Updates on Ethnic Studies in Arizona

While students were on their holiday break, Arizona issued a disturbing wake-up call to anyone who thought the education system had evolved to reflect America’s diversity. In a legal challenge to a controversial law passed in 2010, an administrative law judge pummeled a flagship educational initiative by supporting restrictions on programs based on Latino history and culture.Tucson students occupy a school board meeting

The judge decided that the curriculum used in Tucson’s Mexican American studies programs was biased against white people, apparently because it advocates critical historical perspectives and emphasizes struggles of indigenous and Latino communities, as well as the links between that legacy and contemporary politics. The ruling comes as no surprise, as the struggle between the school district and school superintendent John Huppenthal has been dragging on for months. The focus now is on a pending federal lawsuit aimed at halting the law.

CNN quotes from ruling:

In Tuesday’s ruling, administrative law judge Lewis Kowal said the auditors observed only a limited number of classes. He added, “Teaching oppression objectively is quite different than actively presenting material in a biased, political, and emotionally charged manner.”

“Teaching in such a manner promotes social or political activism against the white people, promotes racial resentment, and advocates ethnic solidarity, instead of treating pupils as individuals,” Kowal wrote. He cited a lesson that taught students that the historic treatment of Mexican-Americans was “marked by the use of force, fraud and exploitation,” and a parent’s complaint that one of her daughters, who was white, was shunned by Latino classmates after a government course was taught “in an extremely biased manner.”

So to sum up, it is “extremely biased” to teach critical viewpoints of the oppression, displacement and systematic discrimination that Mexicans and other groups have encountered throughout U.S. history. Because for students to learn about the many atrocities strewn along the path of Manifest Destiny would upset the national narrative of continual social progress, rugged individualism, and free enterprise. And once the veneer of triumphalism begins to crack, students might start to use their often-neglected critical intellect to unravel myths of “personal responsibility” and “equal opportunity” that have propped up neoliberal dreams for the past few generations.

The ruling’s ideological rationale encapsulates the political fictions fueling ethnocentrism in public schools. That’s precisely why many students yearn for education that pushes past negative media portrayals and stereotypes of people of color (and they’re willing to agitate for it). Tucson high school student Korina Lopez, whose father teachers in the district, told Democracy Now!, “It’s very important to me because I know that it teaches a deeper understanding of history and the things you learn. And it just gives you a whole new appreciation of your community and society.”

Ethnic studies in public schools has long been under siege. Though the programs have flourished, enrolling hundreds of elementary, middle and high school students, the law, HB 2281, aimed explicitly to penalize educators that have fought to introduce more critical pedagogy.

According to the federal legal complaint filed by ethnic studies advocates and teachers this fall, the state’s then-school superintendent Tom Horne declared that the Mexican-American Studies Department of Tucson’s No. 1 unified school district “[p]romotes the overthrow of the United States Government.”

The witchhunt rhetoric surrounding the program reflects the overarching paradox of the state’s charge of “bias” in ethnic studies. A glance at the demographic structure of Tucson’s school system shows that individual opportunity doesn’t exactly thrive in communities riven by deeply rooted racial and economic segregation.

The Arizona government’s preference for “teaching oppression objectively” certainly plays out in ironic ways. Authorities have no qualms displaying their own biases when it comes to policing schools and communities. The most glaring example is SB 1070, the law that would encourage the profiling and detention of suspected undocumented immigrants. The state has also marginalized teachers who fell short of “fluency” standards–i.e. people with Spanish accents who teach kids with limited English. At one school in Phoenix, reported the Wall Street Journal last year, “State auditors have reported to the district that some teachers pronounce words such as violet as ‘biolet,’ think as ‘tink’ and swallow the ending sounds of words, as they sometimes do in Spanish.”

If only more Arizona officials had been schooled in the very programs that they seek to outlaw. According to the Save Ethnic Studies campaign, the programs have proven effective not only at supporting academic performance in the conventional sense–higher graduation rates and test scores–but helping close the profound “achievement gaps” that plague low-income communities of color. The campaign stresses that the ethnic studies model incubated in Tucson has become a national model:

98 percent of the students say they do homework at night to keep up with the next day’s class. 95 percent discuss what their learning with their parents. Students have given reports to the TUSD board, Pima County Board of Supervisors, the Arizona state legislature, the Black Congressional Caucus and the Hispanic Congressional Caucus.

