Los Angeles student groups to protest racism and other right-wing hate

A busy week will be upon us. As most of you know, CEJ's campaign-turned-movement for the Schools LA Students Deserve has really grown in the last few years. Many of our chapters (we have 14 now!!) are called Students Deserve and our students, parents and teachers often call us Students Deserve now, although we are still Coalition for Educational Justice as well (CEJ). We have chapters as far west as Venice HS, as far east as Garfield HS, in Hollywood, Koreatown, Silver Lake, North Hollywood and South LA. We're seeing our dream of organizing across our huge city come to life!!

We wanted to share an exciting event  that our students have planned on their own with some support from our two new paid Students Deserve organizers, Maricela (full-time student and parent organizer) and Alfredo (part-time, supports the student organizing piece).

We're very excited to announce:

• Weds, January 18th: Students United Against Hate, United for the Communities LA Students Deserve 
Event- MacArthur Park 4:30pm
 (PDF Flyer attached below) We want a safe space for students by students as we challenge Trump, his politics, his followers, the systems of oppression that have allowed him to exist, and the damage that he wants to do to us.
  
  
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  There will be music, art, spoken word and a panel discussion. Our students are AWESOME. Please come to MacArthur Park on Wednesday after school if you are available!! We know that UTLA Chapter Chairs have Area Meetings that afternoon. 

We also will be involved on Thursday: January 19th: UTLA/ROS LA Morning Action. You probably know about the action taking place at schools. Students Deserve students want to support whatever this looks like at your campus to show that we won’t let Trump mess with schools and our communities.

Stay involved. Stay strong. Stay united. We will not be bullied by the incoming president and his right-wing cabinet nominees. WE WILL NOT BACK DOWN!

See you on Wednesday standing strong at MacArthur Park and Thursday standing strong at our schools!!

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Los Angeles student groups to protest racism and other right-wing hate

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) March General Assembly

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) General Assembly

Thursday, March 19, 2015
4:30-6:30PM
St. Marks Lutheran Church
3651 South Vermont Ave,
Los Angeles, CA 90007
(2 blocks north of the Expo line's Vermont station)

Following an invigorating Parent Institute this past Saturday, parents are full of ideas for how to move our work into the next stages!

Students have ideas for on-going political education efforts at their campuses, especially around the Black Lives Matter movement and issues, and how to launch the social media campaign through a cross-school online video.

Our campaign at the School Board is moving forward too, as meetings continue with School Board Members to develop a resolution for the changes students deserve to see in their schools.

Please join us to put all this into action.

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) March General Assembly

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) January General Assembly

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) General Assembly

Thursday, January 29, 2015
4:30-6:30PM
St. Marks Lutheran Church
3651 South Vermont Ave,
Los Angeles, CA 90007
(2 blocks north of the Expo line's Vermont station)

Lots of potentially exciting organizing is coming up this year for the Schools LA Students Deserve Grassroots Coalition. We hope that you all can join students, parents, and teachers as we continue to fight for a socially just schools and communities!

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) January General Assembly

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) November General Assembly

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) General Assembly

Thursday, November 6, 2014
4:20-6:45PM
St. Marks Lutheran Church
3651 South Vermont Ave,
Los Angeles, CA 90007
(2 blocks north of the Expo line's Vermont station)

The 2014-2015 school year is our time to take concrete action together and change the educational system and bigger systems that shape it.

Our key focal areas are:

1. Criminalization, punishment culture and push out in schools
2. Lack of Nurses/health services for youth through schools
3. Limited College Counselors for students
4. Narrow curriculum because of an over-emphasis on standardized testing - lack of electives (arts music, ethnic studies, etc.)
5. School destabilizations like reconstitutions that force an end to critical programs or push out veteran staff, especially African-American staff

Please join us as we move forward with exciting new steps and actions!

Rosa Jimenez's notes from previous General Assembly:

At SLASD's most recent General Assembly (October 2), participants forged ahead with a new student campaign, parent organizing, and coordination of teacher actions at 14 schools across LA.

The meeting was largely facilitated by students, and students led their own student-only discussion to develop their plan of action.

This week, students in at least 6 different schools across LA are kicking off a postcard petition drive to demand changes in their schools. Students from several different high schools collaborated to develop the postcards, which postcards will be delivered to the School Board in a creative action that highlights students' voices.

Parent and community organizers are in the process of reaching out to neighborhood councils & parent advisory councils, and plan to participate in UTLA parent / community forums, as well as build townhall meetings to represent the power of parents and community.

