal desire to see the students punished. Her attitude
predetermined
>
> the violent nature of the conclusion to the occupation. We see this
as
>
> the culmination of a climate of intolerance that has increasingly
>
> enveloped the University under the current administration.
>
>
>
> We do not ask you to endorse the tactics taken by the students
during
>
> the occupation nor share all their concerns; we do, however, appeal
to
>
> you as members of the University community to seriously evaluate the
>
> implications of the President’s heavy-handed approach to ending the
>
> occupation. The eight jailed students desperately need your
recognition
>
> and support.
>
>
>
> Anup Grewal
>
> Tullia Marcolongo
>
> David Tough
>
> Jessica Grillanda
>
> Jill Stavely
>
> Claire Prashaw