“There’s a big myth up there that these classes are about immigration”, says Augustine Romero, Director of Student Equity at TUSD. “It’s actually about analyzing problems in the real world and addressing those problems by coming up with solutions.”

Analyzing problems in the real world and coming up with solutions. If officials think that’s anathema to a sound education, then they’ve given civil rights advocates the most principled argument yet for why ethnic studies is so vital for the next generation of community leaders.

Michelle Chen is a contributing editor at In These Times. She is a regular contributor to the labor rights blog Working In These Times, Colorlines.com, and Pacifica's WBAI. Her work has also appeared in Common Dreams, Alternet, Ms. Magazine, Newsday, and her old zine, cain.

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Mexican American Studies in Arizona Needs No Defense: It Needs More Defenders
by Jeff Biggers
11/17/11
Huffington Post

In a must read cover story in the most recent Tucson Weekly, acclaimed journalist and fifth-generation Tucsonan Mari Herreras expertly sorts fact from fiction in the controversial Ethnic Studies ban in Arizona.
Yet, underscoring Herreras' debunking of 10 myths -- that "stories of mythical proportions have surrounded the fight for Mexican-American studies -- with some truths sprinkled in between the lines" -- is one of the most tragic, if not obscene, realities in Arizona's education showdown: As the state inches toward its centennial in 2012, Mexican Americans -- including the 60 percent of the students that make up Tucson Unified School District -- still have to defend and justify the teaching of Mexican American history and literature, as if Mexican Americans are not part of the greater American experience.

The final showdown over the extremist witch hunt to outlaw Ethnic Studies in Tucson is only days away; but, the supremely American struggle for democratic education, justice and local control of schools has been playing out in the state's segregated minds for over a century.

Five years ago, long-time educator Salomon Baldenegro nailed Tucson's and the state of Arizona's enduring and shameful problem: "...history is cyclical, and the Mexican haters have resurfaced. We again find ourselves having to prove our legitimacy in our own country."

Or, at least in the legislative narrative of a modern-day Arizona framed by recalled Tea Party President Russell Pearce and his friends, Canadian-immigrant and violence-invoking Attorney General Tom Horne, and Tea Party extremist John Huppenthal, the embarrassingly incompetent Superintendent of Public Instruction.
Or, in the silence and ineptitude of a school district overseen by a demoralizing figure like TUSD

Superintendent John Pedicone, who reneged on his promise to join the Mexican American Studies program in their federal court battle for constitutional rights, unleashed unforgivable and excessive police brutality on the city's youth and elderly icons last spring, placed obstacles on the program, referred to college-bound students as "pawns," refused to participate in public forums to heal the divide in the city, and dismissively concluded the historic legacy of Mexican American Studies as a "distraction" in his overwhelmingly Mexican American district.

In a chilling reminder of his acquiescence to the hateful narrative of Horne and Huppenthal, Pedicone refused to publicly rebuke, despite numerous pleas, Huppenthal's vicious charge in September that his district's own Mexican American youth could be compared to Hitler's paramilitary Jugend.

Let's be clear: No other high school program in Arizona -- perhaps even the nation -- has gone through such scrutiny, investigation and media abuse and disinformation, as the Mexican American Studies program in Tucson.

And yet, no other high school program among low-income students in the state of Arizona -- or perhaps the nation -- has proved its undeniable success in alleviating the achievement gap, graduating college-bound students, inspiring community-engaged young citizens, and garnering unprecedented praise from national education experts and an independent audit. No other program has sponsored as many public forums to heal and bring together the city on issues concerning its youth.

Bottom line: Mexican American Studies Needs No Defense: It Needs More Defenders.
In 2006, Baldenegro wrote:

We grew up in the 1950s and early 1960s, when American society viewed Americans of Mexican descent as foreigners and there was a concerted campaign by society, particularly the schools, to make us feel inferior and treat us as interlopers in our own land.
We had two choices. We could acquiesce and shuffle through life, hat in hand, picking up society's crumbs. Or we could resist and assert our humanity. We resisted.
In coalition with barrio activists and some Mexican-American professionals, we fundamentally changed the educational, political, cultural and social landscape of Tucson and Arizona.

