Notes from the Ethnic Studies Home Front: Student Protests, Texting, and Subtexts of Oppression Lydia R

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Notes from the Ethnic Studies home front: student protests, texting, and subtexts of oppression Lydia R. Otero and Julio Cammarota*

Mexican American Studies, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA (Received 24 September 2010; ﬁnal version received 22 June 2011)

The protest against Arizona House Bill 2281 designed to ban Ethnic Studies from K-12 public schools on 12 May 2010 in Tucson resulted in 15 arrests. Stu- dents walked out of their classrooms in large numbers to defend their Mexican American Studies curriculum and program. Based primarily on participant observation of the protest, the authors examine the pedagogies of transformational resistance, interrogate HB 2281’s repressive aspects, and illuminate the role of social networking media as expressions of cultural citizenship in the twenty-ﬁrst century. Keywords: youth activism; social justice; Ethnic Studies

Introduction As professors in the Department of Mexican American Studies at the University of Arizona (UA), the authors participated in a protest against anti-Ethnic Studies legislation on 12 May 2010. Governor Jan Brewer had signed House Bill 2281 that banned Ethnic Studies from K-12 public schools the previous afternoon. During the ensuing protest, one author was arrested and charged with third-degree trespassing, but neither professor was involved in planning the protest events. Arizona, the focus of media attention in 2010 for its punitive anti-immigrant stance, moved to legislate ideological borders and zeroed in on a public school curriculum with a history of nurturing a critical consciousness and creating a politically enlightened citizenry (Cammarota 2009). Although we interrogate the ideologies that underpin HB 2281 to illuminate the context of oppression to which the protesters responded, this article is based primar-

Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 ily on participant observation. Far from being a linear protest and conﬁned to one location, it cuts across a number of spatial boundaries. We employ an interdisciplin- ary lens to fully relate the level of civic and student mobilization that transpired that spring day. Cognizant of our position, analytical gaze, and the shifting geographies, our main goal is to tell a story of transformation and resistance. Young people are central to our narrative so we conducted a few follow-up interviews after the protest to evaluate mobilization efforts that seemed to happen instantaneously as “fast organizing” (Yang 2007). In reality, however, students had been strategizing for months. We also examine a concept of educational resistance

*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

ISSN 0951-8398 print/ISSN 1366-5898 online Ó 2011 Taylor & Francis http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2011.600267 http://www.tandfonline.com 640 L.R. Otero and J. Cammarota

known as “transformational resistance” (Solorzano and Delgado Bernal 2001) as it relates to how resistance ﬂows in and through youth organizing and activism. As we unravel the events of May 12, we also examine the role of social networking media, texting in particular, to form a complex web created and utilized by students to garner support for their education and associate these forms, and forums, as expressions of “cultural citizenship” in the twenty-ﬁrst century (Flores and Benmay- or 1997). We conclude by illuminating youth organizing/activism as resistance and a key component to transformational pedagogies.

The subtext of oppression On 23 April 2010, the Governor of Arizona, Jan Brewer signed Senate Bill 1070 (“the broadest and strictest anti-illegal immigration measure in recent US history”), tagged the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act” by its proponents such as legislator Russell Pearce. As she signed the bill, Brewer acknowledged that “people across America are watching Arizona.” The global denouncements, outcries, and protests had not deterred her and her Republican allies from enacting legislation that openly targeted and sought to contain Mexican people. In fact, the glare of the global spotlight seemed to have emboldened them. On May 11, a little over two weeks after signing SB 1070, Jan Brewer signed House Bill 2281, designed to eliminate Ethnic Studies from the public schools. Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne had devised this legislation and ensured its passage in the state’s legislature. This sweeping bill has the potential to shut down Ethnic Studies programs throughout the state. Horne, however, had designed HB 2281 to empower the Superintendent of Public Instruction to investigate and selectively declare programs “out of compliance.” School districts would then be given an ultimatum – dismantle Ethnic Studies programs or lose 10% of their total state funding each year. Thus, this legislation allowed Horne to target Tucson Uniﬁed School District’s (TUSD) Mexican American Studies (MAS) program. He had demonized this program for the last four years, claiming it fos- tered “ethnic chauvinism,” provided a breeding ground for “racial hatred,” and referred to students in this program as “rude” and “insolent.” Thus, HB 2281 included reactionary claims that Ethnic Studies “promotes the overthrow of the US government.” Analogous to SB 1070, the anti-Ethnic Studies bill sought to curtail border

Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 crossing. In this case, it targeted pedagogies that have transformative possibilities and which provide students with unretractable insights into systems of power. HB 2281 opposes “border pedagogy,” which Giroux (1993, 28) asserts is an educational process that builds a “democratic public philosophy” to renew public life through the veneration of cultural differences. Ethnic Studies opponents such as Horne, Pearce, and Brewer, insist on disseminating simplistic narratives based on historical amnesia that mask hegemonic versions of power. They press color-blind narratives and claim that they legislate “without regard to skin color, accent, or social status.” Reﬁned in the rhetoric of cultural imperialism, these high-proﬁle politicians stead- fastly refuse to acknowledge that multiple experiences and oppressions exist, even as they exploit the anemic economy and scapegoat Mexican people. They have mastered the rhetoric that nimbly avoids engaging in any thoughtful conversations that imply unbalanced power relations and that could possibly implicate them as oppressors. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education 641

In recent years, and in many cases, particularly in heated statewide elections, Republicans have managed to control the mainstream political debates. For instance, Horne’s primary criticism of MAS is the use of Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed as a core text. Horne claims that this work “falsely” teaches students they are oppressed. Indeed, Freire’sdeﬁnition of oppression centers on ideological forces that derive from societal institutions that maintain dehumanization through actions that attempt to deny the individual’s right to self-determination. Ironically, by outlawing education programs where students learn ethnic history and culture, Tom Horne imposes obstacles to self-determination and thus oppresses students who seek more relevant pedagogical pathways. According to Horne, “We should be teaching the students that this is the land of opportunity; they can achieve their ambitions if they work hard. They should not be taught that this is the land of oppression” (MacEachern 2008). These types of statements actually testify to the effectiveness of MAS’s use of The Pedagogy of the Oppressed because it produces young people capable of naming their oppressors and in possession of the analytic skills that enable them to create their own counter-narratives. On May 12, they rose to confront their oppressor – Horne, his policies, and the larger structures of power.

Transformational resistance Solorzano and Delgado Bernal (2001) argue that traditional educational resistance theories may point to how student agency contends with social and cultural repro- ductive forces, but fail to acknowledge how this elevated consciousness affects social justice activism. These scholars present a type of resistance termed “transformational resistance” that involves a young person’s understanding of social oppression and commitment to social justice. With an orientation that links oppression with a desire for social justice, young people’s resistances will appear, “political, collective, conscious, and motivated by a sense that individual and social change is possible” (Solorzano and Delgado Bernal 2001, 302). The Ethnic Studies protests we witnessed exemplify the linkages between social change and transformational resistance. Although understanding oppression with a desire for social justice may lead to a resistance fomenting social or institutional change, transformational resistance, we propose, may include actions for change that may not reap immediate results. Therefore, young people’s intentions may produce different consequences not immediately noticed, yet still have long-term

Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 effects. For instance, students protesting a racist school policy may not see the “success” of changing that policy. Through their protest, however, these students promote and sustain a consciousness about the unjust structure of education, which might inspire future actions and educational policies. Although the protests failed to foster immediate success in reversing HB 2281, students engaged and created enhanced public forums to gestate ideas of dissent and imagination. The moment invested in thoughts and actions that initiate dissent and imagination is what Giroux and Giroux (2004) call “public time” in which people discuss, learn, and formulate egalitarian processes and structures that contribute to the overall development of democracy. In other words, time utilized in resistance may fail to produce substantive objective transformation while still generating subjective perspectives that clarify and solidify people’s democratic agency. Transformational resistance includes the time and energies spent to initiate a public forum in which people can enact forms of 642 L.R. Otero and J. Cammarota

democratic citizenship. We turn to these forms of citizenship born from transformational resistances.

