The Free University of NYC

Save the dates and spread the word! Free University’s next two events:

SUBWAY SALON pt 2
Sunday, March 9, 2pm-4pm
West 4th Street Subway Station, middle level between A/C/E and B/D/F/M train platforms
RSVP/share here
topic: “How can we free transportation?”
We look forward to hybrid participation – including people who come to stay, and riders on their way somewhere. We will alternate between discussion, public writing (big and visible), and public drawing (big and visible).

PIRATE MUSEUM TOUR of the Lorraine Hansberry “Twice Militant” exhibit
Sunday, March 16, 2pm-4pm
Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway (2/3 train)
RSVP/share here
Come explore the letters and archives of Lorraine Hansberry–Black radical playwright of A Raisin in the Sun–to the lesbian periodical The Ladder. We’ll tour the exhibit on its closing day, and then hold an on-site dialogue at the museum.
More info on the exhibit can be found here and here.

Contact FreeUniversityNYC@gmail.com to get involved.

Join Free University as we create more meaningful direct contact around the city, starting with our first-ever SUBWAY SALON this Sunday, 2/23, 2-4pm.

Brief notes from our Saturday 2/15 mtg:

-G. from The People’s Record shared info on an upcoming project–“The People’s Manual”–with which Free U can collaborate by crowd-sourcing content. Manual editions will explore housing justice, education, militarization, policing, border imperialism, etc. More details as they develop…

-E. and S. are spear-heading our first “Subway Salon” this Sunday 2/23. This will be a “test run” for future subway salons on a range of themes. Please come out to support it!

-L. is spear-heading Free U “Pirate Museum Tours,” where we invite people/neighborhood groups to engage with NYC museums in pop-up radical education contexts. More details/initial proposals forthcoming.

We aim to focus on these projects throughout the Spring as we build an “Our Right to the City” theme and network of participants for the May Day Free University at Madison Square Park.

Upcoming dates to save:
– Sunday, 2/23, 2-4pm – First-ever Free U “subway salon,” West 4th station middle level
– Saturday, 3/1, 2-4pm – Free U coordination mtg, location TBA
– Sunday, 3/9, 2-4pm – Second Free U “subway salon,” West 4th station middle level (unless otherwise announced)

Heads-up! Free University is holding our next mtg tomorrow (Sat), Feb 15, 2pm-4pm, at 16 Beaver St, 4th floor, lower Manhattan. All welcome.

Please see the notes below from last weekend’s potluck/visioning session so we can jump into motion tomorrow.

Big gratitude for those who gathered today to share community and bright ideas. Our next Free University session will be Saturday, 2/15, @2pm (location to be determined). Please mark yr calendars.

Here are notes from today’s potluck + visioning session…

*lessons from our past work:
– make events/mtgs scheduling consistent
– create within our capacity
– playfulness is powerful!
– food/drinks are key organizing tools
– include short readings with event themes
– video-document for wider event lasting power

*winter Free U public spaces to consider:
– subway stations
– atriums
– museums

*event ideas:
– “subway station salons” – hold a “pop-up” dialogue in a station to engage with a wide array of New Yorkers on social issues. make it a performative, fun, short burst of political contact to spread the word about Free U. Goal: try hosting one at the end of February on “Our Right to the City”!
– museum tours – similar aim to transform a space with community dialogue (ex: Brooklyn Museum 1st Saturday).
– film screenings
– more “counter-classes”
– “Free coffee with Free University” tabling in public spaces – small-scale personable outreach
– good ol’ fashioned flash mobs!

*themes/potential collaborators:
– de Blasio’s election – what does it mean for building NYC power from below?
– learning about international movements (Brazil’s and Sweden’s mass fare-hopping actions
– people of color-led race, gender, and LGBTQI justice (Dream Defenders, Safe Outside the System)
– environmental justice – anti-fracking, XL pipeline, TPP (350.org)
– surveillance then and now – on COINTELPRO and PRISM
– linking east/west coast education & anti-militarization struggles (No 2 Napolitano @UC, Save City College of SF, anti-ROTC town halls)
– Our Right to the City – demanding universal school lunch, pre-K, affordable housing, food, open hospitals, transportation, etc.

Free University *Open House* people’s potluck
Sunday, February 9
11am-1pm
@Ya Ya Network Space
224 West 29th Street, 14th Floor
Manhattan, NYC

RSVP/share: https://www.facebook.com/events/269107623256460/

Calling all visionary students, rowdy teachers, rooted community members, lucid laborers, given and chosen families, wise elders, study/action circles, underground archivists, street griots, subway scholars, warrior poets, social reproducers, rank and file agitators, Dreamers, doers, documentarians, artists, scientists, lovers, healers, copwatchers, muralists, pluralists, and all others who wish to GET FREE TOGETHER…

Free University-NYC welcomes you to an *OPEN HOUSE* people’s potluck on Sunday, February 9, to explore education & action project ideas for 2014 and beyond. Bring friends, food, and fellowship.