Teachers plan to support student and parent/community organizing, as well as organize co-workers at their schools sites around an understanding of the importance of building connections with parent and student communities.

Schools Present:

• STEM Academy of Hollywood
• Maya Angelou Community High School
• Santa Monica College
• UCLA Community School - Robert F. Kennedy Campus
• New Open World Academy - Robert F. Kennedy Campus
• Manual Arts High School
• Dorsey High School
• Charles White Elementary School
• Los Angeles High School
• Loreto Elementary School
• Palms Middle School
• Hamilton High School
• Alta Loma Middle School
• North Hollywood Highly Gifted Magnet High School

Movement Snapshot:
The Blowouts in East LA - focus on role of base-building and organizing in making the Blowouts possible

Discussion & Vote on Our Strategy & Demands for the Upcoming Period:

Approved Strategy:

1. Student-Led Tactics Including Post Cards for the Board of Education & Escalating Actions
2. Big Parent Meetings
3. Small Amounts of Focused Energy to Meet with Friendly Board Members
4. Building with Other Schools
5. Build with Other Organizations
6. Strengthen Communication Between Schools & Across Sectors (students with students, for example)

Approved Demands:

1. College Counselors, Nurses, and Librarians at our schools
2. More Elective & Art Classes and Ethnic Studies as a Graduation Requirement for All LA Schools
3. Fewer Students Per Class
4. Resources for School Improvement, Not IPADs for Testing
5. Stop Reconstitution in All its Names

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) November General Assembly

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) October General Assembly

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) General Assembly

Thursday, October 2, 2014
4:15-6:30PM
St. Marks Lutheran Church
3651 South Vermont Ave,
Los Angeles, CA 90007
(2 blocks north of the Expo line's Vermont station)

Rosa Jimenez's notes from previous General Assembly:

Students and Parents from 10 different schools across LA participated. Many teachers from an even more schools and community college students attended the General Assembly as well.

Members from half a dozen community organizations participated as well as reps from various labor organizations and neighborhood councils.

As always, the General Assembly started with a Snapshot of a Social Movement—this time focusing on lessons that can be learned from students getting organized for educational justice across the nation.

Then the General Assembly created space for students, parents and teachers to discuss where to take our movement. We want to build off of our last year’s organizing and successful actions, including our March where we called upon LAUSD’s School Board to take up the issues that students, parents and teachers of the Grassroots Coalition have been organizing around.  Students met as a constituency group, as did parents and the teachers in a third group.

The Grassroots Coalition of Schools LA Students Deserve came up with some great ideas which we will be announcing soon.

Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) October General Assembly

Coalition for Educational Justice (CEJ) to participate in Great March for Climate Action

Dear CEJ Friends and Supporters:

You may recall Allesadro CEJ's participation in last year's Largest Climate Rally in LA history to support the largest climate rally in Washington DC on the same day, President's Day, 2013. This year, the fight for a cleaner environment and action on global warming is growing larger. Environmental activists are starting the Great March for Climate Action ACROSS THE UNITED STATES, in Wilmington, CA by the Port of Los Angeles and ending in Washington DC in November, in time for the mid-term elections, to push our elected officials to address the threat of global climate change.

The communities around LA's harbor (San Pedro, Wilmington, Long Beach, ...) are among the most polluted areas in California, with higher rates of asthma and other respiratory ailments. The Valero oil refinery, in Wilmington near the rally site, is responsible for one third of the state's carbon emissions into the atmosphere. The low income communities of color that are just north of the Port are the most adversely affected by the pollution and chemicals produced by the refineries and plants in the area. This is why the march is starting in Wilmington rather than, say, Santa Monica (which was the organizers' first choice before deeper political/environmental discussion ensued). The reason the rally is so early in the day is because the marchers have to get all the way up to Exposition Park by nightfall in order to sleep in the park for their first night of the cross-country march.

This year, both Allesandro CEJ and the entire city-wide CEJ are among the scores of organizations sponsoring the rally in Wilmington at the start of the Great Climate March.

DATE; Sat, March 1, 2014
TIME: 9:00 AM (8:30 AM press briefing)
LOCATION: Wilmington Waterfront Park, Wilmington, CA (Los Angeles Harbor -- "C" Street)

We are expecting to have some CEJ students (with some teachers, alumni and community members) arrive on one or two buses to participate in the rally. Perhaps we'll have time to march a few blocks with the marchers after the rally. The rally will last about an hour and then, around 10 AM, or a little later, the march will start.

