Free School University (FSU)

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Free School University (FSU) is a learning community of Occupy Boston. Topics vary from fun-and-games to politics and revolution. Our goal is to form an autonomous zone to entertain educate and enliven Occupiers and the general public, and to share skills needed to maintain it. The FSU has provided support and created the space for skill sharing, self-organization, teaching, and more than 150 learning opportunities so far. 

FSU Working Group Meetings take place every Friday from 5:30 - 7:30pm at the Harvest Food Coop Community Room (581 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge - near Central Square T stop). Note: We do not meet in the cafe. Go all the way to the rear of the store, behind the display case and up the stairs. The conference room will be on your left. It is not handicap accessible. Please let us know if this is a problem for you.

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To schedule a teach-in, please submit the following information to fsu@occupyboston.org. If you know the exact date and time and have all of the information below ready, please include POST: (date / time) in the Subject of your email. After everything is confirmed, you can use the Occupy Boston Event Submission Form to expedite posting to the occupyboston.org event calendar.

  • Date & Time
  • Location
  • Title & Brief Description
  • Short Biography
  • Working Group Association
  • Sponsors (if any)

For general inquiries or to join the FSU Working Group, please email: fsu@occupyboston.org.

 RESOURCES                                                                                                   

Free School University

Working Group Information

  • Working Group, register and login to participate. You do not have to login to view the FSU files on our working groups page.
  • List Serve, sign up for our working group's email list
  • Living Agenda for upcoming FSU Working Group meetings
  • Wiki Talk Page, space to share ideas for building this wiki page and FSU generally

Meeting Notes

October - November 2011  December 23, 2011
December 2, 2011 December 26, 2011 February 3, 2012
December 7, 2011 January 6, 2012 February 17, 2012
December 16, 2011 January 20, 2012 February 24, 2012






The Howard Zinn Memorial Lecture Series


 CURRENT TEACH-INS                                                                               

After Dewey Sq: Where is The Occupy Movement Going in MA?

Sunday, March 4, 2012 (1:30-3:30pm) @ The Democracy Center, 45 Mt Auburn St, Cambridge (Central Square): This panel is sponsored by the Boston local of Democratic Socialists of America; cosponsored by Free School University working group (Occupy Boston). The event is free and open to the public. Non-members are welcome. There will be a brief business meeting before the panel discussion during which Boston DSA members will elect a new Executive Board. David Knuttunen of Occupy Newton, Occupy Boston Free School University, and Boston DSA will moderate. Panelists include Chris Faraone, Katie Gradowski, and Betsy Boggia. 

Chris Faraone began his writing career by free-lancing Hip Hop reviews for such publications as Yellow Rat Bastard, The Source, the Weekly Dig and the Boston Herald before becoming a staff reporter for the Boston Phoenix,where his coverage of the Occupy movement on both coasts resulted in his debut book---99 Nights With The 99%. Katie Gradowski is an organizer with Occupy Boston, where she focuses on outreach and anti-foreclosure work as well as the Occupy The T campaign. Her “real job” is in Somerville, where she helps run a kid’s community science workshop and “spends time making things, tinkering, and taking stuff apart." Betsy Boggia has helped establish Occupy Natick. She also  has long experience with  grassroots organizations, political campaigns, local non-profits  (most recently with Girl’s LEAP Self-Defense), has been a legislative aide for State Senator Cheryl Jacques, and a co-founder of the Greater Boston Chapter of the Million Mom March for sensible gun control.

FSU-RADIO

FSU-RADIO is an educational series by the Free School University at Occupy Boston that streams live on OB Radio every Wednesday night at 7pm. Our goal is to maintain an autonomous zone to entertain educate and enliven Occupiers and the general public. Our purpose is to provide support and space for skill sharing and sharing basic info regarding Occupy Boston and to encourage self-organization, teaching, and learning opportunities.Call 617-506-9726 with questions or comments during the show, or join the IRC chat at occupyboston.org/radio.

Lester Lee

Wednesday, February 29, 2012: With historian Lester Lee.

Randy Albelda

Wednesday, March 7, 2012: On the day before International Women’s Day, our guest will be feminist economist Randy Albelda (PhD), Professor of Economics at University of Massachusetts-Boston, who will be discussing women and poverty (and what we need to do about it).

Gordon Fellman

Wednesday, March 14, 2012:  Gordon Fellman (PhD), Professor of Sociology at Brandeis, will be talking with us about Marxism and its ongoing relevance to understanding how Occupy helps clarify the meaning of central Marxian concepts like alienation, ruling ideas, false consciousness, genuine consciousness, and social class. He will reason that one's understanding of Occupy is greatly enhanced by applying Marx to it.

Left Forum

Occupy Consciousness: Meszaros’ Toolbox

Saturday, March 10, 2012 (10am, in the the Community Room at Harvest Co-Op in Central Square, 581 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA): Doug Enaa Greene (Occupy Boston activist, member of the Kasama Project), Irv Kurki (coordinator for essential discussions on advanced theory), and Mario Rendon (American Institute of Psychoanalysis) will offer their reflections on Istvan Meszaros' latest work and relate it to the current situation.

