15
May 11
Boyle Heights Students and Educators Rally Against Education Cuts
Photo by Mike Roe/KPCC (SCPR)
Last Friday thousands of Los Angeles Unified School District educators, parents, students and supporters filled Pershing Square to protest against layoffs and education budget cuts– a matter they called “A State of Emergency.”
Supporters from Roosevelt High School, Felicitas and Gonzalo Mendez Learning Center and other schools in Boyle Heights took to the streets and joined the downtown rally.
Students at Mendez Learning Center started things early as they staged at sit-in at their school Friday morning. At around 10am, they began to walk out of the school headed to Pershing Square and escorted by police. “We walked out to stop the education budget cuts,” said junior Franklin Granados. “The class of 2012 are being limited and will have no college corner or college counselors because there’s no funding.”
Granados said after rallying at Pershing Square, students returned to school once police warned them of truancy citations.
At about 2:30pm, a group from Roosevelt High School, Hollenbeck Middle School and possibly nearby elementary schools gathered at the Soto Street Metro Gold Line Station where teachers, students, parents and other district employees spoke about the education crisis before taking the train to join the rally at Pershing Square.
The California Teachers Assn. organized the rally to draw attention to the $12 billion the state faces in potential cuts to education. In LAUSD, over 5,000 employees have been given preliminary layoff notices this year.
Students from Mendez Learning Center walk to Pershing Square- Photo from Felicita Gonzalo Mendez Facebook page
Group from Roosevelt High School rallies before heading to Pershing Square
A walkout where LAUSD gives its tacit permission by declaring it a limited day, where it can still collect Average Daily Attendance (ADA), gives no consequences to corrupt LAUSD officials that continue to dumb down public education in a district that is now 75% Latino. It 40 years after the Latino walkouts in E.L.A. and Latino education at LAUSD is worse than ever. It is my belief that a boycott of LAUSD where students stop going to school and reconstitute their classes elsewhere with retired teachers, will finally give LAUSD a consequence for their continued corruption that is causing Latino and Black students their futures and often their lives. At http://www.perdaily.com we talk about what is really happening at LAUSD and describe how a boycott could be organized by parent and students with the help of educators. Contact me if you are interested at: Lenny@perdaily.com or check out: http://www.perdaily.com/2011/04/lausd-boycott.html