Category: Featured

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Tucson Freedom Summer

NYCoRE stands in solidarity with the Tucson Freedom Summer

Content below copied from:

http://tucsonfreedomsummer.com/FREEDOM_SUMMER/FREEDOM_SUMMER.html

TUCSON, AZ.

– This summer Tucson is Ground Zero for the Chicana/o movement. For the past two years Raza and their Allies in Tucson have been fighting the power structure in Arizona battling to Save Mexican American Studies and Ethnic Studies! In the month of July a broad coalition of local and national organizations are calling on organizers, artists and activists from around the country to converge on Tucson as we advance the struggle for human rights in Arizona.
In July activists groups on the ground in Arizona are expecting rulings on SB 1070 the racial profiling law as well as HB 2281 the law that specifically targeted the destruction of Tucson Unified School District Mexican American Studies program by eliminating millions of dollars of state funding. This six year struggle came to a head in January of this year when the TUSD school board voted to honor Arizona HB 2281 by ending the Mexican American Studies program and then quickly followed this terrible decision by banning over 50 titles from use by Mexican American students!
During Tucson Freedom Summer there will be daily activities for volunteers including but not limited to: canvassing for November school board elections, community education, updating websites, working social media, ceremonias, Danza Azteca, fundraising, direct action along with working and assisting artists, teachers and poets in the popular education of participants and Tucson residents.
Save Ethnics Studies wants to invite organizers, artists and activists to come as individuals, collectives and work groups. To help with travel expenses we are arranging housing in Tucson and all requests will be handled on first come first serve basis.

WHY A FREEDOM SUMMER IN TUCSON?

The Tucson Chicana/o-Mexicana/o-Latina/o and Progressive communities have fought valiantly these past two years against racism, cultural bigotry and the anti-intellectualism so pervasive in the power structure of Arizona and around the country. Tucson Freedom Summer is above all a non-violent convergence in the tradition of militant direct action that will bring the best of social justice agitation with it. As such participants will be expected to go through training on non-violence and issues specific to the struggle in Tucson. Participants will be expected to identify themselves as Freedom Summer members and will be expected to follow the rules of Tucson Freedom Summer.
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Father’s Day: March w/NYCoRE @ End Stop & Frisk: Silent March Against Racial Profiling

Spend part of your Father’s Day with NYCoRE and NYCoRE’s People of Color Working Group at the:

End Stop & Frisk: Silent March Against Racial Profiling

Sunday, June 17th (March steps off at 3pm)

We will meet at 110th & Lennox at 2:30 pm

For question please email: edwin@nycore.org

If you are having trouble finding us please call Edwin at 917.400.6255 or Rita 240.506.0786

We hope to see you there.

In solidarity,

NYCoRE and NYCoRE People of Color Work Group

 

Some Facts about Stop and Frisk (from NYCLU as posted by NAACP)

  • In 2011, NYPD officers conducted 685,724 street stops, a more than 600 percent increase since Mayor Bloomberg’s first year in office when officers conducted 97,000 stops. More than 4 million people have been stopped under this administration.
  • The massive spike in street interrogations has done little to remove firearms from the streets, the ostensible reason behind the stop- and-frisk regime. Instead, the wholesale violation of civil rights has sown mistrust between police officers and the communities they are supposed to protect.
  • Nine out of 10 people stopped are totally innocent, meaning they are neither arrested nor ticketed.
  • No gun is retrieved in 99.9 percent of stops.
  • The proportion of gun seizures to stops has fallen sharply — only 780 guns were confiscated last year, not much more than the 604 guns seized in 2003, when officers made 160,851 stops.
  • Though they account for only percent of the city’s population, black and Latino males between the ages of 14-24 accounted for  percent 4.7% of population, and 41.6% of the stops in 2011. The number of stops of young black men exceeded the entire city population of young black men.

 

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New Resource: Write On!: Writing for Social Justice

Write On!: Writing for Social Justice

NYCoRE is pleased to be sharing a new resource for and by teachers: write on! writing for social justice. write on! is a resource that was created by NYCoRE’s Write On! Writing for Social Justice inquiry to action group (ItAG).

Download write on! writing for social justice

Description:
(An excerpt from the Introduction to write on! by Lindsey Johnson and Joy Osborne)

‘The function of art is to do more than tell it like it is- it’s to imagine what is possible.‘ ~bell hooks

..our Inquiry to Action group has worked together to create a space of imagination. Our aim was simple: to determine what the phrase ‘writing for social justice’ meant to us individually, and as a group, and to transform our teaching practice through our time together.

A little under two months later, we offer you this text. A combination of our own personal musings and tools that make social justice teaching ‘go,’ we hope that this book inspires you to approach your next lesson, unit or long-term plan with a fresh lens.

…Writing for social justice is a process that we use to critique society, struggle, the world and our own personal histories; it affirms life and struggle. Community creates trust, which allows us to be vulnerable. We become vulnerable so that we can become empowered. When we become empowered, we begin to develop actionable plans for our lives.

Writing for social justice gives both students and teachers a mindful purpose to our work. We want our students to have a safe space in which they question. A social justice framework allows students to develop a voice and to become creators of knowledge. We want our students to be able to use language as a way to build confidence and strengthen communication. We must honor their efforts and willingness to engage.

We hope that this offering will do a few things for you, dear reader:
• Push you to think about writing for social justice in new ways
• Inspire both yours and students’ creativity in your classroom
• Help you to find ways to further incorporate student voice
• Give authentic voice to the work our group has done together as a team

Thank you for reading. It has been a true pleasure to write, and to rise up, together.

paz. amor. justicia.

Write On!

Download write on! writing for social justice

write on! ItAG Facilitators & Participants:

Ama Codjoe is the poetry-teaching artist with A.C.T.I.O.N. (a social justice and arts program) and the co-facilitator for the Social Justice Pedagogy Team at DreamYard Project in the Bronx.  Chrissy Williams is a high school English instructor at Arturo A. Schomburg Satellite Academy in the Bronx.

Participants/Resource writers include:

Ama Codjoe Marissa Metelica
Abigal Ellman Joy Osborne
Stephina Fisher Dirk Peters
Rosie Frascella Jennifer Phuong
Latisha Gilbert Ariela Rothstein
Kayty Himmelstein Helen Rubinstein
Lindsey Johnson Devon Stanley
Vani Kannan Elissa Vinnik
Stuart Kermes Chrissy William

 

 

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