Accomplishments
Here are a few of our accomplishments from this last year.
Over the course of this year our agenda was packed with public interest campaigns. We're proud of our victories, but more than that, we're as energized and determined as we've ever been to take on serious problems, to push for common sense solutions, and to work with you, our supporters, friends, and allies, toward positive change.
Hunger and Homelessness: We are facing one of the worst economic crises since the Great Depression. Unemployment rates keep going higher and more people are forced into poverty every day. This spring we joined the national Hunger Cleanup, Through our annual Hunger Cleanup 50 students from the Newark campus joined 5,000 students across the country for a day of service in our communities. Together, we raised also raised $3,000 for the Newark Covenant House, Oxfam’s Haiti Relief and national efforts to combat poverty.
More Affordable Higher Education:
In March, President Obama signed the largest student loan bill in history into law. The new law increases financial aid for students by $36 billion, and it won't cost taxpayers a dime because it's funded by cutting wasteful hand-outs to banks and loan companies like Sallie Mae and Citibank. Across the country 10,000 of you called, wrote, emailed, and tweeted your Congressmen asking them to take action. In addition, our DC staff worked tirelessly to bring your message to legislators and their staff.
Global Warming: Building support for global warming solutions.
We're calling on the Senate to build a clean energy economy that will create jobs and enhance America’s national security while protecting the environment. Across the country, we mobilized over 30,000 students and community members to contact their Senators to call for clean, renewable energy and an end to our dependence on oil and coal. We held events on campus and off to educate thousands of people, resulting in more than 100 news stories about our work.
Reforming
the health care system in order to make health care affordable.
Despite hundreds of millions
of dollars spent by the insurance industry to stop reform, health insurance
reform became law. Our priority has been to make
health care affordable. This
law takes unprecedented steps to lower costs for families and small businesses,
and it prohibits insurers from using pre-existing conditions, errors on forms,
and lifetime or yearly caps to drop your coverage or price it out of reach. It
also helps young adults – a highly uninsured demographic - by allowing them to
stay on their parents’ coverage until age 26. Here at Rutgers Newark we held a Health Care Forum to educate students on the campus about the realities of reform. We also collected over 200 petition signatures from students that wanted more affordable Health Care