Friday, February 10, 2012
6:00PM
Arts and Letters Building, Room 101
Hosted by: Delores Fisher, Lecturer, Africana Studies
Meet the founders and directors. Hear about their creative process. Participate in a discussion of San Diego theater arts for people of color.
Bear Arts Foundation is a national cross-cultural arts service organization committed to encourage, nurture, and strengthen the creation and production of new work in the theatre by artists of color.
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KEYNOTE SPEAKER: SYLVIA MENDEZ
“The case of Méndez v. Westminster and the Desegregation of Public Education”
11 AM TUESDAY, MARCH 6 ROOM: H-117/118
Sylvia Méndez is the oldest daughter of Gonzalo Méndez, a Mexican immigrant, and Felicitas Méndez, a Puerto Rican, who fought so she and her brothers could have equal education through the case of Méndez et al v. Westminster et al. Ms. Méndez continues the legacy left by her parents to campaign for education. Ms. Méndez was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United States’ highest civilian honor, on February 15, 2011. The Annual Gracia Molina de Pick Feminist Lecture Series honors the founder of the San Diego Mesa College Chicano Studies Department and recognizes her life-long commitment to education, feminism, and dedication to the mission of the community college.
Organized by the Chicano Studies Department
Co-sponsored by:
San Diego Mesa College Humanities Institute and
Chicano Latino Heritage Celebration Committee
For more information:
César López, Ph.D.
Chair and Associate Professor
Chicana and Chicano Studies Department
San Diego Mesa College
7250 Mesa College Drive
San Diego, CA 92111-4998
(619) 388-2368
celopez@sdccd.edu
http://www.sdmesa.edu/chicano-studies
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By Jeff Biggers
Common Dreams
January 24, 2012
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/01/24-2
As the nation watches the Tucson Unified School District’s spiral into disarray, hundreds of students walked out of their Tucson schools Monday 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 and inaccurate statements and carried out the extreme actions of confiscating books in 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.
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.”
The New York Times referred to the extremist measures of Arizona state superintendent of public instruction John Huppenthal on January 10th, who threatened to withhold millions of dollars if TUSD didn’t terminate the nationally acclaimed program immediately.
As her Tucson school district prepares to celebrate the 140th anniversary of its founding by Mexican American immigrant Estevan Ochoa, Cholla High School student Ahtziri Iñiguez noted that she was following the march in the footsteps of
her brother, a graduate of the Mexican American Studies Program.
“I think it’s very unfair that people here don’t let us learn about our own culture,” she said. “My brother took (Mexican American Studies) classes his junior year and he would go home and discuss with my Mom and interested me in education,
so I knew I wanted to take these classes.”
Less than two months away from the anniversary celebration of Arizona native and United Farm Worker leader Cesar Chavez, Iñiguez added: “We did this walk out to prove if you want something you should fight for what you believe in, because if you don’t do anything, nothing will change.”
Known as the “Sheriff Arpaio of Ethnic Studies,” Arizona education chief John Huppenthal defended his campaign slogan to “stop la raza” in an extraordinary Democracy Now debate on TV last week. The Tea Party activist Huppenthal has referred to Mexican American students as “Hitler Jugend,” and raised concerns across the nation about possible criminal behavior last summer when he openly misrepresented the results of an independent audit that praised the Mexican American Studies program and found it in compliance with Arizona’s bizarre
Ethnic Studies law.
State Rep. Sally Gonzales introduced a bill to repeal the Ethnic Studies crackdown last week. A similar bill to repeal Arizona’s notorious SB 1070 immigration law was also being introduced.
Instead of surrendering to Huppenthal’s crackdown, many community leaders in Tucson called on the Tucson Unified School District board to join a federal court suit against the state and summon the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice to follow up their investigation of Arpaio and investigate Huppenthal for racial profiling, hate crimes, fraud and even extortion.
Last month, when the DOJ charged Arpaio with “chronic culture of disregard for basic legal and constitutional obligations” and a “widespread pattern or practice of…activities that discriminate against Latinos,” Tucson supporters of Ethnic
Studies wonder if similar charges could be made for Attorney General Tom Horne and Superintendent Huppenthal, who have invoked violent imagery and pathologically singled out only Tucson’s Mexican American Studies program.
[Jeff Biggers is the author of The United States of Appalachia, and more recently, Reckoning at Eagle Creek: The Secret Legacy of Coal in the Heartland (The Nation/Basic Books).]
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As you may know, Arizona has banned the teaching of ethnic studies, specifically targeting Mexican-American Studies in the Tucson Unified School District. Eleven TUSD teachers, administrators and students are suing the state to bring back Ethnic Studies (www.saveethnicstudies.org).
The Mexican American Studies program in the Tucson Unified School District is facing the real threat of being shut down. The program successfully keeps otherwise-disengaged students motivated to learn and go on to college by using curriculum with which they culturally identify to teach critical thinking skills and empower the students to be strong leaders in their communities.
Despite all of the benefits of the program, in May 2010 Governor Jan Brewer signed a bill (HB 2281) into law that aimed to ban ethnic studies in Arizona schools. This law went into effect at the beginning of 2011 and prohibits schools from offering classes that are designed for students of a certain ethnic group. As a result, the Mexican American Studies program in Tucson, which has contributed to a 97% decrease in the dropout rate, is now facing a serious threat to its existence, while African American, Native American, and Asian American Studies programs are all allowed to continue.
An independent audit commissioned by the state found the program to be fully in compliance with Arizona’s ban, and recommended that the program be maintained as part of the core curriculum for high schools. Despite these findings, State Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal has threatened to withhold $15 million of state funding from the school district.
Learn more!
Watch the trailer of Precious Knowledge which documents the program and the battle to save it. The full program will be shown at the fundraiser.
