STUDENTS FIGHT FOR CHANGE
STUDENTS FIGHT FOR CHANGE
UC SANTA BARBARA'S
STUDENT ACTIVISM: STUDENTS FIGHT FOR CHANGE
The University of California, Santa Barbara has a long history of student activism. Since it was established, there have been multiple student-run organizations for change on our campus. One of the most known and iconic demonstrations of UCSB's student activism started in 1968. Starting with twelve students, the North Hall Takeover influenced many generations of students to demand for more inclusion and ethnic representation. This led to the creation of the Black Studies Department, which paved the way for more diverse departments to be created at UCSB.
The student-led fight for the Black Studies Department, and the continuous fight for representation and student involvement in the department throughout UCSB's history, reveals the power UCSB students have when they stand in solidarity for change...
OUR STORY BEGINS IN
1944
when UCSB joins the UC system
...originally named The Santa Barbara College of the University of California, the university only had a few departments at it's inception...
and fourteen years later, in
1958
UCSB expanded, establishing the College of Letters and Science, and introducing a School of Engineering and a School of Education.
Original copy of the proposal for Black Studies program from UCSB's archives
TEN YEARS AFTER THAT....
1968
SPRING QUARTER
Ten years after it established it's new schools, UCSB's history of student activism begins ...
By 1968, UCSB students were fed up with the slow progress of their school.
In response to some of these frustrations, the Afro-American student union produced a "Proposal for Establishing A Black Studies Program" to the University, demanding that a program of Black Studies be introduced to the university for the well-being of it's African-American students.
Click on the underlined words to read the Proposal
UCSB students demanded change and they believed in their cause:
“We demand a program of ‘BLACK STUDIES’, a program which will be of, by, and for black
people. We demand that we be educated realistically; and that no form of education
which attempts to lie to us, or otherwise mis-educate us will be accepted...
We ask that this program be considered because the destruction of our minds and the current rate of attrition for our students can no longer be tolerated. We ask that this program be reconsidered because nothing less will do.”
Photo courtesy of UCSB's Black Studies Department
circa 1968
However, the University did not answer their demands and the students did not feel that UCSB cared for the well-being of it's African-American students. So, they decided to take a stand and do something about it...
The North Hall Takeover
This led to...
FALL QUARTER
OCTOBER 14TH 1968
...the Afro-American Student Union's response to the injustices that black students felt on UCSB's campus: twelve students "bariccad[ed] themselves in the North Hall computer center [at] around 6:30 am."
their
demands
List of Demands courtesy of UCSB A.S. Living History Project
“White Privilege is your history being part of the core curriculum and mine being taught as an elective.”
THE SCENE ON OCTOBER 14TH, 1968
Photos and quotations courtesy of UCSB's The Current, The Daily Nexus, and the Santa Barbara Sentenel
Descriptions provided by the Santa Barbara Sentenel
Thomas Crenshaw
bsu member and protester
We knew we were doing the right thing … the question was, how fearful were we of the consequences? That was the issue. Were we fearful? Yeah, we were fearful. Were we afraid? Yeah, we were afraid. There were a lot of us who met to go into North Hall. Only 12 of us showed up.
The students were not full of empty threats... "One official report typed up in the immediate wake of the takeover describes '…some of the students crouched in front of the computers armed with heavy hammers and large wrenches…"
They wanted to show the university how fed up they were with the injustices it was allowing.
North Hall Takeover photograph
OUTSIDE NORTH HALL
an article by UCSB's The Daily Nexus described the scene...
[The students] inside the building spoke through megaphones to the mostly white crowd below, which grew to approximately 1,000 near the end of the day. They reiterated their demands and tried to illustrate the problems facing African-American students at UCSB.
Some of the audience members were sympathetic, and some were incensed. One professor tried to calm the crowd and asked them to admire the courage of the protesters, while another told students that anyone involved would not get a grade in his class.
Others, angered by the protests, tried taking the situation into their own hands; one graduate student broke through the glass doors and tried to storm North Hall before students in the building turned a fire extinguisher on him. Another man shouted that there had never been any problems before blacks arrived on campus.
A number of the white students in the crowd gathered around the building to prevent police or administrators from getting past while others, unable to join the protesters, threw food up to them.
Twelve Students: Jim Johnson, Murad Rahman, Arnold Ellis, Thomas Crenshaw, Dalton Nezy, Ernest Sherman, Booker Banks, Mike Harris, Vallejo Kennedy, Stan Lee, Don Pearson, and Randy Stewart.
inside north hall
In 1968, North Hall was the home of the mainframe computer for the entire UC system, the IBM360/65 Mainframe, "the pride of modern computing, a research machine that also was the keeper of student records and other invaluable data without which the campus would be sunk."
The students knew exactly where to hit the UC where it would hurt; they knew exactly how to get the UC's attention. They wanted change and they were going to do anything to get it.
