Latino and Latina Roundtable, NAACP, and other supporters Get a Supportive Vote on 2 Resolutions from PUSD School Board

“SB-1050”

The Community Development Committee of the Latino and Latina Roundtable has been meeting for quite some time with involvement from parents and some staff from the school district, students from colleges in the region, local government representatives, and members from community-based organizations – in being part of – and supporting the efforts of the College for All Coalition, a statewide coalition of over 50 organizations and labor unions that are committed to reinvesting in public higher education and increasing equity and inclusion.  As a condition of the UC receiving funding from the legislature to increase enrollment slots from the 2015-2016 baseline, UC must develop a plan for increasing the admission of California resident students and LCFF plus students (students who attend high schools that have a 75% – or greater – student enrollment of low-income, English learners and foster youth) of which the Pomona Unified has three high schools that are LCFF plus (Ganesha, Pomona, and Garey) with a total student enrollment of 4,371 students and with a diversity of students (90% Latino; 5% African American; 3% Asian American; 1% Filipino; and 1% White.

After presentations from members of the Latino and Latina Roundtable, the NAACP, and the College for All Coalition, the Pomona School Board voted in support of a bill SB 1050, Senator Kevin de Leon’s college readiness bill, to provide more funding for college readiness resources, expand college enrollment slots, and expand educational opportunity for LCFF plus students and students from first generation backgrounds.

“Community Schools”

After the Latino and Latina Roundtable, NAACP, and other supporters spoke in support of a resolution on the implementation of the concept of “community schools,” the Pomona Unified School Board  voted its support unanimously.There are 51. Million children enrolled in approximately 5,000 community schools in the United States.  They are developed t with the same objective of addressing inequities at both the school and community levels. Some of the aspects that community schools share in their strategic plans include: 1) culturally relevant and engaging curricula; 2) an emphasis on high-quality teaching, not high-stakes testing; 3) wraparound supports, such as health care and social and emotional services; 4) positive discipline practices, such as restorative justice; 5) parent and community engagement; and 6) inclusive school leadership committed to making the transformational community school strategy integral to the school’s mandate and functioning.  Community schools develop   strategic partnerships with businesses, nonprofits, universities, hospitals, and other community-based organizations.

Reminder: Meeting of the Latino and Latina Roundtable this Saturday, June 11th from 1 -3 PM at the Pitzer College Broad Center Room 208 (1050 N. Mills ave.) in Claremont.  We will discuss the implementation of plans regarding LRT website and newsletter, immigrant rights, voter registration, candidate and initiative forums, support of community schools concept, pipeline legislation to higher education, park restoration and murals, our ongoing collaboration with coalition efforts, and other new business.

Jose Zapata Calderon

President of the Latino and Latina Roundtable

Emeritus Professor of Sociology and Chicano/a and Latino/a Studies

From Joseph Silva and Crystal Flores:

UNITE-HERE LOCAL 11 has this 8 week paid summer internship for students interested in worker organizing. Below is the link to our online application.

http://jobs.unitehere.org/job/4043

Muralist and artist PAUL BOTELLO will be part of a class, Rural and Social Movements, this next Wednesday, April 27^th at 3:15 PM at Pitzer College Broad Hall 210 where he will make a slide show historical presentation pertinent to our Mexican-origin immigrant/working class communities and discuss the development of murals and art that he has been part of in East Los Angeles and the region.  As part of the class, he will take students on a tour of the murals that he worked on (with students) at the Pitzer College campus.

Paul Botello was born and raised in East Los Angeles. He earned a BA and an MFA from Cal State University, Los Angeles. He teaches art in the LAUSD school system and has taught, in the past, at the Claremont Colleges. In 1994 he traveled to Berlin, Germany where he collaborated on a giant mural titled “Global Chessboard.” Other recently completed murals include “Citizens of the World” at Esperanza School, and “In Unison” at the Maravilla Housing Facility. He also completed a large-scale mural on the Metro Gold Line construction fence that was located at First Street and Soto. Portions of the mural can now be found at the Pueblo del Sol Community Center in East Los Angeles. He has painted a number of murals in the Inland Empire region where he has collaborated with Pitzer students including five murals on the Pitzer campus and two murals (of collaboration with Pitzer students and day laborers): a mural at the Pomona Day Labor Center and one at Vina Danks school in Ontario. Botello lives and works in East Los Angeles, and exhibits his work in Los Angeles and abroad.

Jose Zapata Calderon

The Supreme Court Upholds One Person, One Vote:

An important decision today in the Supreme Court that helps to stultify the efforts to stop the growing political power of our communities..  The Latino and Latina Roundable held a well-attended forum in Pomona a few months ago and brought attention to the significance of this case, Evenwel vs. Abbott, and how we had to be vigilant of its intent at changing how electoral districts are drawn across the country (revamping who comprises electoral districts) and reshaping who is ultimately represented by elected officials.  The challengers in the Texas case, represented by the conservative legal group Project on Fair Representation, argued that the practice of drawing Congressional districts should no longer use total population from census figures as a marker for creating electoral districts – but that it should exclude those ineligible to vote , such as undocumented immigrants, felons, and young people below the voting age.

If the Supreme Court would have decided otherwise, it would have meant that, in areas where there are a large number of noncitizens – those districts would have had diluted representation – because the districts would have been drawn just on the basis of the numbers of voters and not based on the total population.  This is a big victory against the conservative right-wing forces  who are seeking to suppress the growing political power potential of our Latino and Latina communities – our immigrant communities — and the potential of the political strength of the diverse people of color, women, LGBTQ, labor, faith-based, and community-based coalitions – that have manifested themselves more than ever in recent years.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-court-voting-districts-20160404-story.html

Jose Zapata Calderon