Blog 8

1. The connections is Reed making between the 1978-1992 “retrenchment period” at CUNY and the Covid-19 pandemic has a lot to do with death which was mentioned a lot. Things were not good at all during what is known as the “retrenchment period” because free education was no longer something people would look forward to. “We cannot accept the death of this great, free University because we cannot accept the death of the spirit, the death of aspirations, the death of the future, that will surely follow for our children, the students”. Like this was a sudden change to what was once a free way to receive collegiate education and this changed all the students lives as well. With COVID-19 being the cause of many deaths, this is how Reed would connect the two since CUNY would bring many deaths to student’s futures.
2.  The suggestion that Reed makes for both anti-racist and anti-austerity groups at CUNY is that they take all of the demands at each colleges have then they could come together and resolve it as a whole. “If these ten demands were combined with the demands of Brooklyn College’s Anti-Racist Coalition, CUNY Law, Hunter, Lehman, and beyond (as the Brooklyn PSC chapter suggests), then we could activate them altogether instead of continuing to silo them as “racial justice” or “economic justice” issues respectively”.
3.  Reed used the term “death cult” to show to the readers how all the change in CUNY have really made it unoticeable. It reminds of how the many examples of neoliberalism since there are so many ways the city tries to make itself new. Due to this dealth cult, it made CUNY impossible for students who come from minority communities to afford it. This dealth cult showed how neoliberalism destroyed what was once great to so many people.

CUNY Dream