THESE TWELVE STUDENTS FOUGHT FOR CHANGE...AND THEY WON
1969
spring quarter
April 17th, 1969
Six months after the student-run protest, the official "Proposal For a Black Studies Program" was finally devised, outlining the structure of a new Black Studies department at UCSB.
An official proposal was devised, in association with both the BSU and the University:
When the administration ignored their griefs, Black students turned towards each other to fight against the injustice they experienced on campus. BSU members faced a myriad of obstacles, including threats of suspension, a violent student, and an unsure, tense crowd, to make their voices heard. The North Hall Takeover stands as a powerful example of student action, and opened the door for establishing future Ethnic and Gender Studies departments at UCSB.
HOWEVER, WHILE THE BATTLE MAY HAVE BEEN WON, THE STUDENT'S WAR WAS NOT OVER
FALL QUARTER
OCTOBER 29, 1969
THE NORTH HALL TAKEOVER MAY HAVE SUCCEEDED IN ESTABLISHING THE BLACK STUDIES DEPARTMENT BUT STUDENTS FOUND THAT THEY STILL HAD A LOT TO FIGHT FOR....
Original newspaper reports on black students' call for the resignation of Dr. Fisher
100 UCSB students took part in a protest, calling on Dr. Sethard Fisher to resign as chair of the Black Studies Department.
Rashidi Ali, student and spokesman of the protest stated,
"Dr. Fisher is no longer recognized by black students on this campus as being the chairman of the black studies department, and he is no longer recognized as being relevant to black people. He does not relate to black people; he does not relate to the community."
The BSU was opposed to Dr. Fisher, as they believed that he "refuses to acknowledge black students as legitimate participants in the program’s decision-making process."
play the track
To hear the BSU call on Dr. Fisher to resign
the bSU's claims:
Dr. Fisher's response:
the aftermath:
Dr. Fisher resigned and Dr. James Smith took over as chair, but this did not solve the early problems that the new department would face:
“The department had problems with staff fluctuation and finding replacements who were willing to put in the extensive hours needed to construct their own curriculum. In addition to staffing problems, black studies struggled to prove it belonged among the other academic departments on a campus where many professors disapproved of ethnic studies in general.
It also faced a problem with professors who would use the department to advance their careers. Professors interested in the established departments would enter the university through black studies, then immediately request to switch to traditional subjects.”
QUOTATIONS FROM THE DAILY NEXUS
Original document of BSU's claims from UCSB Archives
Original document of Dr. Fishers Response from UCSB Archives
CLICK ON THE DOCUMENTS TO READ WHAT EACH PARTY HAD TO SAY
1974
Dr. James Smith resigned, and Dr. Gerard Pigeon took his position for 26 years.
Pigeon resigned as chair in the year 2001. His 26 years were fruitful, and when he left, he left with him: a Black Studies Department with
“nine professors, four lecturers, three of the last six valedictorians, over 4,000 enrolled students and a top-10 national ranking for faculty research.”
the departments current website
QUOTATION FROM THE DAILY NEXUS
THE NORTH HALL TAKEOVER ALSO LED TO:
The Center For Black Studies
The Black Studies Center was created on September 19, 1969 in response to the North Hall Takeover. The center is "the research and community service activity by which education on the public campus is made relevant to the particular needs of Black students."
Chancellor Cheadle's status report on the center obtained from UCSB's archives
The center's demand for more support from the university:
But the development of the center was not so successful.
the center went under review for the first time, 5 years after its creation, and the conclusion of the review was that the center did not serve its purpose as an organized research unit in the university. And the center believed that this was because of the lack of human resources and funding for them to perform its functions.
The university agreed to the continuation of the center for Black Studies without it being subject to conduct organized research program but still provide community services:
In 1975,
CLICK ON THE DOCUMENTS TO READ THE CLAIMS
from the creations of the department and center for black studies to the fight for student involvement in the major...
It is clear that The North Hall TakeoveR WAS an act of change that will never be forgotten, and will forever influence the black studies department.
Daily Nexus, UCSB Archives
Jeffrey Stewart
Former Chair of the Black Studies Department
It can be said that after that takeover in 1968, the curriculum at UCSB forever changed.
students in the BSU created a list of demands to Chancellor Henry Yang, and one of those demands was that the campus memorialize what took place on October 14, 1968 and create a display of the Takeover in North Hall.
"This is a beautiful display of what can be done through student activism"
- Nadya Chavies
IN 2012,
Recent photos of UCSB North Hall
NORTH HALL TAKEOVER 50 YEARS AFTER:
A BLACK VISION OF CHANGE
From October 12th to the 14th of 2018, a weekend conference, organized by Prof. Jeffrey Stewart, was held at UCSB to recognize and celebrate fifty years since the North Hall Takeover.
50 YEARS LATER, THE TAKEOVER STILL ENTICES CHANGE.
Panel for the Black Alumni Association during the Conference. Picture provided by UCSB HFA
Jeffrey stewart and some of the twelve bsu students who participated in the north hall takeover, 50 years later.
Daily Nexus, Courtesy of Professor Jeffrey Stewart