For anyone not on a bus who wants to march: Feel free to march only a little, meet the marchers along the route, or join them for the closing ceremony. Route details will be available soon.

March A Little Or A Lot!!!
Climate Action Fair (2.5 miles): Wilmington Athletic Complex, 1650 Figueroa Blvd., Wilmington, CA. About 2.5 miles into the march a stopping point with activities and entertainment will be available for those that would prefer to walk a shorter distance.

Great March Destination & Day One Closing Ceremony (17.5 miles): Los Angeles Exposition Park area (details to come) 

If interested, sign  onto facebook and search for: Great March for Climate Action - Kickoff & Rally and join the event!

Also, a website for the event is: http://j.mp/GreatMarchWU  (may have to cut and paste this into your browser)

Make your own signs! Join CEJ and other progressives to force action on climate change! Hope to see you there!

CEJ to Participate in Climate March and Rally by Robert D. Skeels

Coalition for Educational Justice (CEJ) to participate in Great March for Climate Action

Crenshaw Student Forum - Community Standing up to Deasy's Racist Reconstitution

"What's happening at Crenshaw is representative of the death of the large, urban comprehensive high school all across the country." — Dana Goldstein

From the organizers:

If you have time to attend one after school thing for the remainder of the year, May 28th in support of Crenshaw, has to be that event. This will be a student led event, co-sponsored by CEJ, Community Rights Campaign, Sierra Club and Schools LA Students Deserve. The event should gain major media attention, and is part of our grassroots and legal strategy challenging LAUSD on this destabilizing attack upon one of our schools.

Event will be at Brotherhood Crusade at 5415 Crenshaw.

Crenshaw Forum Flyer 2013 by Robert D. Skeels

Crenshaw Student Forum - Community Standing up to Deasy's Racist Reconstitution

2ND ANNUAL CEJ/PEAC Social Justice Schools Conference

Attacks on our schools continue, but the fight is stronger than ever as exemplified by the Schools L.A. Students Deserve Campaign. Parents, students, teachers, community organizations have come together to not only build a vision for schools but to think about a strategy to win.

2ND ANNUAL CEJ/PEAC Social Justice Schools Conference by Robert D. Skeels

Program: 2ND ANNUAL CEJ/PEAC Social Justice Schools Conference by Robert D. Skeels

2ND ANNUAL CEJ/PEAC Social Justice Schools Conference

Resistance begins with organizing: Social Justice Schools Conference Report Back

First published on Schools Matter

"How do we help students and teachers to stop blaming ourselves and each other and start working together to change the system?" — CEJ Student Activist

Photos by Robert D. Skeels, see the entire set.

We're beginning to see scattered resistance to the corporate school privatization agenda of the Billionaire Boys Club, ALEC, and Arne Duncan. Across the country we are seeing parents stand with educators against the scourge of standardized tests. Parents Across America is a representative cross-section of many of those on the forefront of these battles. In New York we've seen powerful movements by entire communities and groups like the Grassroots Education Movement (GEM). GEM brought us the watershed The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman. Seattle activists have opposed charter schools in the backyard of one of the most infamous charter supporters around. Oregon organizers passed Tax Fairness with their Measures 66 and 67. In Florida authentic parent groups opposed the charter trigger law imported by right-wing astroturf groups. In my neighborhood community members and parents from Micheltorena Street Elementary School and Elysian Heights Elementary School have begun fighting back against proposed colocations (read corporate charter occupations) imposed by the corporate Prop 39. These struggles, and many more, hint at a nascent organized resistance to the corporate privatization fatalism our rulers say we have no choice but to accept.

In order to overcome the vast resources of those pushing the neoliberal school privatization project, it's going to take increased organization, engagement, and political education of community members, educators, activists, parents, and students. The recent Social Justice Schools Conference held jointly by Coalition for Educational Justice (CEJ) and Progressive Educators for Action (PEAC) did just that. I want to reproduce this report I received from a CEJ member Rosa Jimenez in order to instill a sense of hope along with an understanding that this type of organizing takes work. I myself attended this amazing conference, and also assisted the organizing committee that put it on. It's no small work to organize these type of events, but over two days hundreds of people were reinvigorated, educated, inspired, and armed with new tools to continue the fight against the privatization of our public schools.

