Student-Based Group Organizes Statewide to Ensure Equal Education
by Andrea Guerrero and Adam Murray, Students for Educational Opportunity

In the largest student-led, grass-roots effort in years, thousands of students across California have organized as Students for Educational Opportunity (SEO) and are gathering signatures to place the Equal Educational Opportunity Initiative (EEOI) on the November ballot.  Our initiative is designed to ensure all Californians equal access to education.  The initiative reads, "in order to provide equal opportunity, promote diversity, and combat discrimination in public education, the state may consider the economic background, race, sex ethnicity, and national origin of qualified individuals."

The EEOI is our response to efforts to dismantle programs designed to ensure equality of opportunity from kindergarten through college.  If California is to prosper in the next century, our schools must educate all of its children, and our graduates must reflect the diversity of our many communities.  Currently the Governor is attempting to dismantle enrichment programs designed to enhance the education of our neediest children.  These programs which provide K-12 students with the readiness, motivation, and technical skills needed to advance to higher education show how affirmative action benefits California.

At the college level, students have already felt the devastating effects of recent measures prohibiting affirmative action in public education.  The number of African-American, Latino, Native-American and Filipino students who were admitted and enrolled this past year fell by more than 850m at some of the University of California graduate and professional schools.  The effect of this drop was particularly evident at the UC San Diego and UC Irvine medical schools, which had no African-Americans in their entering classes, and at UC Berkeley's law school, which had only one African-American, no Native-Americans and no Filipinos in its entering class. In the UC undergraduate schools, the number of Latino and African-American students who will be admitted and enrolled In next year's class is projected to fall by as much as 70 percent.  As students, these drops jeopardize our education.  As Californians, these drops jeopardize our future.

The EEOI would reverse this trend by permitting schools to consider all aspects of an individual's background, including economic background and race, in order to meet the needs of every student in California.  While we need money and formal endorsements the most important thing we need now is signatures.  On January 28th, students at 30 schools began gathering the approximately 800,000 signatures we need by the end of April to place this initiative on the November ballot.  In order to gather this formidable number of signatures in a volunteer campaign, we are asking students and non-students alike to each volunteer 20 hours over the next 10 weeks.  If 400 groups each gather 2500 signatures (250 a week over the next 10 weeks) that would amount to 1 million signatures.

To find out how YOU can volunteer, make a donation or simply get more information, contact Students for Equal Opportunity at one of their three offices:  Berkeley (main office) - (510) 601-8405; Fresno (central California) - (209) 237-3736; San Juan Capistrano (southern California) - (714) 364-4370.  Email them at EEOI@aol.com, or visit their website at http://www.hotbed.com.