High school student federations in Chile went on a national strike this week to demand free services and better conditions in universities.

Student leader Laura Ortiz said students would mobilize in different ways, particularly by peacefully occupying about 50 schools.

The radicalization of the massive protests is seen in Chile as the beginning of a “New Penguin Revolution”, in allusion to the student movement of 2006, which had similar demands of less privatization, a free, year-long National Student Card, and improvements to universities.

This time, students are also advocating the repair of university facilities damaged by the February 2010 earthquake in Chile.

Correspondingly, university student federations continued mobilizing to protest Chilean institutions and the national economic, political and social model, and expressed support for a nationwide general strike called for Thursday in defense of public education.

In fact, a dozen universities were practically shut down already, including the University of Chile, the University of Santiago, the Metropolitan University of Educational Sciences, the Tecnologica Metropolitana, the Federico Santa María in Concepcion, and the Los Lagos in Puerto Montt.

“Education is a right and it is not guaranteed as such in Chile; instead, it is a service for which we have to pay and therefore go into debt,” said Camila Vallejo, president of the student federation at the University of Chile.

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