Tuesday, April 30, 1996

Students First! slate has proven vision, experience ­ and results

By John Du

It's springtime. The birds are singing. The bees are buzzing away. Amidst the beautiful weather and chirping birds, though, a team of students called Students First! is campaigning hard for the Undergraduate Student Association Council elections to ensure that the council continues to put Students First!

Putting students first does not mean talking a big game without proven experience and proven results to show for it. It does not mean starting to care about issues only one month before student elections when you have been inactive all year long. Finally, it does not mean dividing the campus by attacking students of color and their issues while calling for a false sense of unity.

Putting Students First! means having proven experience. It means consistently fighting for students even when we are not running for office. It means being principled enough to take difficult stances without compromising our beliefs.

Putting Students First! means really working on relevant issues such as decreasing reg fees so students don't have to work 30 to 40 hours a week and mortgage our futures by taking out more loans. It means advocating for financial aid so that over 60 percent of UCLA students who receive financial aid can afford an education. It means fighting for affirmative action so that students who have suffered from historic and current discrimination will have a right to attend a university.

It means negotiating a $6 per hour student minimum wage to conform with new university guidelines which require that all financial aid recipients make at least $6 per hour in order to even be eligible for financial aid. It means fighting for lower prices by restructuring ASUCLA towards fiscal stability ­ not by firing student employees and cutting student services.

It means establishing more student services. It means defending the 5,000 UCLA students who are legal immigrants against proposed legislation which will deny them financial aid and fundamental human rights.

This year, the Students First! council has effectively fought to keep the doors of education open. Here are some of our successes. We:

* CREATED a campus-wide Booklending Program

* SAVED $700 per student by defeating two proposed fee hikes

* LOBBIED to restore $17 billion in financial aid

* PRESSURED regents to delay elimination of affirmative action

* DEVELOPED four new student-run outreach programs

* INCREASED funding for all student groups

* FOUGHT for flexible dorm meal plans, and

* IMPLEMENTED a Scholarship Resource Center at no extra cost to students.

These victories were achieved because Students First! was able to organize students and utilize our strength in numbers to hold administrators and decision-makers accountable to the needs of students.

The so-called "United Students," composed primarily of fraternity and sorority candidates, has run an incredibly venomous and dishonest hate campaign to smear these real victories. When people attack Students First!, they are attacking you, the student body, because the victories above were achieved by you ­ registering to vote, signing postcards, calling your regents and coming out to rallies.

Next year is going to be a very decisive year for students because it is a U.S. presidential election year. The fate of our reg fees, financial aid and our overall access to education is at stake. We need a student government that has experience in organizing students on a campus, state and national level. We need a student government that has a clearly articulated plan instead of just name-calling and empty rhetoric. We need a student government that will put Students First!

Du is a candidate for undergraduate president.