If We Fight, We Can Win! Where Next in the Struggle to Save Vermont’s State Colleges?

Chancellor Jeb Spaulding thought he could get away with closing three of Vermont’s six state colleges. His proposal would have had a devastating impact on working class people; it would have slashed hundreds of jobs from the state colleges, destroyed the economies of whole sections of the state, especially the Northeast Kingdom, and foreclosed opportunities for young people to get education for skilled high paying jobs like nursing.

But professors, staff, and the communities that depend on the colleges rose up and stopped Spaulding in his tracks. Over 37,000 people signed a petition demanding that the proposal be withdrawn, thousands called their state legislators, and hundreds of cars turned out to a massive parade that shut down Montpelier in a concert of honking horns. Faced with this outpouring of anger, the proposed vote was delayed and then withdrawn in a humiliating setback for Spaulding.

The working class of Vermont has scored an initial victory against a tidal wave of austerity measures that Governor Phil Scott is threatening. But no one should be under any illusions that the state colleges are safe; the Governor made clear that he wants the legislature to pass a budget with devastating cuts to our public institutions.

The movement spearheaded by unions, students, and communities must prepare for the next phase of the struggle. We should demand that the state fully fund public education at all levels, using money from the federal bailout, cuts in corporate welfare, and taxes on the rich.

We must reject the entire case that Spaulding and the Governor are making that they have no alternative but to cut education spending given the budgetary constraints imposed on them by the coronavirus and recession. In reality, this is a manufactured crisis, and one that can be easily solved.

It is the product of several decades of neoliberal cuts to public funding of education. The Democrats and Republicans have level-funded state appropriations for higher education for decades, dropping Vermont from 3rd in per capita spending in the country in 1989 to 49th today. Both parties are responsible for setting the state colleges up to fail amidst this crisis.

While we have stopped the closures for now, it is clear that the Governor is still determined to force through cuts, and we must be prepared to mobilize again to stop him. In these efforts, we must not fall for any of the Governor’s tricks. One that he floated is pitting state colleges against K through 12 education, saying that if we cannot pay for both, we have to cut one.

We know that he’s been angling to slash funding for primary and secondary education as part of his plan for school consolidation. We must reject Scott’s divide and rule tactic; working class people should have the right to high quality education with well-paid union teachers and staff from pre-kindergarten through college.

There is plenty of money to pay for all of this. It is merely a question of priorities. If the federal government can bailout the big corporations and banks with trillions of dollars, it and the state can find the money to meet Vermont workers’ need for education.

We should demand that the Governor and legislature generate the money in the following ways. First, they should take $25 million from $1.25 billion from Washington to cover the immediate shortfall in funding for the state colleges. Second, they should raise taxes on the rich, which they have cut for decades, to bankroll education for the future.

And, third, if they have to cut anything, they should cut corporate welfare schemes like the Remote Worker Program, Vermont Training Program, and the Vermont Employment Growth Incentive. However rhetorically innocuous in name, these programs are frankly just giveaways to the bosses and rich.

It will take a fight to win these demands, because they challenge the neoliberal logic accepted by most of the political class in Montpelier and Washington. Save for a few exceptions like Progressive Lieutenant Governor David Zuckerman and Progressive Senator Anthony Pollina, and members of the Vermont Worker’s Caucus, most of the politicians, Democrats and Republicans alike, were slow to respond and only agreed to delay and then withdraw the proposed cuts, when the petitions, calls, and car protest forced them to.

But if we stay united, if we reject Governors divide and conquer strategy, if we maintain pressure on our elected officials through a diversity of tactics, we can win. We must build on our initial victory of stopping the closures and intensify our organizing, mobilizing, and protesting until we have secured education at every level as fully funded public right for all working class people.