On November 17, 1939, the Nazis executed nine Czech student leaders, sent 1200 more to concentration camps, and closed down all of Czechoslovakia’s colleges and universities indefinitely.
On November 17, 1973, the Greek junta staged a tank attack on Athens Polytechnic to put down an uprising by Athenian students against the regime. At least two dozen people died in the vicinity of the university that night.
Since 1941, November 17 has been celebrated as International Students Day, and on this International Students Day demonstrations are breaking out all over:
- I’ve been on Twitter this morning talking about the Occupy Wall Street actions.
- Italian students are rioting against education cuts in Milan.
- Some thirty thousand Greeks took to the streets of Athens in a march commemorating the anniversary of the 1973 attack.
- Protesters in Portland, Oregon were arrested early this morning after they occupied a local bridge. CNN video now showing a much larger group.
And later today students at some eighty American colleges and universities are planning student strikes and other actions.
I’ll have more in a bit.
studentactivism.net 
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