Years later, few Tucsonans have had the vantage point and experience as youth advocate and educator Sarah Gonzales. Unlike many entrenched and highly paid administrators or politicians who have failed to take on the Tea Party extremists or defend Tucson's children on the frontlines, Gonzales has spent the last decade organizing arts, education and social justice projects in schools and youth communities throughout Arizona.
She writes:

The voices of the community most central to Ethnic Studies have been ignored, refuted and disrespected. The treatment of our youth, respected elders, MAS teachers and community supporters has been egregious. Unfortunately, in many social movements the leadership oppresses the voice of the community instead of seeking the community's knowledge.
I think the community is seeking to hold Pedicone responsible for the hostile climate that his leadership or lack thereof created at the school board meetings around this topic. It is quite understandable that a community who has been beaten, arrested and devalued would not trust or support the leadership. The community has a right to seek accountability for these transgressions.

Ethnic Studies is a placeholder in the long line of anti-immigrant and anti-Latino/a legislation in Arizona recently. To view it as somehow different from the rest of the legislation is to be ignorant to structural inequality.

Arguments over curriculum or programmatic changes for the "best interest" of the students by people who have no education, participation or background in Ethnic Studies serve only to distract from the unity needed to refute an unjust piece of legislation that has no business in Tucson.

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Ethnic Studies Myths
by Mari Herreras
Tuscon Weekly

In Arizona, we have firsthand experience with the power of myth—for example, think of Gov. Jan Brewer's claim of an endless stream of headless corpses in the desert.

It's that kind of storytelling that has helped our state become a top exporter of anti-Mexican sentiment, first with SB 1070, and then with HB 2281, Arizona's anti-ethnic-studies law.

The myths surrounding the Tucson Unified School District's Mexican-American studies classes—which HB 2281 was written specifically to deal with—begin with state Attorney General Tom Horne, back when he was state superintendent of public instruction.

In 2006, labor-rights activist Dolores Huerta addressed Tucson High Magnet School students and uttered these words: "Republicans hate Latinos."

Horne reacted by dispatching his deputy superintendent, Margaret Dugan, to explain to students why Huerta was wrong. Horne wanted students to know that Republicans do not hate Latinos. However, many students—frustrated that they were not allowed to ask Dugan questions—stood up in unison with tape across their mouths. More than 200 walked out during her speech.

Horne investigated where these students learned about free speech and civil disobedience, and determined they gained their knowledge in a series of Mexican-American studies classes. The best solution to Horne, apparently, was to get rid of these classes, as he soon spearheaded HB 2281.

Since Huerta's statement and the beginning of Horne's crusade, stories of mythical proportions have surrounded the fight for Mexican-American studies—with some truths sprinkled in between the lines.
It's time to sort things out.

Myth No. 1: Republicans love Mexicans.

Around the time when Huerta spoke at Tucson High, a series of bills was being passed by Arizona's Republican-majority Legislature—including earlier versions of SB 1070, border-security bills, a bill requiring employers to use a work-eligibility-verification system, and bills to deny in-state tuition and financial aid to noncitizen students. Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano vetoed most of the bills.

There were also four state ballot proposals that targeted immigrants, including an English-only law, which voters passed. Nationally, a controversial federal immigration-reform proposal led to a series of immigration-related protests across the country, including in Tucson.

Huerta's statement was part of an appeal to students, as she was asking them to look at the legislation and challenging them to start a campaign to address why "Republicans hate Latinos."

This led to the aforementioned speech by Dugan, and the walkout by students, which infuriated Horne. In an open letter in 2007, he wrote that TUSD's program should be terminated. Next, in 2008, he worked with lawmakers on SB 1108, the first anti-ethnic-studies bill. He tried again in 2009 with SB 1069, but both bills failed to become law.

But then Barack Obama was elected president, and Napolitano went with him to Washington, D.C., to head up the Department of Homeland Security. Jan Brewer, Arizona's Republican secretary of state, became governor, and with a Republican majority in the Legislature passing SB 1070 and HB 2281, she signed them into law in 2010.

