Obies protested the School of the Americas twice before.
			Saturday Concert to Benefit Oberlin SOA Watch; Obies to March on School of the Americas Next Weekend By Betty Gabrielli
	A 1999 alumna's account of last year's march against the School of the Americas: Sara Marcus was a senior when she wrote the article for the Oberlin Alumni Magazine.		NOVEMBER 12, 1999--Students will pack the Cat in the Cream Saturday night at 9 for a benefit concert to fund next weekend's protest at the U.S. Army School of the Americas (SOA). A variety of campus ensembles will perform at the benefit, including the Oberlin Can Consortium, Fuad Ahmad, The Connection, Jason Miles Goss, and Ilu Aiye. The program will include student poetry and a spoken-word group, The Word Orchestra. "The SOA benefit has always been a popular event," says concert-coordinator Brendan Cooney, a third-year double-degree student from Brookville, Indiana. "People really turn out for it. We invite a lot of different bands, and they attract all kinds of students." The November 19-22 demonstration--the third to have Oberlin participation--is expected to draw more than a thousand Ohioans and more than 10,000 protesters nationwide to demand the school in Fort Benning, Georgia, be closed. The national SOA Watch charges that many of the soldiers trained there have committed thousands of atrocities against civilians and human-rights workers in Latin America. Widespread Support Campus interest in the SOA movement is widespread. Besides the proceeds from the concert, the Oberlin contingent is being funded by grants, campus offices, T-shirt sales, and a raffle. A record number of Oberlin students--an estimated 60 to 70--have been attending weekly planning sessions. Jackie Downing, a sophomore from Topsfield, Massachusetts, and Laurel Paget-Seekins, a junior from Philo, California, are coordinating the trip as well as next semester's lobbying campaign as a joint project between the Oberlin Peace Activists League (OPAL) and La Alianza Latina. Over 110 Obies from more than 20 states and four foreign countries--more than double the number of Obies who went last year--plan to be highly visible at the protest. "We might be the largest student group there," says Downing, "and we'll be wearing T-shirts that read 'Oberlin Students Say Close the SOA' in English and Spanish." The students will depart next Friday for Georgia, where some will be joined at Fort Benning by parents and siblings who will take part. On Saturday, Downing, whom the national SOA Watch has asked to serve as the student spokesperson at the protest, will speak at a press conference. "I'm excited but really nervous," she says. High-Risk Action On Sunday, Downing says, "the Oberlin contingent will join thousands in a solemn funeral procession onto Fort Benning to remember the thousands who have died at the hands of SOA graduates." Downing, Paget-Seekins, and Kate Berrigan, a first-year student from Baltimore, Maryland, will be among a hundred activists from around the country taking part in a high-risk, nonviolent, nondestructive action at Fort Benning that could result in arrest and federal imprisonment. If convicted, they could face six months in prison and a $5000 fine. The students, who have the support of their families and professors in the action, are clear about why they are putting their personal freedom on the line. "The School of the Americas," say Downing and Paget-Seekins, "represents the role that the U.S. plays in human-rights abuses and injustice worldwide. And the SOA is something we can change; we can do something about it, because it's in our country--it's only 15 hours away. And it's something we can win. We're really close to closing it. "Our actions will send a clear message out to the American people, to our representatives, and to President Clinton: that it's not okay that our government uses our tax dollars to train people to murder, torture, commit atrocities. It's not okay at all. It doesn't matter how many nonviolent activists are sent to federal prison--the movement will continue to grow and strengthen until the SOA is closed."
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