CU Students from All Four Campuses Call for Regents to Divest from Fossil Fuels

Today North Carolina’s Brevard College announced that the school will divest from the fossil fuel industry by 2018. The institution is the first in North Carolina and in the entire Southeast to do so. They join a long line of educational institutions, pension funds, religious institutions and in the case of the United Kingdom, political parties that are moving away from investments in the fossil fuel industry.

Locally, Naropa University divested its holdings in 2013 from what they said were investments that were “causing harm.” At the time, the move included current investments in companies causing greenhouse gas emissions but also included future investments in the fossil fuel industry.

Stanford University announced its commitment to divest from coal in May of 2014 and is receiving further nudging from its student activists under the banner Fossil Free Stanford, as well as from its faculty body to divest from all fossil fuels.

Fossil Free CU from all University of Colorado campuses has been growing in numbers and in creativity for nonviolent direct actions. On February 20, 2015, the group confronted the Board of Regents for an answer to the question, “Whose side are you on?” Indeed, twice during the meeting they posed the question to Regent Steve Bosley, the head of the Investments Advisory Committee who refused to answer.

The students shared with KGNU that they intend to step up their actions during the Spring semester and of course, we will continue to follow this issue.

The following piece includes highlights from what happened before, during, and after the students’ meeting with the Board of Regents.