Precious Knowledge movie trailer
http://vimeo.com/15062646
TUSD Mexican American Studies Program
http://www.tusd.k12.az.us/contents/depart/mexicanam/index.asp
Interview by Anderson Cooper between Tom Horne and Michael Dyson
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gOW2vBGHBU&feature=rela
Sign the Save Ethnic Studies Petition
http://action.nclr.org/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=4802
Join the 11 teachers and administrators from the Mexican American Studies program and two of its students to defend the program. Sign the Save Ethnic Studies petition below to show your support and we’ll keep you updated on the progress of the lawsuit against the Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction and the State Board of Education.
We the undersigned support the effort to save ethnic studies in the Tucson Unified School District. The Mexican American Studies program poses no threat to the state of Arizona or its education system. On the contrary, it provides a proven-effective method to educate students and motivate them to stay in school and become productive leaders in their community.
We stand in opposition to State Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal’s attempt to withhold $15 million of state funding from the school district. This action is completely unwarranted given the results of the independent audit commissioned by the state, which found the program to be fully in compliance with Arizona’s ethnic studies ban. In fact, the audit recommended that the program be maintained as part of the core curriculum for high schools in the district.
The Mexican American Studies program should be applauded and replicated for its success, not destroyed by a pointless ban.
Saturday, February 25, 2012
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Native American Heritage Month Event
Trail of Tears
As presented in the documentary
“How the West was Lost”
Introduction and
discussion to follow film
by O. Pierre Romero
November 10th
1:00pm-2:30pm
SD Miramar College ~ Room:B-305
Please consider extra credit to encourage student attendance.
Coordinated by:
San Diego Miramar College Diversity and International Education Committee
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(Versión en español: favor de ver abajo)
2nd Binational Conference on Border Issues
San Diego City College
December 1, 2011
9 am – 3 pm, Room D 121A
Politics of Violence:
Militarization, Incarceration and Globalization in the U.S.-Mexico Border Area
Keynote Speaker: Anabel Hernandez, Mexico City
Author of Los Señores del Narco (The Drug Lords)
The U.S./Mexico border has become increasingly important and relevant to communities living and interacting with one another on both sides of this international boundary. Impacts and perceptions of the border region are the subject of many contemporary research projects, advocacy and activism. Presentations in this conference will explore the impact of the border on populations living both in the U.S. and Mexico. They will also discuss how border communities perceive and respond to these impacts from various perspectives through current research, activism, advocacy and life experience.
Conference panels
Conference organized by:
Chicana/o Studies Departments at San Diego City College, and Mesa College and Baja California Chapter of the International Council on Monuments and Sites
Conference sponsors:
City College president Terry Burges
American Federation of Teachers, Local 1931
City College World Cultures Program
Contact and additional information:
E-mail: binationalconference@gmail.com
Blog: www.conferenciaborder.blogspot.com
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2a. Conferencia binacional sobre asuntos fronterizos
San Diego City College
1 de Diciembre, 2011
9 am – 3 pm, Salón D 121A
Políticas de violencia:
Militarización, encarcelamiento y globalización en la frontera México/EUA
La frontera México/Estados Unidos es crucial para las comunidades que viven e interactúan en ambos lados de la línea internacional. En la actualidad, los impactos y percepciones de esta región fronteriza son la base de múltiples proyectos de investigación y organización. En esta conferencia abordaremos el impacto de la frontera sobre las poblaciones en México y EUA. Las presentaciones explorarán, desde diversas perspectivas, las respuestas y percepciones de las comunidades en ambos lados de la línea. Las presentaciones son reportes de investigación, trabajos de organización o narraciones de experiencias de vida.
Presentación especial por Anabel Hernández, México DF
Autora de Los Señores del Narco
Paneles
Conferencia organizada por los Departamentos de Estudios Chicanos/as en San Diego City College y Mesa College y por la Sección Baja California del Consejo Internacional de Sitios y Monumentos
Conferencia realizada con el apoyo de:
Terry Burges, Presidente de City College
Federación de Maestros de EUA, sección 1931
Programa Culturas del Mundo de City College
Contacto e información adicional:
E-mail: binationalconference@gmail.com
Blog: www.conferenciaborder.blogspot.com
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SDSU Department of American Indian Studies’ 35th Anniversary
Looking Backward, Looking Forward:
35 Years of Making a Difference
SCHEDULE
Thursday, Nov. 3rd
5.00 PM Welcome
5.30 PM Soaring Eagles Dancers
6.30 PM
Honoring Rouillard family & acknowledgement of the contributions of past Faculty, Staff and Community: Florence Poston, Gwendalle Cooper, Roy Cook, Marilyn Robinson, Dwight Lomayesva, Sr., Lorena Dixon and Flossie Lofton
7.30 PM Keynote Speaker: Kevin Grover, Director, NMAI
Friday, Nov. 4th
8.30 AM Blessing
9.00 – 10.15 AM
Panel on Health:
Chair: Romelle Majel McCally,
Speakers: David Lucero, Dan Calac, Misty Taylor, Natalia Orosco
10.30 – 11.45 AM
Panel on Economic Development
Chair: Mike Connolly
Speakers: Sam Brown, Jr., Lee Acevedo, LaShunna Davidson
12.00 – 1.30 PM Lunch
1.45 – 3.00 PM
Panel on Sovereignty and Law
Chair: Devon Reed
Speakers: Temet Aguilar, Bo Mazzetti, Kathy Deserly
3.15 – 4.30 PM
Panel on Education
Chair: Linda Locklear
Speakers: Ral Christman, Flora Howe, Dwight Lomayesva, Stan Rodriguez
Andy Maciel, Major Manuel Hernandez
5.00 – 6.00 PM Wildcat Singers
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