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Volume 76 Number 1 Copyright © 2010 Diablo Valley College - The Inquirer

Thursday, February 25, 2010

www.theinquireronline.com

We hope to build a student movement that will hold these politicians’ feet to the fire. -Frank Runninghorse

“

Students will soon shell out more money to park their wheels, but they will be able to buy semester passes online and use debit/credit cards for the machines.

Beginning this summer, the price of a semester parking permit will rise from $35 to $40, while daily passes will cost $3 instead of $2.

The fee hike was approved 4-1 by the governing board Dec. 9 over the objections of board member Tomi Van de Brooke and student trustee Christina Cannon, who does not have a vote.

Although the district’s budget crisis was cited as a reason for the increase in presentations to student leaders, 75 percent of the $5 increase in semester passes ($3.75) will go to an outside company to manage the online and debit/credit card purchases, according to a re-port given to the board before the vote.

The new rates were supposed to take effect this semester, but district spokesman Tim Leong said DVC still needs to “work out the bugs” before students can pay for day passes with credit or debit cards,

Citations, however, increased as of Jan. 1, with a parking ticket now costing $40 instead of $35.

In addition to providing a new service, Police Chief Charles Gibson told student leaders the parking fee increase would ease $235,000 in budget cuts to his department, which includes police aides and maintenance of campus parking lots.

See PARKING, page 6

Oksana YurovskyStaff writer

Pleasant Hill may not be a hotbed of political activism like Berkeley, but DVC students care about college fee hikes and other campus issues.

Students for a Democratic Society will hold a rally at 11 a.m. March 4 in the patio area between the cafeteria and student union building to protest the state-wide community college fee increases and to organize a student political move-ment at DVC.

“We hope to build a student movement that will hold these politicians’ feet to the fire,” said Frank Runninghorse, a long-time student and SDS community member.

In July 2008, community college fees rose from $20 to $26 per-unit and the state’s fiscal crisis resulted in a massive closure of classes at California’s community colleges.

While some in SDS prefer a general strike of the school in addition to a rally, many mem-bers say such radical action isn’t realistic right now.

The key, they say, is to show up. “We want to get people involved and stand up for the their rights,” said Julia Jordan,

a global studies major who joined SDS to raise awareness that something can be done about the budget cuts.

SDS member Nick Holmes said, “We know we’re at the birth of a new civil rights movement, so we need to build our warriors.”

Political science professor John Kropf, said he likes SDS and its political activism but cau-tioned it’s harder for commuter schools like DVC to form large activist groups because stu-dents do not live on campus and often work part- or full-time jobs.

A goal of the March 4 rally is to build support for the “March in March” rally March 22 when California educators and students travel to Sacramento to protest the increasing costs of at-tending college, Runninghorse said.

The Associated Students of DVC and the Inter Club Council have yet to take a stand on the rally, but ICC President Francisco Hinojosa said he believes the ASDVC will officially support it.

“We can only hope that more clubs [are] as passionate about keeping the doors open for students to still attend college,” Hinojosa said. “I like the [rally]. It speaks to the American spirit, and I miss that spirit around our campus”.

SDS members plan to leave DVC after the March 4 rally and meet up at Civic Center in San Francisco with other activists to protest the higher education budget cuts.

“We need to make the politicians fear us and respect us,” Runninghorse said.

Contact Jonathan Roisman at jroisman@theinquireronline.com

Jonathan RoismanStaff writer

students

say no to

fee hikesSDS students rally DVC

community to pre-vent statewide com-munity college fee increases

”

Jubilation greeted the Accreditation Commission of Junior and Community Colleges’ announcement that DVC is no longer one step away from becoming a satellite campus of Los Medanos or Con-tra Costa College.

By moving DVC from “show cause” (the bottom rung of the proverbial ladder) to “probation,” the Commission placed the college one step closer to full accredita-tion. But the clock continues to tick.

DVC has until October 2010 to satisfy all of the Commission’s recommenda-

tions outlined in its evaluation team’s re-port of November 2009.

“We really felt a huge sense of relief and accomplish-ment,” said Presi-dent Judy Walters of her reaction to the Commission’s Feb. 1 letter, which arrived by fax.

Noting that DVC had “completed significant amounts of good work to ad-dress the deficiencies noted in the Com-mission’s action letter of January 2009,” it encouraged the college “to continue its

work to fully address all deficiencies.” In its confidential report to the commis-

sion in November 2009, the evaluation team said, “The climate [of DVC] has changed from one of isolation and resistance to inclusion and par-ticipation.”

Walters attrib-uted some of that change to the DVC community’s

stunned reaction a year ago to being placed on “show cause,” a finding that requires the college to resolve all noted

problems within two years or face clo-sure.

“Everyone said we don’t want to be tagged with these old names and these old labels anymore,” Walters said. “We are working together.”

English professor Keith Mikolavich, who served as co-chair of a work group within DVC’s accreditation oversight task force said, “Going on ‘show cause’ forced us to change. We knew we had problems but when someone from the outside says ‘get your house in order,’ it gets you a lot more focused.”

“We don’t want to be tagged with these old names and these old labels anymore.”

- Judy WaltersDVC President

Troy PattonStaff writer

See PROBATION, page 6

EDITORIAL ENTERTAINMENT

Students pay more,college gets less

Storytelling

Festival:

Speakers bring soul, wisdom and passion to DVC.

Page 3

Rally in the Valley:Fight for your right

Students can influence the changes needed.Page 5

Accreditation status moves to ‘probation’

FEATURESThis ain’t your normal 24...hours in Iraq.

Inquirer staff writer Chris Clark recounts his experiences on his tour in Iraq during wartime.

Page 2

Chris Corbin / The Inquirer