Tucson students step up their protests of ethnic studies elimination

[marmar]

from AlterNet:



As the nation watches the Tucson Unified School District’s spiral into disarray, hundreds of students have walked out of their Tucson schools today in a coordinated protest against the banishment of the district’s acclaimed Mexican American Studies program.

Pouring into the downtown Tucson area from Pueblo, Cholla and Tucson high schools, among other institutions, the students brought their march to the offices of floundering Tucson Unified School District (TUSD) administrators. In recent days, administrators and board members have issued a series of conflicting andinaccurate statements and carried out the extreme actions of confiscating booksin front of children. Last week, a recently hired assistant superintendent from Texas made a troubing call for the deeply rooted Tucson students–many of whom trace their ancestors to the town founders– to “go to Mexico” to study their history.

Supporters of the Ethnic Studies/Mexican American Studies program, which wasterminated indefinitely on January 10th by the school board, launched walkouts last week and have vowed to step up their actions for a large-scale walkout, teach-in and launch of a “School of Ethnic Studies” on Tuesday, January 24th.

In a district with over 60 percent of the students coming from Mexican American backgrounds, the TUSD board “dismantled its Mexican-American studies program, packed away its offending books, shuttled its students into other classes,” according to an editorial in the New York Times on Sunday, because “it was blackmailed into doing so.” .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/766182/students_step_up_tucson_walkouts%3A_protest_mexican_american_studies_banishment/