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FSU President Marlene Kim's Remarks at the March 18, 2018 UMB Community Forum

4/19/2018

Marlene Kim, Economics Professor and President of the Faculty Staff Union. Remarks at the UMB Community forum, April 18, 2018.

We are here today to say that UMass Boston will not be treated as a second class citizen. 

The UMass System, the Board of Trustees, and Board of Higher Education needs to provide educational opportunities to all its citizens, including the underserved.  The Massachusetts legislature needs to provide funding and oversight that’s needed to ensure this. 

The purchase of Mount Ida shows starkly what is wrong with this system--when one campus can have two campuses and we cannot have one. 

There is power and funding apartheid in the UMass System, which perpetuates unequal opportunities in Massachusetts.    

UMass Boston has never received the money we needed to rebuild our campus, our substructure, our parking garage (which is in our substructure), or to move our utility corridor (from under our substructure). 

Is it fair that UMass Amherst can buy Mount Ida because it receives the lion’s share of state revenue, when we get a puny amount and can’t rebuild our campus as a result?  We need to rebuild campuses like ours that need rebuilding before adding campuses for luxuries like internships. 

Make no mistake:  UMass Amherst’s purchase is to obtain presence in Boston.  It is empire building; it is an expansion plan.  They want to grow to be a top 20 public university. If they go head to head with us, we will lose, because they receive so much more money.  There will be no competition.  We will lose programs; we will lose more faculty and staff.  We will lose educating the underserved. 

No one likes the Mount Ida deal--not the Mount Ida students.  UMass Boston will get crushed. 

Go to the Board of Higher Education on Tuesday at 9 am, the 21st floor of 1 Ashburton Place.  Speak out against this purchase.  (Email EQuiroz@dhe.mass.edu if you want to speak on this before Monday, 9 am)

Reagan’s busting the air controller’s strike is cited as the demise of unions.  We will look back at this purchase as the demise of UMass Boston if we don’t stop it. 

Turnout, speak out, and stop this!  I’ll see you on Tuesday!