Students for Quality Education (SQE) is an organization at California State University, Stanislaus (Stan State) dedicated to the California Master Plan for Higher Education’s principles of an affordable, accessible and quality education for the California State University (CSU) System.
SQE and The California Faculty Association (CFA) have built a student and faculty alliance to work together to fight for affordable and quality education.
“There is power in numbers. When there is not enough education for students that directly affects the faculty, and vice versa. We are fighting with them, for them and for ourselves,” Raina Chelise said.
Chelise (senior, Communication Studies) is the CFA Student Organizer of the Stan State Chapter and the Chair of SQE. SQE has been absent on our campus for six years, so Chelise is developing and recreating the organization. 
“I think there is a lot of power in SQE because you are the voice of the student. The fact that there was no representation for six years, that is scary,” SQE secretary Jennifer Morales said.
SQE is fighting for a fully-funded CSU. Their argument is that education should be completely free. SQE would like to bring awareness to students about the two major problems that the CSU System is facing. First, the Governor and the State Legislature have been cutting funding to CSU because of the lack of accessible state funding. Second, because of the budget cuts, the CSU Chancellor and the Board of Trustees are reconstructing the CSU into a more exclusive university system.
In January 2016, the freeze on tuition will be over and tuition may rise. SQE invites students to come together and act to prevent this from happening.
“Our tuition has gone up, up, up. Over the past decade it has tripled. Our faculty, their salary has absolutely stayed the same,” Chelise said.
SQE emphasizes the fact that faculty working conditions are student learning conditions. When classes are cut, students cannot enroll in them and it can take them an extra year to graduate. As for the faculty, it means unemployment. Furthermore, when classes are impacted, the students are undereducated and faculty is overworked.
 “All of the power is in the students,” Morales said.
SQE will also be attending the CFA Rally “Fight for Five,” which will take place in Long Beach on Tuesday, Nov. 17. “Fight for Five” is the faculty’s demand for a 5% raise to be approved by the Board of Trustees.
SQE will be driving students and meeting up with other CSU campuses in Long Beach. Anyone who would like to be part of the fight is invited to attend.
SQE welcomes anyone who is interested in joining the organization. If you would like to be more informed you can attend their weekly meetings every Wednesday from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m at the Faculty Development Center in room 113. For more information, visit www.csusqe.org or contact Raina Chelise at [email protected].