*EMBARGOED RELEASE UNTIL: Monday, January 23th, 2012, 8:00 AM*

Contacts: OccupyUMB@gmail.com

Students Occupy the University of Massachusetts ± Boston in Solidarity with OccupyWall Street

*Monday, January 23rd, Students Occupy The Campus Center at The University of Massachusetts ± Boston*

The movement that began on Wall Street on September 17 has continued for over 5months to spread globally and brought people together to take part in direct democracy.Occupy UMass Boston moves to bring this conversation to the campus this springsemester. We seek to create an alternative to the prevailing corporate model of educationthat excludes students, faculty, and staff from the decision making process.

Occupy UMass Boston liberated the first floor atrium at the UMass Boston CampusCenter in Boston, today Monday, January 23 at 7 a.m., to begin an ongoing protest to provide a forum where students, staff, faculty, and members of the community can cometo a consensus on what concrete changes would provide quality, accessible education inBoston that is available to everyone in the 99%.

Occupy UMass Boston seizes this space in solidarity with #OccupyWallStreet,#OccupyBoston, Students Occupy Boston, as well as others across the globe, from Spain,to Egypt, Tunisia, the UK, and elsewhere, who stand in resistance against the attacks bythe 1% on working people.

Occupy UMass Boston is the beginning of an ongoing discussion about the problemswith America¶s public higher education system and how it has become less and lessaccessible to communities of the poor and minorities while simultaneously increasing thedichotomy between the haves and have-nots. We recognize that this divide is destructivenot just to our generation in this country but to the global community.