Social Justice Schools Conference Report Back

by Rosa Jimenez

Dear Educational Justice Community,

THANK YOU so much to those of you who were able to attend CEJ's and PEAC's Social Justice Schools Conference on February 10 and 11. Over 200 people attended this historic convening. This was more than a one-time event, it was a critical moment to regroup and redefine a new strategy for meaningful educational reform. The entire conference was volunteer-led and volunteer-driven. Registration, childcare, and lunch were all free. We hope that the event reminds all of us that we can continue to create the spaces that we need in order to move forward our work and our communities' rights!

Students, UTLA teachers, parents, community-members, and a few charter school teachers discussed the attacks our schools and communities face. We also focused on education policies, our vision for how we want schools to be, and specific pedagogical practices that support genuine student learning.

On Friday evening, civil rights and labor leader, Bill Fletcher challenged the audience to shift UTLA into a Social Justice Union — one that aligns itself with students, parents and community in the fight for real education justice. He described how the public sector is under attack and that unions must be committed to democracy, organizing and aggressively challenging ineffective education policy. Students, parents and teachers then engaged with each other about his speech, in small groups, and then posed questions to him about the connections between rebuilding the union movement in this country and the occupy movement, and how to get unions to be committed to issues beyond pay and other narrow trade union issues, but aligned more with what students and parents are fighting for such as economic and racial justice.

On Saturday morning, conference attendees heard panelists speak to a broad set of issues we must address as we build social justice schools. John Rogers, Director of UCLA's Institute for Democracy, Equity and Access, spoke about how neo-liberalism, education policy and the economy are structured so that there are fewer jobs, higher incarceration rates and less money going toward education than in decades past. He then offered up ideas on what unions and community orgs can do to put out a vision for real change and the need to organize around it. CEJ student leader Taylor Broom, CEJ parent leader Kahllid Al-Alim, and I then spoke about on the ground organizing we have done at our schools through CEJ, PEAC or independently to challenge the attacks on education and promote real change. Additionally, Taylor spoke about how schools should be focused on more than just test scores — that schools should also be focused on what students need — like providing college counselors, small class sizes, electives like Black and Chicano/Latino history and literature, and other electives that students want to take. Students asked critical questions like "How do we help students and teachers to stop blaming ourselves and each other and start working together to change the system?"

The conference then moved into workshops. Many of the workshops showcased working examples of how we can create the education that students, teachers, and parents want and need. There were workshops on developing critical literacy skills and a love for learning, community-based education programs that engage students in deep thinking and action, alternatives to the school-to-prison pipeline and the need to stop truancy ticketing, dual-language immersion programs and more. While this conversation has been happening separately for many years, this conference brought together union members and community members in an important step towards growing our ability to work together. As a 5th year teacher who has been RIF'd four years in a row and as a young Chicana and mother, I found the dialogue inspiring — it gives me hope in a time when the attacks keep growing. It reminded me that I am not alone in thinking that what we need is movement!

Photo by Ronni Solmon. The sign at this CEJ student workshop said: 'Who are the 1% and what do they have to do with public education?'

While the adults were in workshops, students from ten different schools participated in a student-led section of the conference. This was a space for youth to discuss with each other the systemic problems of public school funding, how the 1% influence education policy (and what to do about it), racism and inequity, and what kind of changes students feel need to be made in schools so that schools better meet their needs.

The conference ended with a lively and theatrical action at Chase Bank, a few blocks away. It was a fun way to end the weekend and make connections between the underfunding of our schools, the 1%, and our willingness to take things into our own hands...

We were thrilled to have the Raza Ed Committee, Latino Caucus, Women's Progressive Caucus and United Valley Caucus endorse this conference and it was great to see rank and file and union leaders from other unions come out to support as well. We know that it will take all of us together (and many many more) to transform our own union and to work more systematically in the long-term to organize for educational justice with our communities.

These are crucial conversations in era where elite education "reformers" are the ones shaping and promoting educational policies for our schools. These reformers include Bill Gates, Eli Broad, and Richard Riordan who represent the 1% that the Occupy movement critiques. Their policies and strategies coming from the 1% for educational reform ignore the reality that our schools and our communities do not have what they need and deserve. This conference set us on a course to define our own educational reform needs together. We cannot and will not have elite business people who have their own interests in mind determining the future or our public schools which are supposed to be for everyone.

It would be great to hear from others who were in attendance about what you experienced and got out of the conference!

