My students can be a docile bunch. Simple questions get simpler answers, and complex questions yield 31 pairs of downcast eyes. Asking “What do you think?” is usually the most frustrating part of my day.

So I was pleasantly surprised on Wednesday when a student, who is usually talkative anyway, sought me out at a cafe near campus to tell me: “We went on strike today.”

All three of my undergraduate classes, 93 students total, staged a protest this week against the university’s plan to send its foreign language department to an auxiliary campus in Lushun, about an hour bus ride from the school’s current site on HeiShiJiao Street.

I should note here that no one from the English department has ever officially told me of this plan; I heard about it from students. When I asked the Foreign Affairs office, my liaison told me, “Maybe in September some departments will move.” He added that teachers would still live at the current campus, but they’d take a bus down to their classes. When I asked where his information came from, he said he too heard it all from students.

Whatever uncertainty exists in this plan, there was enough substance to spook my students into action. On Wednesday morning, they surrounded the administration building, and when the department heads walked out, they shouted at the administrators to let them stay in Dalian.

OK, so it wasn’t subtle or eloquent, and they’ll probably catch hell for it. But they won.

As one student, whose English name is Stream, put it: “We have struggled for this decision and we have succeeded.”

They argued, once things quieted down, that the university had told them nothing of moving to Lushun when they enrolled two years ago. The administration was effectively breaking a contract with them by relocating their department without consultation.

“Before we came to this university, we didn’t know we would move to another school, so we didn’t accept it,” Stream said.

It sounds like incoming students will still be sent south. Dalian Foreign Language University is already there, and Medical University is set to move in July. Students and teachers from both schools have been complaining for months.

There are two problems with Lushun: It’s 45 minutes from the main university area in Dalian, and probably 90 minutes or more from downtown. Getting there is tricky, and it’s not as developed as the main city.

It’s also restricted. Because there’s a naval base at the southern tip of the peninsula, foreigners risk detention or worse going down there. Friends of mine have been fined and delayed by going where they shouldn’t, entirely by accident. It’s a sketchy situation.

My friend Kerrilee visited the new Medical University site with some of her colleagues from that school. While there, they planted what she called “memorial trees to remember our foreign teachers.” There won’t be many next year.

For students, studying in Lushun means isolation from a growing and dynamic city. It means going downtown to shop or visit friends is now a day-trip.

“We just did it for ourselves, and for our department and students, for everyone,” Stream told me. “Everyone doesn’t want to move. That is so remote a place.”

This entry was posted on Friday, June 1st, 2007 at 6:04 pm and is filed under the Dalian life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.