As alumni of City University of New York (CUNY), we have always felt proud. CUNY is the largest public urban university system in the nation and boasts a population of majority Black and Brown students.

As students from working-class backgrounds, we saw CUNY as being more reflective of our city’s diverse demographics than the private and elite universities. The inherent diversity of our campus communities provided us with an invaluable education that went far beyond the syllabus – we learned from the realities and histories of our peers. At CUNY, we learned how to build community. We learned to organise. And we spent our time mobilising for Palestinian liberation.

Last month, students and workers set up a Gaza solidarity encampment, showing the true potential of CUNY to become a people’s university. Years after we graduated, we headed back to campus to help organise and witness this historic action.

The encampment presented five demands to the CUNY administration: divestment from companies and military contractors complicit in the Zionist genocide and occupation; boycott of academic institutions complicit in Zionist settler-colonialism; solidarity with the Palestinian national liberation struggle; demilitarisation of the campus; and a return to a fully funded, tuition-free people’s CUNY.

While the focus was on ending CUNY’s complicity in the genocide in Gaza, the encampment built a community based on solidarity and care. De-occupiers organised daily meals, an accessible food pantry, and a 24/7 medical tent in case of emergencies. Every day, the encampment offered political education, movie screenings, and activities for children.

The encampment also paid homage to the rich history of radical organising at CUNY and in Harlem. It drew on the legacy of our elders who mounted a similar occupation in 1969 to demand educational equity for Black and Puerto Rican students through their Five Demands. The students publicly renamed City College to the University of Harlem. In 2024, echoing this mobilisation, we also raised five demands and declared in a banner: “Harlem University: est. 1969, re-est. 2024”.

We also........

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