The presenters contend that the American mind is stocked with the categories, symbols, and rules of the 1 percent, and that it is absolutely necessary to start discarding and restocking with the relevant structures of the 99 percent. Seating is limited, please RSVP to (617) 731-8725 or email ikurki2@verizon.net. This panel is sponsored by the Monthly Review.

Radical Theory in Social Change: The Work of Michael Lebowitz

Sunday, March 11, 2012 (1pm, in the the Community Room at Harvest Co-Op in Central Square, 581 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA): Chair Irv Kurki (coordinator for essential discussions on advanced theory) and speakers Amy Hendrickson (activist with Brookline Peaceworks, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, and Boston Stop the War) and Jim Barton (independent scholar and co-author of Thinking on Paper and Thinking Together) will discuss the separation of radical theory from practical struggles as a weakness that can be overcome.

Michael Lebowitz's recent work (Build It Now: Socialism for the 21st Century) elucidate the powerful potential of integrating radical theory and practice as in the trasformative struggles in revolutionary Venezuela. The speakers will illustrate universal lessons in Lebowitz's work and discuss possible applications. Seating is limited, please RSVP to (617) 731-8725 or email ikurki2@verizon.net. This panel is sponsored by the Monthly Review.
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Peace & Justice Forum

OBRadio: Veterans for Peace

This weekly radio broadcast organized by members of the Smedley D. Butler Brigade of Veterans For Peace streams live on OB Radio every Monday night at 6:00pm. Call 617-506-9726 with questions or comments during the show, or join the IRC chat at occupyboston.org/radio.

Monday, March 5, 2012 (6:00pm): Hosted by Bob Funke, member of the Peace Action Working Group at Occupy Boston and Vietnam Veteran For Peace. Veterans For Peace is a non-profit educational and humanitarian organization dedicated to the abolishment of war employing the motto "De Oppresso Liber" (Liberate the Oppressed).

The Howard Zinn Memorial Lecture Series

From the Organizers of The Howard Zinn Memorial Lecture Series: We, as citizens, academics, and members of the 99%, would like to contribute to the conversation taking place at Occupy Boston about how to make a better, more equitable world for all of us. In the radical and participatory spirit of Occupy Boston and similar radical movements of the past, we see our role, as Giovanni Arrighi once argued, as helping the movement to develop its "own autonomy through an understanding of the broader processes, both national and global, in which their struggles [are] taking place" (The Winding Paths of Capital, New Left Review, Mar-Apr 2009). 

We wish to participate in the movement not from a position of authority, but one of mutual dialogue. While people know their situation much better than we ever will, as academics we are better positioned "to understand the wider context in which it develops" (Ibid). For this reason we have created a series of lectures in which academics lead a dialogue with Occupy Boston participants on issues of economic, political, and social justice. We call these lectures The Howard Zinn Memorial Lecture Series at Occupy Boston in honor of the late, great Boston Historian. More programming to be announced! For an archive of past lectures, click here. 

Carl Finamore: On the Egyptian Revolution

Friday, March 23, 2012 (6:00pm - 8:00pm, Encuentro 5, 33 Harrison Ave, 5th Floor, Boston): Carl Finamore was a first-hand witness to the Egyptian Revolution last year that toppled Hosni Mubarak. Finamore has been back several times to Egypt and will speak on the dynamics and impact of the Revolution.

OCCUPYfilm: Occupied Peoples | People's Occupations

This FREE series of films and discussions presented by the organizers of The Howard Zinn Memorial Lecture Series will take place at the Community Church of Boston (tentatively) every Thursday nights at 7:30pm through Thursday, May 10, 2012. This series is being organized with the intent to shed historical and social light on our current situation, by bringing people together to reflect on past and present people's struggles, in particular those struggles which are most often buried in the mainstream historical narrative. Check back soon for more details! More films to be announced. For a list of past films, click here.

Community Gathering | Peace & Economic Justice

Monday, April 9, 2012 (6:00pm): Occupy Boston Community Gatherings are held weekly on Monday evenings at St Paul's Cathedral on Tremont Street, from 6:00 to 8:30 PM. The first half hour of the Community Gatherings are set aside for socializing or mini working group meetings. Free School University will host a Community Gathering based on the theme of Peace and Economic Justice and will include educational programming. Programming is to be determined, and anyone interested in helping to build the event is welcome to attend our Working Group meetings on Fridays from 5:30pm to 7:00pm at the Harvest Co-Op in Central Square.


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 ARCHIVES                                                                                                      

Past Teach-Ins

Since our first teach-in on October 7, 2011, the Occupy Boston Free School University has created the space for more than 150 teach-ins! For a complete list of past teach-ins, click here. 

Video Archive

To access our video archive, including nearly 40 videos of our past teach-ins, click here. If you have video you would like us to add to the archive or links to coverage of FSU events in the news, please email them to us at fsu@occupyboston.org.

News Media Archive




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