Truth: When it comes to most Arizona Republicans, Huerta has a gift for stating the obvious.

Myth No. 2: Horne's anti-ethnic studies law isn't anti-Mexican.

HB 2281 was written to focus on only one school district in the state, and on only one program.

TUSD has other ethnic-studies programs that focus on African Americans, Native Americans, Pacific islanders and Asian Americans. But only Mexican-American studies classes—and their teachers—are under attack. When former state Sen. John Huppenthal successfully ran for state superintendent (while Horne ran successfully for attorney general), part of his platform was to get rid of la raza, a term from the Chicano movement that means "the people."

He didn't say black studies, or Indian studies. He said la raza.

From Nolan Cabrera's perspective, fear and politics are the real reasons behind laws like SB 1070 and HB 2281. Cabrera, an assistant professor at the University of Arizona's College of Education, has been a vocal supporter of the TUSD program.

"Social-science research shows us that the Latino population is the largest-growing in this country right now, and that's what makes it very easy to play upon those fears," Cabrera says.

"They've been doing it for years. It plays on your fears and increases turnout on the conservative right. The other timing (factor) is the recession: When people are pinched, they react. Look at our past with Operation Wetback, and then the Chinese Exclusion Act—'throw out the foreigners.'"

Truth: Hatred of all things Mexican can help you get elected in much of Arizona.

Myth No. 3: These classes are teaching a form of Mayan religion.

Some, but not all, of the Mexican-American studies classes in TUSD open with a poem written by Luis Valdez, of Zoot Suit and La Bamba fame. The poem is called "In Lak Ech," a Mayan phrase that was used as a greeting; the poem in some ways mirrors the golden rule.

Here's Valdez's poem:
In Lak Ech
Tú Eres mi otro yo / You are my other me.
Si te hago daño a ti / If I do harm to you,
Me hago daño a mí mismo / I do harm to myself;
Si te amo y respeto / If I love and respect you,
Me amo y respeto yo / I love and respect myself.

After reciting the poem, students sometimes participate in what is called the unity clap. The unity clap originated with the United Farm Workers as a way to bridge the communication gap between Latino and Filipino workers who did not share the same language; the idea was to create unity. The clap starts off slowly, then gets faster and faster.

In the movie Stand and Deliver, East Los Angeles math teacher Jaime Escalante is depicted using a form of clapping to get students revved up, and he even throws in a bit of Mayan math history. However, no one accused Escalante of teaching students Mayan religious practices, or of being in a cult.

Pueblo High School teacher Sally Rusk, who teaches Chicano history, explains that when the classes recite "In Lak Ech" and other Mayan writings, "What we're doing is a paradigm of reflection—to engage the students to reflect on actions and their history. The whole reason we study history is to learn from the past. As we learn, we need to share with others, and this is where it is scary for critics, because it is about transforming society.

"We open the week and end the week saying we want a revolutionary state of mind, but that's not about the violent overthrow of our country. We're (telling) our students that we can no longer accept the high dropout rate for Chicanos."

Truth: Ethnic-studies classes keep some Latino high school students from dropping out—a fact that doesn't impress Mexican-American studies opponents.

Myth No. 4: John Pedicone is against ethnic studies because of the Southern Arizona Leadership Council.

As soon as John Pedicone became TUSD's superintendent, local activists said his appointment was an attempt by the Southern Arizona Leadership Council—of which Pedicone was once a member—to take over the direction of Tucson's largest school district.

SALC has had its share of criticism as an organization with a political agenda. Members include car-dealer Jim Click (a conservative Republican) and many area corporation representatives. The council has been accused of being overly Anglo and not doing a good job of representing a wide spectrum of Tucsonans.

"The fact that people try to generalize SALC and my affiliation is misguided," says Pedicone.

Pedicone describes SALC as a group of "effective community leaders" who want to improve Tucson and its economy. He says he looks at working with members of SALC as a way to bring education and business together.

"The fact that people talk about bigotry, but then generalize or make assumptions and create fear based on my affiliation with SALC, is wrong," Pedicone says, "because it just isn't true."

