PRESS RELEASE
WHO: Movimiento Estudiantíl Chicanx de
Aztlan (M.E.Ch.A.)
WHAT: Press Conference & Action re:
Ethnic Studies on Anniversary of East LA Walkouts
WHERE: SE Corner of Campbell & Central
Ave (in front of PUHSD Offices), Phoenix
WHEN: Thursday, March 7, 5 pm
WHY: To demand M.E.Ch.A.’s full
inclusion in PUHSD’s Ethnic Studies development
CONTACT: Rafael Reyes (480/518-5500)
On March 6, 1968, students from
East LA high schools began walking out of classrooms to demand a better
education. In part, students were asking
for Chicano Studies classes to be instituted into the district’s
curriculum. By week’s end, over 20,000
Chicana/o students were part of this mass-mobilization at the height of the
Civil Rights Movement.
It was the different Chicana/o
student organizations who facilitated the walkouts, and a year later, regenerated
into the birth of M.E.Ch.A. (Movimiento Estudiantíl Chicano de Aztlan/Chicano
Student Movement of Aztlan). The
walkouts were an unqualified success, as evidenced by the countless number of
M.E.Ch.A. chapters still active to this day, as well as the numerous Chicano
Studies classes, departments, and college degree programs being offered. Of
special note was Tucson Unified School District’s Mexican American Studies
Program, a nationally-renowned program but since banned due to Arizona’s House
Bill 2281 in 2010. In 2017, a federal
judge found that racism was the cause of the Ethnic Studies ban.
On March 12, 2012, the Nahuacalli
Educators Alliance presented a letter to then Arizona State Superintendent of
Public Instruction John Huppenthal, demanding that the United Nations
Preliminary Study on the Doctrine of Discovery be implemented by the Arizona
Department of Education into all levels of its services. This is especially relevant to M.E.Ch.A.’s
demands of PUHSD, with the board’s recent adoption of an Indigenous Peoples Day
at its October meeting.
Fast forward to March 7, 2019, 51
years after the aforementioned student-led movement, Phoenix Union High School
District does not offer Chicano Studies classes, or even broader Ethnic Studies
classes. This is a crisis, in a district with an 84% indigenous student
population (81.7% “Hispanic”, 2.4% “Native American”). This, in a time when research confirms that
students who enroll in Ethnic Studies courses out-perform students who don’t,
and enroll in post-secondary schooling at a higher rate than their peers. Although
the district has begun a process to implement Ethnic Studies, it has failed to
include M.E.Ch.A. as part of its development.
Therefore, on this day, M.E.Ch.A. students, teachers, parents, and
community stakeholders will gather in front of the PUHSD’s offices on Thursday,
March 7, 2019, to conduct a press conference & rally before attending the
PUHSD School Board meeting at 6:30 this same evening. Both at the press conference and at the
school board meeting, M.E.Ch.A. will read a statement that explains and
elaborates on our actions and demands.
###
No comments:
Post a Comment