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Reporting from Iran in the wake of the apparent theft of the presidential election is still extremely fragmentary, but it’s clear that there’s a tremendous amount of unrest, and that that unrest is in large part being led by students. Here’s what I’ve been able to glean about the situation so far this morning:
Hundreds of riot police have shut down the road to the dormitories at Tehran University, where student riots against the regime took place ten years ago. Violence has also been reported at Shahid Beheshti University. More than a hundred faculty members at Sharif University in Tehran have resigned in protest of the government’s actions regarding the election. University exams, scheduled for this weekend across Iran, have been postponed until next month.
Much of the most dramatic news on the Iranian situation is coming from Twitter. (English-language Twitter feeds from Iranian students include @change_for_iran and @tehranelection — I’ll add to this list as I can.) Many of these reports are unsourced and unverifiable, but a sample of results from a search on iranelection university gives a feel for what’s out there:
- @1luvfreedom Students at Univ of Tehran barricaded campus. Continue to hold the university against security forces’ violence. #iranelection
- @smileofcrash 180 teachers of Amir Kabir university resign for supporting people…Viva teachers:) #iranelection
- @Gita situation in tehran University is so worrisome. police have attacked to girls dormitory #tehran #iranelection
- @madyar: the students and people of ferdosiuniversity in mashhad have demonstration and they chant#IranElection #IranElections
Iranian students are taking to the streets to protest the apparent theft of their country’s presidential election by hard-line incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Iran’s students overwhelmingly supported challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi, and they are deeply distrustful of government results that show Ahmadinejad winning re-election in a landslide. In Tehran there are reports of police beating students with batons, and even of police and student demonstrators throwing rocks at one another.
It remains unclear what steps Mousavi will take next, and how the nation’s students will react as the situation develops — some believe that a meek response by Mousavi could further inflame student anger, creating further instability in the system.
More on this story as it develops.
3 pm update: It’s now midnight in Tehran. Very little solid news has emerged in the last few hours. There are reports that Iranian mobile phone service has been cut off, and that that internet access has been restricted or degraded. Time magazine has eyewitness reports of the fatal beating of a protester, and rumors that Mousavi has been placed under house arrest are circulating widely.
Teenage students at a school in Loughton, England staged a boycott of one of their classes this spring when they discovered that the classroom it was held in had been fitted out with video cameras.
The students at Davenant Foundation School discovered the cameras when they arrived in class one Monday morning — they had not been consulted on, or even informed of, their installation. Seventeen of eighteen students in the class walked out.
It took school administrators two weeks to address the students’ concerns, saying that the cameras had been installed for teacher training purposes and would not be activated without prior notice to the class. Later, however, students discovered that microphones in the room had been turned on. (They turned them off.)
Last week two of the protesters, Lela Clancy and Sam Goodman, published an opinion piece on their protest, and the public response to it, in The Guardian, one of Britain’s leading newspapers. It’s well worth reading.
(via Boing Boing)
A study of forty thousand American college students finds that gays, lesbians, and bisexuals are more likely to place importance on political activism than straights, and that gay and bisexual men are more likely to be involved with student organizations. (LGB students were also more likely to value participation in the arts.)
The study, which was just published in the Economics of Education Review, is only available publicly as a pricey ($31.50) download. The above info is from the article’s abstract, and if I can get library access to it, I’ll bring you more details.
A reminder: My panel at the NYC Grassroots Media Conference is tomorrow at 2:45 pm at Hunter College.
Here’s the panel description:
Student activists are constantly struggling to build community, and new media offer powerful tools for making that happen. Our workshop will explore the role of activist-produced media in creating news, transforming existing narratives, and empowering students in the university and the larger society. The panel will consider the role of alternative and mainstream media in recent organizing at CUNY, NYU and the New School, examine how activists can make effective use of Facebook, Twitter and other social media tools, and illuminate how educators can bring activist-produced video into the classroom.
Our lineup is going to include folks talking about the use of blogs, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube in student organizing, and our presenters are a mix of undergrads, grad students, and others. It’s going to be a great session, and if you make it out, be sure to come say hi afterwards.
The whole conference is looking great, and it’s ridiculously cheap, so if you’re going to be in NYC tomorrow and you’re not already booked, you should be sure to stop by.
Saturday morning update: Conference tweeting is at the #nycgm hashtag. A photo of me is up here, if you’d like to say hi.
studentactivism.net 
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