UPR Student Strikes: The University as Battleground

The University of Puerto Rico is not just an educational institution — it is one of the most important political spaces in Puerto Rico's colonial history.

1948 Strike:
- Students struck against Law 53 (the Gag Law) that criminalized the Puerto Rican flag and independence advocacy
- The strike connected educational freedom to political freedom
- Students were arrested and expelled
- The 1948 strike established UPR as a site of anti-colonial resistance

1971 Strike:
- Students protested the presence of ROTC (Reserve Officers' Training Corps) on campus
- Connected the anti-Vietnam War movement to Puerto Rico's colonial condition
- Police entered the campus — Antonia Martínez Lagares, a young woman bystander, was killed by police
- Her death became a symbol of colonial violence against the independence movement

2005 Strike:
- FBI entered the UPR campus to arrest Filiberto Ojeda Ríos — leading to protests about federal law enforcement on Puerto Rican soil

2010-2011 Strike:
- The largest UPR strike in recent history, lasting approximately two months
- Students struck against a $800 special fee imposed to address the university's budget crisis
- The strike was about more than tuition — it was about the privatization and defunding of public education
- Police used tear gas and batons against students
- Faculty and community members supported the strike
- The strike achieved partial concessions but the broader defunding of UPR continued

2017 Strike:
- Students struck against PROMESA-mandated austerity cuts to UPR's budget
- The fiscal control board required the university to cut $300+ million
- Students argued that cutting public education was destroying Puerto Rico's future
- The strike connected university funding to the broader colonial economic crisis

Why UPR Matters:
The University of Puerto Rico is politically significant because:
1. Public university: As the island's flagship public university, UPR is where working and middle-class Puerto Ricans receive higher education — attacks on UPR are attacks on social mobility
2. Political space: The campus has been a space for political organizing, debate, and consciousness since its founding
3. Cultural institution: UPR has been a center for Puerto Rican cultural production — literature, art, music, and intellectual life
4. Colonial target: The fiscal control board's cuts to UPR represent colonial priorities — the colony invests less in educating its own people
5. Brain drain connection: UPR budget cuts drive faculty and graduates off the island — contributing to brain drain