Truth: While it's probably a good idea to keep an eye on SALC, repeating over and over that Pedicone is a SALC operative doesn't make it true.

Myth No. 5: John Pedicone is working to dismantle Mexican-American Studies.

Pedicone says he's aware of the claim that he doesn't support ethnic studies, and that it's hearsay. He calls the attack on ethnic studies part of a specific political agenda that he is not involved in.

"Unfortunately, people are on edge on both sides," Pedicone says.

Janet Marcotte, executive director of the YWCA Tucson, describes herself as a Pedicone supporter, and says she also continues to support ethnic studies.

"I've also been characterized as a great friend of John, but when I first reached out to him, I'd never met him face to face. I've been following everything he said, and following it closely, because it is an issue I care a lot about," Marcotte says. "... We would not be appealing (Huppenthal's finding that TUSD violated HB 2281) if it wasn't for John. I don't know why that keeps getting overlooked."

However, teachers and others who support the program disagree. Rusk says changes made to the Mexican-American Studies Department that were championed by Pedicone have had a negative impact on the program. The director, Sean Arce, was essentially demoted when Assistant TUSD Superintendent Lupita Cavazos-Garcia was placed in charge of the program (as well as other district-wide programs).

Rusk says that this year, all of the Mexican-American studies teachers were forced to work full-time, which prevented some of them from doing effective outreach for their classes, like working on dropout-prevention programs and participating in community events.

The district also changed the way the classes were offered and how students registered for them. With little time for outreach by teachers, enrollment dropped, Rusk says.

Although district officials claim to support the program, the end result of the changes is "that our enrollment is down by more than half this year," Rusk says. Instead of supporting the program, they're dismantling it, she charges.

Truth: It's difficult to publicly criticize a program that has been proven to help students—and what happens behind the scenes is what matters to its survival.

Myth No. 6: Isn't it time to move on?

With State Sen. Russell Pearce—an author of SB 1070—having been recalled, ethnic-studies activists say now is the best time to take advantage of a newfound energy and interest in changing the state.

However, both Marcotte and Pedicone say the district faces more-important problems than ethnic studies.
UA's Cabrera says he'll be happy to move beyond ethnic studies "when we no longer live in a racist society."
Cabrera says Pedicone and school-board member Mark Stegeman brought criticism by ethnic-studies supporters upon themselves. For example, after the student-led group UNIDOS took over the TUSD governing-board meeting on April 26—when Stegeman planned on introducing a resolution to make Mexican-American studies classes only available as electives, and not requirement-fulfilling classes—Pedicone and others criticized the students rather than accepting some of the blame for the students' frustration, Cabrera says.

"When you start vilifying the students, you are almost parodying Huppenthal and Horne," he says. "Why demonize these kids if they are fundamentally interested in having this conversation? UNIDOS' actions stemmed from the students being ignored and not having their voice listened to. So right now, (with the late Judy Burns' seat on the school board open), why not have a youth voice present?"

Truth: No, it's not time to move on.

Myth No. 7: MECHA is anti-Semitic and un-American.

During the state Administrative Court hearings, the state presented an e-mail to Pedicone from assistant superintendent Lupita Cavazos-Garcia regarding her concerns that MEChA, a national cultural and academic organization for students, was described as anti-Semitic, and that it could potentially indoctrinate children.
Questioning MEChA in this manner was surprising to local activists, who pointed out that U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva was a member of MEChA, as was Tucson City Councilwoman Regina Romero.

The Community Advisory Board for TUSD's Mexican-American studies program called for Cavazos-Garcia to be removed from her administrative position, but she remains in place.

"Her comments clearly illustrate a profound misunderstanding of the organization and a general lack of support for groups dedicated to the educational advancement of Latino youth," reads the advisory board's press release.

"Despite Garcia's personally held beliefs, TUSD has placed her in charge of the district's Mexican-American studies program, which similarly prepares students for advancement in higher education and teaches American history and literature through the Mexican-American perspective. Despite the program's proven efficacy in increasing student achievement, under Garcia's direction, the department has seen a dramatic internal restructuring and a damaging decentralization of program staff."

