The “Day of Action” was organized by a new statewide student group, New Jersey United Students, which held similar rallies at public universities throughout the state.
“The common theme is the budget cuts at the national and state levels,” senior Nicole Buffington, a member of NJUS, said in an interview. “Over 70 percent of Rutgers students are on financial aid.”
Buffington said students are pushing to have a greater role in Trenton
“What we really want is to have two student representatives work with the state legislators on the higher education committee,” she said. “Right now, students don’t have a voice. We think that’s unfair. We can think critically, we can help come up with solutions that go way beyond just identifying problems.”
Junior Matthew Cordeiro, also an NJUS member, said the cuts to education reflect a deeper crisis over values.
“There is a big crisis in priorities at the national level and at the state level,” Cordeiro said in an interview. “At the national level, we’re spending $3 trillion going to war, while at the state level, we spend money building up a prison system in which the cost of incarcerating a single prisoner is nearly enough to fund the tuition for three Rutgers University students.”
The speakers included Rutgers University Student Assembly President Yousef J. Saleh, who gave a rousing speech that urged students “not just to walk but to leap into action.”
Another speaker, sophomore John Connelly, said the rally continued a long tradition of social activism among Rutgers students.
“If you walk the banks of the Raritan, you are walking in the footsteps of rebels; and thank God for that!”