IRVINE : UCI Students Fast to Protest Fee Hikes

Four UC Irvine students vowed Thursday not to eat until the weekend in an attempt to publicize their disagreement with a proposed 24% fee increase.

Another 18 students at UCI will take turns fasting for one day each next week to continue the protest, said David Goldstein-Shirley, 29, a graduate student and one of the fasters who helped lead a noontime rally on campus to announce the protest. About 200 students at other University of California campuses are also fasting to air their objections to the fee increase proposed earlier this month by the governing Board of Regents.

The UCI rally drew about 70 students at its height, about 10 fewer than those watching a Karate demonstration 100 feet away. The interest level of students was not lost on undergraduate student president Jose Solorio, who also is fasting in protest.

“Even now, more students are watching the karate demonstration than this,” Solorio’s amplified voice boomed from a makeshift stage outside of the student center. “It’s sad, sad, sad. . . . All I see is apathy every single day, and all I have (in my office) are students bitching and moaning about the fee increase.”

The proposed increase would add $550 a year to student fees, raising the yearly fee to an average of $2,824 for California residents. The amount does not include the cost of housing, living expenses, books or other supplies.

The proposal, combined with last fall’s 40% increase and a 10% increase in 1990, would mean a $1,348 increase in student fees from two years ago, a 91% increase overall for state residents.

If students want to have a voice, Solorio said, they must get politically involved and lobby their state legislators. A total of 22 students are fasting to call attention to skyrocketing college costs that are forcing some students out of a UC education, he said.

Earlier this month, the proposed fee increase prompted about 300 UC Davis students to occupy a campus building for several days. Five students were arrested.

Besides the fasting, students at all nine UC campuses are encouraging a letter-writing campaign to legislators, said Goldstein-Shirley, a doctoral student in comparative culture. UCI has collected about 150 letters so far.

But trying to get students at UCI involved continues to be a struggle, he said.

Students at UCI do care, said Manuel Gonzales, 19, a sophomore studying engineering who stopped by the rally.

“A lot of them have classes,” Gonzales said. “This week is midterms, so it’s hard for them to stop by. But I think every student here has a complaint about the fee increases.”

The fee increase is going to hit particularly hard this time around because of the economy, said Vernon Bacon, 28, a senior studying criminal justice. He has been laid off from two recent jobs at grocery stores and is currently unemployed, he said.