The Progressive Student Network (PSN) was a national, multi-issue, progressive college student activist organization in the United States. It was founded at a conference in 1980 as a merger of the

Revolutionary Student Brigade The Revolutionary Communist Youth Brigade (RCYB) was the former youth group of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA. History The Attica Brigade was an anti-imperialist student organization in the United States in the early 1970s. It was initia ...

, the Midwest Coalition against Registration and the Draft (Mid-CARD), and the Student Coalition Against Nukes Nationwide (SCANN). The founding of the PSN commemorated the 10 year anniversary of the

National Guard National guard is the name used by a wide variety of current and historical uniformed organizations in different countries. The original National Guard was formed during the French Revolution around a cadre of defectors from the French Guards. ...

killing student anti-war protesters at

Kent State Kent State University (KSU) is a public research university in Kent, Ohio, United States. The university includes seven regional campuses in Northeast Ohio located in Ashtabula, Burton, East Liverpool, Jackson Township, New Philadelphia, ...

and

Jackson State Jackson State University (Jackson State or JSU) is a public historically black research university in Jackson, Mississippi. It is a member of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund and classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High research ac ...

in 1970. The PSN quickly grew and attracted many new progressive student activist groups motivated to protest against the shift to the right in U.S. politics when

Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...

was elected president in 1980. Through the 1980s and into the early 1990s the PSN worked on many issues including organizing against U.S. military intervention in the

Central America Central America is a subregion of North America. Its political boundaries are defined as bordering Mexico to the north, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest. Central America is usually ...

n countries of

Nicaragua Nicaragua, officially the Republic of Nicaragua, is the geographically largest Sovereign state, country in Central America, comprising . With a population of 7,142,529 as of 2024, it is the third-most populous country in Central America aft ...

and

El Salvador El Salvador, officially the Republic of El Salvador, is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south by the Pacific Ocean. El Salvador's capital and largest city is S ...

(the PSN supported the

Sandinistas The Sandinista National Liberation Front (, FSLN) is a socialist political party in Nicaragua. Its members are called Sandinistas () in both English and Spanish. The party is named after Augusto César Sandino, who led the Nicaraguan resistan ...

and the FMLN); organizing to kick the

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...

off university campuses; the movement against

apartheid Apartheid ( , especially South African English: , ; , ) was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. It was characterised by an ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

; organizing against the

ROTC The Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC; or ) is a group of college- and university-based officer-training programs for training commissioned officers of the United States Armed Forces. While ROTC graduate officers serve in all branches o ...

presence on college campuses; defending women's

reproductive rights Reproductive rights are legal rights and freedoms relating to human reproduction, reproduction and reproductive health that vary amongst countries around the world. The World Health Organization defines reproductive rights: Reproductive rights ...

; and others. PSN groups also led numerous struggles against instances of racism, sexism and homophobia that came up on their campuses. PSN organized a large conference in 1990 at

to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 1970

and

student killings.

''PSN News''

The PSN published a newspaper called ''PSN News'', which came out sporadically, but usually at least a couple times per semester. In the early years ''PSN News'' was published by the UMass Amherst Radical Student Union and the George Washington University Progressive Student Union.Progressive Student Union records, 1966-2008 -- Biographical/Historical note
/ref> Then for most of the 1980s it was published by the University of Iowa PSN chapter, ''New Wave''. In the 1990s it was published by the University of Wisconsin - Madison Progressive Student Network chapter.

References

External links

* Some history of the PSN was adapted from the documen

by Eric Odell, November 1997 * [https://groups.google.com/forum/#!searchin/misc.activism.progressive/$20$20$20$20$20$20$20$20$20$20$20$20$20Progressive$20Alliance$20ClearingHouse$20--$20Part$20II/misc.activism.progressive/lhbNxDNIfVg/bmBSTPLUi94J Progressive Alliance ClearingHouse -- Part II], 1992 re-post of 1989 proposal for Progressive Student Newspaper (PSN) Electronic Network (PSN-EN), by Harel

co-founder of internet's first moderated activism/politics usenet group (misc.activism.progressiv

founded March 1991)with appendix by Charlie Forcey, editor of Princeton's Progressive Review.
Archive of some PSN documents from the early 1990s

Progressive Student Network archive on Left Spot
{{authority control Political advocacy groups in the United States