{"id":7258,"date":"2025-03-12T18:43:54","date_gmt":"2025-03-12T22:43:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/?p=7258"},"modified":"2025-03-12T18:43:54","modified_gmt":"2025-03-12T22:43:54","slug":"the-five-demands-what-can-hunter-students-learn-from-the-1969-uprising","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/2025\/03\/the-five-demands-what-can-hunter-students-learn-from-the-1969-uprising\/","title":{"rendered":"The Five Demands: What Can Hunter Students Learn From the 1969 Uprising?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Promotional
Promotional poster of The Five Demands screening event on the sixth floor of Hunter West. (Anastasiia Poleva) March 7, 2025.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Student Union room was lined with two rows of large, soft cushioned chairs as The Five Demands poster and description projected on the white screen. Usually, a comfortable movie experience would\u2019ve attracted a sizable crowd, but it was 6 p.m. on a Thursday (following a Wednesday schedule to make up for a lost day) and Hunter College was practically deserted. However, the small turnout didn\u2019t deter the Hunter chapter of the New York Public Research Group from continuing to encourage any passerby to stay for the screening, neither did it stop them from dimming the lights and pressing play on the movie.<\/p>\n

The Five Demands retells the events of April 1969, when a small group of Black and Puerto Rican students shut down the City College of New York for two weeks. Motivated by uprisings and protests throughout the country, the students occupied City College in an attempt to fight against institutionalized racism and demand City College\u2019s acceptance rate of Black and Puerto Rican students to reflect that of New York City\u2019s public high schools. The students came up with the five demands, a list of things the administration had to meet for the occupation to end. The demands included the creation of a separate school of Black and Puerto Rican studies and for all education majors to be required to learn Black and Puerto Rican history and Spanish language.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to show the historical nature of activism and how it relates to contemporary issues,\u201d said Alexander Pappas, an NYPIRG intern and a history major at Hunter, when asked about the decision to screen The Five Demands. As it turns out, this isn\u2019t NYPIRG\u2019s first, or last, showing of the documentary.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe feel that it is important to the DNA of our organization,\u201d said Zo\u00eb Vanrabenswaay, a project coordinator for NYPIRG at Hunter. \u201cIt\u2019s always important to stay vigilant, and I think that\u2019s part of the major lesson the students can take away from this. Your rights were fought for by the people before you, and you have the power to fight for them yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mirroring the events of April 1969, in April of last year, a pro-Palestine encampment movement sparked across college campuses nationwide, including City College. Students across the CUNY system came together to set up the Gaza Solidarity Encampment<\/a> on City College\u2019s quad. Drawing on the strategies of the previous takeover, the organizers created a new list of five demands: divest, boycott, solidarity, demilitarize and a people\u2019s CUNY. After five days, the encampment was shut down by NYPD. For the students involved, the aftermath was detrimental as they faced police brutality<\/a>, threats of expulsion, and even felony charges<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"A
A flyer detailing the five demands created by the Gaza Solidarity Encampment with a QR code to sign the petition. It\u2019s posted on the bulletin board of the Rockowitz Writing Center. (Anastasiia Poleva) March 7, 2025.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The screening of The Five Demands created an opportunity for students to learn their CUNY history and draw parallels between 1969, 2024 and now. Even though the uprising in 1969 caused major changes in City College\u2019s system, not many Hunter students know about it.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of what was in this movie was stuff I was unfamiliar with,\u201d said Justice Case, a music major at Hunter. \u201cI\u2019m really glad that [this movie] exists. People knowing about this stuff is really important. It gives a lot of perspective knowing the kind of position we\u2019re in now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like many college students, Case has struggled with wanting to drop out at certain points of his academic career, but knowing the history of how minority groups, specifically Black and Puerto Rican students, fought for their education makes him appreciative of his decision to stay. Even though marginalized groups still face roadblocks in higher education, learning about the movements that attempted to pave the way for equitable education can remind students that they are the facilitators of change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Five Demands details how a group of Black and Puerto Rican students took over City College to fight against institutionalized racism. Their takeover and a list of demands set the stage for the student activism of today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":160,"featured_media":7264,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[674,14,81,144,673],"class_list":["post-7258","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-gaza-solidarity-encampment","tag-hunter-college","tag-nypirg","tag-student-activism","tag-the-five-demands"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7258","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/160"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7258"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7258\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7283,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7258\/revisions\/7283"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7258"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7258"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brie.hunter.cuny.edu\/hunterathenian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}