Cal State LA students, faculty stage walkout to protest proposed budget cuts
With Gov. Newsom's budget proposal, the CSU system faces a nearly 8% cut to its general fund. That's $375 million of state support
Dozens of California State University, Los Angeles students and faculty gathered Tuesday to protest Governor Gavin Newsom's proposed budget cut that would impact all 23 CSU campuses.
"I am afraid for layoffs. We've already seen layoffs in the CSUs, and we have potential layoffs here at Cal State LA," said Leda Ramos, a CSULA professor.
With the governor's budget proposal, the CSU system faces a nearly 8% cut to its general fund -- that's $375 million of state support.
RELATED: Cal State budget crisis could impact campuses statewide
Marcos Zamora, a part-time lecturer at CSULA, said he is afraid of losing his job.
"I am a part time lecturer here at Cal State LA, at the school of social work and technically (I'm) disposable. I don't have a full-time contract, so the layoffs are real for me at Cal States."
The CSU system is the nation's largest public 4-year university system - enrolling more than 460,000 students.
"I am concerned about ethnic studies. We are the second ethnic studies college in the nation. This is the heart of Cal State LA, also our women and gender and sexuality studies and latin american studies," said Ramos. "We will not be erased. So yes, we are concerned about budget cuts in that area too."
Students protesting fear the proposed budget cut could translate to cutbacks to classes and other resources.
"We come to school here so we can do better in the future, have better jobs, better security and we can't do that if you're cutting our budget and we can't take the classes that we have to take," said student Jai'la Paulette.
In a presentation, the finance committee addressed how CSUs have already tightened their belt; 1,430 course sections were eliminated in one year by seven universities between the fall of 2023 and 2024.
Students and faculty throughout CSU campuses statewide are uniting and calling their protest, which will take place over the next several days, a week of action.
Overall, the CSU is predicting a budget shortfall of $400-800 million next academic year.
