Topic: Civil Rights

Article coronavirus immigration DACA

Undocumented students more vulnerable than ever during pandemic
How faculty can make a difference

By Jessica Silver-Sharp, San Mateo Community College Federation of Teachers

When I first wrote about undocumented students in October 2017, I couldn’t have foreseen how things could change so much in less than three years. Two out of three of our campus Dream Centers in the San Mateo Community College District were established during this time when young “Dreamers” were forming a national youth movement and “coming out” across the country. Then, a majority of the hundreds of undocumented students on campus enjoyed legal protections under DACA.

Article CalPERS privatization

CalPERS bails out of private prisons
Drops $12 million investment in GEO Group and CoreCivic

The California Public Employees’ Retirement System, CalPERS, recently rattled the cages of the for-profit prison industry by divesting nearly $10 million of stock in the country’s two biggest private jailers.

The August sell-off came on the heels of the California State Teachers Retirement System, CalSTRS, dropping its $12 million investment in GEO Group and CoreCivic (formerly known as the Corrections Corporation of America).

Article Up Front Civil Rights LGBTQ+ racial justice

Union work is social justice work

By Jeffery M. Freitas, CFT President

When I was elected CFT President in March, I said in my speech to Convention delegates: “I believe that when we fight for education, we also fight for social justice, racial justice, gender equality, LGBTQ rights, and climate justice.”

To be a social justice union, we must not only consider the complex lives of our members and the challenges they face, but look beyond the doors of the schoolhouse to consider the ways our campus communities intersect with our larger communities. When we fight for labor, we must fight for our communities, too.

Article immigration

Support union families torn apart in Mississippi ICE raids
Know how to support immigrant students and families

The CFT and AFT join other progressive groups in condemning the ICE raids in Mississippi – the largest immigrations raids waged in a single state. Immigration and Customs Enforcement swept up nearly 700 undocumented workers from several food processing plants last week, leaving as many families scrambling for support. 

The plant workers of Koch Foods in Mississippi were union members of the United Food and Commercial Workers, Local 1529.

California Teacher CFT Convention

Erwin Chemerinsky: Constitutional scholar brings delegates to their feet
Convention 2018

If you get a case on the Supreme Court, make your brief a shameless attempt to pander to Justice Anthony Kennedy, said UC Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, keynote speaker at the CFT Convention. Why? Because Kennedy has been in the majority 97 percent of cases this year, and 98 percent the year before.

Facebook Gallery: Members in Motion

California Teacher Up Front

Sexual misconduct revelations demand changes in the workplace and society

By Joshua Pechthalt, CFT President

The daily revelations of sexual misconduct by men in authority seem like a turning point in the struggle for gender equality. While this appears to be a sea change, we must remember that Donald Trump’s claim he could grab women inappropriately without their consent failed to derail his run for the White House. That, however, may have been the opening salvo.

California Teacher immigration DACA safe havens

Being an UndocuAlly
How to create a safe campus for undocumented communities

Four days before President Trump rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, Sarah, a young student who commutes an hour each way to attend classes, emailed me that she was dropping my class.

She believed the impending end of DACA meant she would lose her source of income, her DACA driver’s license, and access to financial aid. She was also afraid she and her family would be deported. Her fears were real, however the information she received was incorrect.

Article international

Oaxacan teachers challenge the test

Last year an AFT resolution declared that U.S. public schools are held hostage to a “testing fixation rooted in the No Child Left Behind Act,” and condemned its “extreme misuse as a result of ideologically and politically driven education policy.” AFT President Randi Weingarten proposed instead that “public education should be obsessed with high-quality teaching and learning, not high-stakes testing.”

Article racial justice By Paul Karrer

Were You a Racist?

On the Friday before Martin Luther King, Jr. day, I asked my fifth-graders if they knew why we had the day off. One suggested, “To celebrated MLK’s birthday.”

To be honest, for a ten-year-old that wasn’t bad.

“No,” another piped in, “It’s cuz he fought for blacks’ rights.”

“Good and you’re 100 percent correct.” I replied. Let’s call the child who piped up with that answer Isaiah. He’s perceptive and often sees the big picture.

California Teacher

The woman who helped California women win the vote
Immigrant, suffragist, reproductive rights pioneer never gave up

KNOW OUR HISTORY

Hillary Clinton’s historic run for U.S. President and popular vote victory didn’t just come out of nowhere. She and all the other women who are so much a part of our politics stand on the shoulders of the bold, creative organizers who came before them — women who never let a few losses stop them. Women with names we should know but probably don’t. One of these is Frances Nacke Noel.

Article

AFT steps up support for Native American educators

Robert Chacanaca and about 20 other AFT members from Hawaii, Alaska, the Midwest and Southwest attended the recent National Indian Education Association convention and trade show in Reno, Nevada.

The convention included scores of professional development workshops, as well as a timely presentation on the Standing Rock Sioux tribe’s historic fight to stop construction of an oil pipeline across North Dakota.

Classified Conference 2016: Black Lives Matter conversation engages, unites

“When we say Black Lives Matter, we’re saying that we need an agenda that puts our lives right up there with everyone else’s,” said Christopher Wilson, from Alliance San Diego, a group mobilizing for change in low-income communities and communities of color.

Wilson spoke at the Classified Conference on October 8, before attending the funeral for Alfredo Olango, a black man killed by police in nearby El Cajon.

California Teacher labor solidarity international

Nine killed in Mexico fighting punitive education reform
Government turns to violence, refuses to negotiate

Since the killing of nine demonstrators in the Oaxacan town of Nochixtlán on June 19, Mexico has been in an uproar over the force used against teachers resisting corporate education reform. As the school year started on August 22, teachers in four states refused to return to classes until the perpetrators of the massacre are held responsible and there is a negotiated agreement to change the government’s program.