Pedicone's response is that he can't determine who he employs based on complaints from the community, or based on complaints from people who don't like her as their supervisor.

"The fact that she is in charge is not the issue. Where in any organizational structure does someone who doesn't like their supervisor get to change that?" Pedicone asks.

Truth: When people complain about MEChA, they usually describe a Mexican plot to re-create Aztlan. No one seems to have the ability anymore to understand symbols and metaphors.

Myth No. 8: Anyone who offers criticism of ethnic studies is a racist.

As discussions heated up regarding what Pedicone and TUSD would do regarding the state's finding that the district was in violation of HB 2281, Marcotte says she reached out to the superintendent to devise a strategy for the school district. It was at this meeting that a local activist and ethnic-studies supporter who showed up was told to leave. Accusations flew, and Marcotte was called a racist.

On the contrary, she says. "I think that my corner is being in support of ethnic studies, and I think I've been unfairly characterized."

The passion of those who fight on behalf of ethnic studies, she says, is understandable, especially in the context of SB 1070. Given the anti-immigrant mood in the state, "I think it's been very difficult to focus on how we make things better," Marcotte says. "It happens in this (kind of) situation—'you're not totally with me, so you're against me.'"

Marcotte acknowledges she hasn't always agreed with the tactics of program supporters. "Because of that, it's been very difficult to localize a broad-based group to be supportive of ethnic studies. It would be nice if it was different, so that we could show a unified voice."

Marcotte also says that calls for Pedicone's resignation were absurd. "When that happened, it was hard for me to believe (people calling for Pedicone's resignation) have the best interest of the district in mind."

Truth: At some point, everyone who supports ethnic studies will need to sit down and work with each other. Check egos at the door, please.

Myth No. 9: There's no way to heal wounds and work together.

People who identify themselves as progressive yet have offered criticism of ethnic studies have been called racists, while elders in the Chicano community were escorted from the governing board room on May 3 by Tucson police in riot gear. Other ethnic-studies supporters who surrounded the TUSD administration building that night were stomped on, pushed and bruised by police while they peacefully protested.

Where does the community go from here, as it waits for news from the state Administrative Court judge on whether TUSD's Mexican-American studies program violates state law?

"We need to work together," Rusk says. "This is what we keep saying as teachers—that we need to look at what we teach" and "our wants and goals."

She says, "I'd like us all to have a huge meeting and figure out this division, the escalations and our framework."

Marcotte says opportunities remain for everyone to come together around this issue.

"I've done all kinds of programs, some that are over 20 years old, but that doesn't mean I don't believe there could be improvements," she says. "It's the same with ethnic studies. There probably can be improvements in the curriculum. And right now, it sometimes feels like a battle over the status quo. Frankly, the status quo is not good enough for our students."

The division among people who are on the same side "has been such a horrible thing for our community," she says. "We have just made Horne and Huppenthal very happy. We've been fighting with each other and not fighting for the best interests of students."

Truth: If making Horne and Huppenthal unhappy is a goal all ethnic-studies supporters can agree on, it should be easy to heal wounds and work together.

Myth No. 10: Huppenthal is right: Cambium Learning Group didn't do the audit correctly.

Huppenthal and his team at the state Department of Education testified during the Administrative Court hearings that Cambium Learning—the company and its subcontractor hired by the department to do an audit of the TUSD's Mexican-American studies program—didn't do a satisfactory job.

The audit, which offered some criticism of curriculum and other issues, stated the district and its classes were not in violation of state law, and auditors offered positive comments about the program and its teachers. The audit confirmed that the classes helped students do better in school and increased the likelihood of them graduating and going on to college.

However, TUSD had already heard this news in May when Cabrera presented his own analysis of TUSD statistics on the program.

"There are massive gaps in graduation (rates), but for the (Mexican-American studies) kids, that gap is eliminated," Cabrera says. "It should be profound headline news. ... I have yet to see a program in TUSD that has such a profound impact."

Cabrera says students in the program also began to perform better in classes outside of the program, such as math classes. "There is no Chicano-studies math, but those gaps began to close, too," he says. "That tells me it's not just about teaching the student, but changing their orientation to school in general."

Truth: Teaching kids their history in a way that's supportive helps them do better in school.

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