Thanks again to everyone for participating in this important and inspiring process of creating social justice schools.

Rosa Jimenez
UCLA-CS Social Studies Teacher
Coalition for Educational Justice Steering Committee Member
Progressive Educators for Action Member
Parent
Conference Coordinator

Resistance begins with organizing: Social Justice Schools Conference Report Back

Social Justice Schools Conference by CEJ and PEAC February 2012

What does real school transformation look like? How will we win? Real transformation is rooted in the communities that schools serve, respect the rights of all school employees, and is fully funded.

February 10 & February 11, 2012
Fri: 4:30 to 7:00pm
Sat: 8:30 to 5:00pm
UCLA Community School
700 S. Mariposa Avenue
Los Angeles CA 90005

RSVP: Jimenez.rosa@gmail.com or (909) 753-9007 ASAP
Childcare, Food, and Translation Provided Both Days

Conference Presented Jointly by
Coalition for Educational Justice and Progressive Educators for Action

Keynote Speakers
Bill Fletcher
Labor/civil rights leader and author Bill Fletcher will speak to the attacks on the public sector, the need to project an alternative social vision, and the critical need for an organizing strategy (he is co-author, with Fernando Gapasin, of Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and New Pathways Towards Social Justice).

John Rogers
John Rogers from UCLA IDEA (Institute for Democracy, Education, and Access), will speak on a panel with student, parent, and teacher leaders on real, community and labor led reform models in schools, including a community schools model, and the difficulty of implementing reform within a climate of unrelenting attacks against our communities.

Workshops
There will also be over ten workshops led by students, parents, and teachers that demonstrate the work currently being done in our schools that are signs of real community-driven, democratic, culturally relevant, and transformative practices. These include (along with others):

• Balanced Literacy
• Dual Language Programs
• Alternative Teacher Evaluation System
• Problem-Based, Community-Connected Instruction
• Restorative Justice/Alternative Discipline

20120210 CEJ PEAC Social Justice Schools Conference

Social Justice Schools Conference by CEJ and PEAC February 2012

CEJ Community Forum to Discuss Preventing Outside Takeovers of Public Schools

Will Our Schools be given away to outside Charter Companies?

If you are a community member or have a child at Dorsey, LA High, Johnnie Cochran, 42nd St Elem or any school feeding into Dorsey, Crenshaw or LA High, then...

PLEASE COME TO THIS MAJOR COMMUNITY FORUM
If the schools are given away, all the teachers and school employees can be removed and there may not even be one unified school anymore.
BUT WE CAN STOP THIS FROM HAPPENING!!!

Please join us as we strategize how to stop the give-away and unite to make our schools the best schools in the city

Thursday, January 20, 2010 5:30-7:30
Los Angeles Bahai Center
5755 Rodeo Road, 90016 at La Cienega
Parking Entrance on La Cienega, (across from Target, in between Taco Bell and 7–11, enter through the Large Black Archway)

Childcare, PIZZA and Translation will be provided.

This forum is co-sponsored by UTLA-West Area and the Coalition for Educational Justice

Please Contact Rosa Jimenez at 909-753-9007 if you have questions.

¿Serán Regaladas Nuestras Escuelas a las Componías Chárteres?

Si ud. es un miembro de la comunidad o tiene un niño a Dorsey, LA High, Johnnie Cochran, 42nd St Elem o cualquier escuela que manda sus graduados a Dorsey, Crenshaw or LA High, entonces...

POR FAVOR VENGA A ESTE GRAN FORO COMUNITARIO

Si se regalan nuestras escuelas, es posible que todos los empleados sean despedidos y no sea una escuela unificada.

¡PERO NOSOTROS PODEMOS PREVENIRLO!
¡Por favor unámonos para formar una estrategia para impedir este regalando de nuestras escuelas y como unir para crear escuelas que van a ser las mejores en la ciudad!

El Jueves, el 20 de Enero, 5:30-7:30 pm
Los Angeles Bahai Center
5755 Rodeo Road, 90016 a La Cienega
Entrada para estacionar en La Cienega, (al otro lado de Target, entre Taco Bell y 7–11, entren por el arco grande negro)

Cuidado de niños, Pizza y Traducción serán proveídos

Este foro será patrocinado por La Coalicion Para Justicia Educativa (CJE) y UTLA.

Por favor llame a Rosa Jimenez a 909-753-9007 si tiene preguntas

CEJ Community Forum to Discuss Preventing Outside Takeovers of Public Schools