How you should have reacted to a strike?

Wing Man Lam
Section 1
Week 4

The Reading "A Tale of Two Campuses: Berkeley and Davis Respond to Occupy Movements" by Alan Markow was interesting. I learned the powerful of media from this reading. Through words, focus might be shifted. It all depended on which perspectives did the speakers or writers want the audiences to view. UC Davis administration published the damage and cost of the occupy student movement while UC Berkeley responded to the students that there were existing helps that eased middle class’s financial stress.

To me, these two response were distinct strategies. UC Davis administration intended to present the ideas that striking were not only ineffective but also cost more avoidable money to students and students’ parents. They hoped that students would stop doing so and get back to usual life. If this strategy had been successful, it would have saved a lot of money. However, it didn’t turn out what UC Davis administration had expected, and this action even brought the strike to the next level. On the other hand, UC Berkeley directly showed that they cared about students. The approach would cost some money but announcing solution plan immediately directly calmed protesters down.

No one knew what students and students’ parents would react. Therefore, I viewed UC Davis administration’s decision as a bet. If you lost the bet, you would have to pay the price of losing. In this case, UC Davis administration needed to face criticisms about not caring students. As we could see, the aftermath was quite nasty. I wondered if given UC Davis administration one more choice, would they have responded differently?

Questions: Did UC Davis administration announce something like UC Berkeley did at the end of this violent movement? Did students end up getting what they wanted?