University of Puerto Rico Student Strikes

The University of Puerto Rico (UPR) — the island's flagship public university system with 11 campuses — became a focal point for resistance to austerity and colonial fiscal policy through a series of student strikes.

2010-2011 Strike: In April 2010, students at the Río Piedras campus launched a strike protesting an $800 tuition increase (from approximately $1,600 to $2,400 per year) and $100 million in budget cuts. The strike lasted 62 days and spread to other campuses. Riot police were deployed; pepper spray and rubber bullets were used against students. Over 100 students were arrested. The strike ended with some concessions, but austerity continued.

2017 Strike: After PROMESA established the fiscal control board in 2016, the board proposed $450 million in cuts to the UPR budget — approximately 30% of the university's funding. Students launched another strike in March 2017, occupying buildings across multiple campuses. The strike lasted over two months.

Context: The UPR has historically been both the primary engine of social mobility for Puerto Ricans and a center of political activism. It was the birthplace of much of Puerto Rico's independence movement, and its students have been surveilled by the FBI and Puerto Rican intelligence services since the 1940s.

The austerity cuts to UPR were particularly devastating because they targeted the institution that enabled Puerto Ricans to rise out of poverty created by colonial economic policies. Between 2016 and 2021, the UPR lost approximately 30% of its funding and saw enrollment decline by over 20% — a direct consequence of fiscal control board-imposed austerity.

The student movements demonstrated that a new generation of Puerto Ricans was willing to resist the fiscal control board's authority, framing austerity as a continuation of colonial extraction.