Mission
The University of California Student Association (UCSA) is a coalition of students and student governments that aims to provide a collective voice for all students through advocacy and direct action. UCSA participates in the shared governance of the University of California system, and seeks to advance higher education by empowering current and future students to advocate on their own behalf for the accessibility, affordability, and quality of the University of California system.
Beginnings
Throughout the 1960s, UC students developed a culture of organizing by engaging in the Free Speech, Civil Rights, and Anti-Vietnam War movements. Administrators, Regents, and elected officials responded any way they could to crack down on students’ freedom to organize.
In 1968, when Governor Ronald Reagan instituted the first “student fees” in a UC that was supposed to be free, students created the UC Student Lobby because they realized they needed a permanent organization to mobilize the student voice.
This would become UCSA.
Recent Victories
In 2018, UCSA and student advocacy for the Fund the UC campaign flooded the state capital, and were successful in securing an in-state tuition hike freeze, as well as rolling back in-state tuition by $60 per student. Students at State Capital were able to secure additional funding of $60 per student per year based on inflation-related need. This coincided with the expiration of a class action law suit that funded penalties against UC, but was paid out of students’ tuition. UCSA was able to convince UC to halt the yearly renewal of the surcharge used towards these penalties, reducing in-state tuition by $60 while the State paid the difference. Thanks to UCSA and student advocacy, this is the first in-state tuition rollback in nearly 20 years.
Through our UConsent efforts, we successfully got the UC to implement mandatory in-person training around consent and bystander intervention for all students, and we continue to advocate for staff and faculty training mandates as well. On the legislative side, we helped pass SB 967 establishing
the first-in-the-nation policy to require “affirmative consent” as standard in sexual assault investigations.
We also advocated for an increase of the Cal Grant B award maximum to $2,000, additional funding for the CA DREAM Loan Program to support AB 540 students, and bolstering of the Middle Class Scholarship to refine, but not threaten, its availability.
Through our work and partnership with stakeholders over the last few years, we mobilized the student vote to pass Prop 47 reducing non-serious drug crimes from felonies to misdemeanors, helped Fossil Free CA win a UC-wide divestment from the fossil fuel industry, and created the Higher Education Report Card (HERC) which holds legislators accountable for votes they cast that directly affect students. We also helped mobilize students in support of SB 54, which passed and effectively made California a “sanctuary state” by legalizing and standardizing statewide non-cooperation policies between California law enforcement agencies and federal immigration authorities.
We are hard at work to actualize student power and add to this list of victories in the coming year.