For more info, contact FreeUniversityNYC@gmail.com

“Take Back CUNY!”
Friday, November 15th, 4pm-7pm
CUNY Graduate Center
365 Fifth Avenue at 34th St.
Room C201/C202 (basement level)

RSVP/share: https://www.facebook.com/events/599359933458885

Join CUNY students, faculty, staff, and community in a strategic dialogue and action plan to resist:
– militarization of CUNY with Petraeus, ROTC, research, and recruitment
– theft of student and community spaces like the Guillermo Morales/Assata Shakur Center
– repression of activism and dissent through the CUNY Board of Trustees “Policy on Expressive Activity” and arrests/suspensions/jail-time of CUNY student organizers
– turning colleges into corporations
– labor exploitation

Confirmed speakers: Sharmin Hossain (Ya-Ya Network), Luis Henriquez (Revolutionary Students Coordinating Committee), Glenn Petersen (Professional Staff Congress – Baruch College), Renate Bridenthal (Professional Staff Congress – International Committee)
Co-sponsors: CUNY Adjunct Project, Free University of NYC, New York Students Rising, PSC-CUNY International Committee, CCNY Students for Educational Rights, Revolutionary Students Coordinating Committee, and the Ya-Ya Network.

Please read this critical update on two suspended City College students, Khalil Vasquez and Tafadar “Taffy”  Sourov, who are now facing jail time and criminal charges. Emergency court support this Tuesday, 9am. http://revolutionarystudents.wordpress.com/2013/11/14/cuny-sends-students-to-jail-defend-khalil-and-taffy/.

Monday, November 25: ALL-OUT NYC mobilization
“Crash the CUNY Trustees Wedding”
RSVP/share: https://www.facebook.com/events/195672517284808

Free University “Counter-Class”:
Connections between Petraeus and Pathways

Monday, September 30, 6pm
Baruch College, outside Vertical Campus building
East 25th street between Lexington and 3rd ave
(trains: 6 to 23rd st, N/R to 23rd st)

Join the Free University for the **second** in a biweekly series of “Counter-Classes” to immediately follow General David Petraeus’s course, “Are We on the Threshold of the North American Decade?” We intend to counter his course with critical education of our own.

On Monday, September 30, we will have a 6pm counter-class outside Baruch College’s Vertical Campus building, after the CUNY Board of Trustees meeting. Our dialogue will explore the connections between the decision-making process and politics of hiring David Petraeus, the implementation of CUNY Pathways, and the administration’s disregard for student and faculty input in these and many other university decisions. We invite students, faculty, and staff to strategically unite and make our voices heard.

Preceding our event will be a Professional Staff Congress-led demonstration, 3:30pm-5:30pm outside Baruch College’s Vertical Campus, to protest the Board of Trustees meeting.

RSVP/share: https://www.facebook.com/events/619251184763869/

Stay connected:
FreeUniversityNYC.org
FreeUniversityNYC@gmail.com
facebook.com/FreeUniversityNYC

Free University “Counter-Class”
Monday, September 16, 6-8pm
67th Street and Central Park West entrance to Sheep Meadow
(trains: B/C to 72nd St, 1 to 66th St-Lincoln Center)

We look forward to joining you this Monday, September 16, to kick off our “Counter-Classes” series this semester. We will host a 6pm dialogue on the conflict in Syria, shifting plans for imperialist interventions, and how we can oppose U.S. empire abroad and the militarization of our schools at home. Anthony Alessandrini (Kingsborough Community College) and Rayya El Zein (City College of New York/CUNY Graduate Center) will offer opening remarks. The discussion will link thematic political education with strategies to connect, collaborate, and create ideas for future “counter-classes.” Because it may rain earlier in the day, bring a plastic bag or tarp to sit on the grass. Please spread the word with friends, classmates, colleagues, and comrades.

RSVP/share: https://www.facebook.com/events/236515316499307/2387351396106581

On September 9, General David Petraeus began teaching the course “Are We on the Threshold of the North American Decade?” at Macaulay Honors College/CUNY today as over 100 people gathered outside in vocal opposition. Later that afternoon, while leaving his class, Petraeus was verbally confronted by protestors who disinvited him from teaching at CUNY.

A new initiative by Free University-NYC now intends to counter Petraeus’s course with critical education of our own.

On Monday, September 16, Free University’s Fall 2013 “Counter-Classes” series will begin with a 6-8pm dialogue on the conflict in Syria, the possible U.S. military intervention, and how we can oppose imperialism abroad and the militarization of our schools at home. A 2:30pm demonstration outside Macaulay Honors College will precede our event.

Please RSVP and share.