Also in Varese, students and researchers on the roof of the university

“The Gelmini reform will destroy university research and education; if it’s approved, it will contribute to the economic and cultural decay of our country.”

As the university reform continues along its road to destruction in Parliament, and there are student and university protests in the many cities, in Varese, too, researchers and lecturers climbed onto the roof of the university to stop the “destruction of state education”.

The protest movement, which gathered at 10 a.m. in front of the entrance of the university in the Via Ravasi, climbed up the long flights of steps that lead to the roof of the building, where banners against the reform and poignant slogans were hung up, before curious onlookers in front of the Apollonio Theatre.

With safety helmets on their heads and a plaque commemorating the “demise” of the state university system, the demonstrators shouted their protests, from the roof of their university, against “the chronic under-funding of universities, the additional cuts of millions of euros, and the long years of job insecurity for those who devote their lives to research. The Government presents us with throwaway logic, so we protest.”

A delegation, led by the lecturer Marco Cosentino, went to meet the Chancellor, Renzo Dionigi to express the concerns of the academic world concerns officially. The Chancellor was given a letter from the national coordination committee of assistant lecturers, asking chancellors to threaten, and, if necessary, follow through with their resignations, if the university reform is approved.

The letter also asks the for the university to leave the CRUI (the Association of Italian University Chancellors), “because it had failed in its statutory task of representation and had become an instrument of government policy.”