Happy New Year! Most colleges and universities won’t be back in session for another couple weeks, but the Fossil Free divestment campaign is already gearing up for a big semester.
We were blown away by this campaign’s early success. In just over a month of organizing, over 192 campuses joined the campaign. Unity College and Hampshire College paved the way by divesting their college funds. Students on dozens of campuses organized rallies, marches, teach-ins, and protests to build momentum for their divestment campaigns. The Mayor of Seattle committed to divesting city funds from the fossil fuel industry. And much, much more.
In 2013, we’ve got a few resolutions for the new year:
Expanding to new campuses: 192 campuses in the first month ain’t bad, but we’re not done yet. We’re looking forward to expanding to new colleges and universities across the country over the coming months.
Turning up the heat: Student groups across the country are busy putting together campaign plans to turn up the heat on their college administrations and boards of trustees to make sure they take divestment seriously. There are a number of divestment presentations already schedule for upcoming board meetings and institutions like Middlebury College are launching formal processes to look at divestment. We’ll make sure that even more schools start looking at divestment seriously this semester.
Moving off campus: Students as served as the vanguard for this campaign, but colleges and universities aren’t the only institutions that can divest their holdings from fossil fuels. Seattle has paved the way in showing how cities can divest, now it’s time for others to follow. This Spring, we’ll be working with volunteers across the country to move this campaign to the city and state level.
Getting the faith: Religious institutions played a key role in the anti-apartheid divestment movement and we’re eager to get the more involved in the fossil fuel divestment movement. Bill McKibben just published a piece in Christian Century about the fossil fuel divestment movement’s early stirrings in Christian congregations. Over the coming months, we’ll be partnering with people of all faiths to move divestment forward in their religious community.
That’s just a small sampling of what’s in store for 2013 (and that’s not even including this February 17th’s big mobilization against the Keystone XL pipeline). Let’s get to work!