The months before the May 12th protest The May 12th protest was not a one-time spontaneous event, but one of many political demonstrations and discussions. Students from many MAS programs and schools had been actively involved for months, participating in a series of events to save Ethnic Studies. In February 2010, when the bill was first introduced into the Arizona legislature, students organized a forum of parents and students from across the school district who discussed the MAS curriculum and how it had inspired them to learn and excel academically. They also discussed the mounting threats. When the bill passed in legislative committee in April, students held a 24-hour vigil and protest in front of Tucson High School, a high-traffic corner across the street from the UA, to support Ethnic Studies. Evidence of their vast social networks is that several hundred people participated throughout the 24-hour period, and the protest received both national and local media attention. Students, joined by parents and community members, formed a human chain at this vigil that lasted throughout the night. This protest that emphasized coming together as a group and the strength that stems from collective mobilization offers insight into the young students’ political ideology. The collective action can be perceived as “authentic help,” what Freire (1998, 113) defines as: “all who are involved help each other mutually, growing together in the common effort to understand the reality which they seek to transform.” Finally, on the evening of 11 May 2010, students from across the district attended a school board meeting. Again, several students entered their voices into the public record and rose to inform school board members and the audience about the virtues of their Ethnic Studies program. It was at this public meeting that some students learned that Horne might visit a MAS classroom the next day.

May 12th protest Indicative of their political competency, most students had been informed of Horne’s intentions after the school board meeting through Facebook, My Space and texting. They did not express their dissatisfaction by boycotting the educational sys-

Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 tem, however. On May 12, they poignantly did what they did on countless ordinary school days. In order to mobilize and stage what in the end appeared as a choreographed demonstration, these students made it a point to attend their respective schools. In itself, this action provides a glimpse into the extensive nature of their political exchanges and strategies. The Social Justice Education Project (SJEP) is the primary youth education and activist program in Tucson and a key component of TUSD’s MAS program (Cam- marota and Romero 2009). When SJEP program manager Kim Dominguez and other SJEP students learned that Tom Horne planned an impromptu visit to a MAS classroom on May 12, they took this opportunity to confront the state’s highest- ranking education ofﬁcer and decided to prevent Horne from using their MAS program to endorse his platform. They had initially planned to block the entrance to the classroom door with a human chain. If Horne would have pursued this plan, the student protests would have been conﬁned to one site and school. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education 643

Around 9:00 am on May 12, SJEP student coordinators learned that Horne had changed his plans and had decided to hold a press conference at the TUSD’s central administration office. They texted fellow students in MAS programs across the city who immediately understood the political meaning and its collective implications. Students at five different schools instantaneously walked out of their schools and marched to the district’s central administration to confront Horne. As they moved onto the streets, they sent more text messages. Such is the nature of social network organizing and protocol; when people receive a call to action or notification about an event, they pass it along. In 2010, forwarding text messages was part technological ease and another part social action to construct and maintain a community of practice (Lave and Wenger 1991). In this case, the community of practice consisted of educators, community members, teachers, students, parents, etc., committed to sustaining and promoting Ethnic Studies. Despite occupying bodies recognized by the dominant society as “minors” and denied full participation in the body politic, the young people who organized and walked out of their schools on May 12 understood the implications of the passage of HB 2281. Students walked out from classes as far as four miles away and some were as young as 11 years old. Dominguez initiated the firestorm sent around 9:30 am through a simple text message that read, “Tom Horne going to TUSD central administration bldg, protest today at 11:00 am in front of TUSD building.” The students furthest away from TUSD headquarters left for their destination from Wakefield Junior High School. Located in the “Southside” this school is about four miles from TUSD headquarters. The protesters could have selected a shorter and more direct path, but the route they chose ensured that their procession drew public attention. Constantly chanting and carrying signs, they marched to confront Horne through the city’s main commercial thoroughfares, including 6th Ave. that crosses through the central business district. Witnessed by one of the authors, the crowd of about 75 junior high school students obeyed traffic signals and the ani- mated procession confined itself to one side of the sidewalk. Cognizant of the dis- tance and high temperature, the professor went to a nearby pharmacy to buy bottled water for the marchers. While in the store, the author noted many women buying provisions – chips, granola bars, juices, and water. It turned out that parents were purchasing these items to support their children’s efforts to defend their education programs. Once the authors arrived at TUSD’s central administration building, the protest

Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 was alive and well, with close to 600 students surrounding the building. They had locked arms and had formed a human chain on the sidewalks in their efforts to control space. The human chain encompassed the entire industrial block and obstructed the main front entrance and all emergency exits. Once Horne arrived, students deduced, he would have no choice but to rupture the human chain. Press outlets arrived in great numbers, ensuring that if Horne fractured the chain, his actions would become a media spectacle. At least two bullhorns blared political call and response chants. They reveal adeptness in locating power and rhetorical creativity. They blended Spanish and English into chants, “Tom Horne Escucha, Estamos En La Lucha” (Attention Tom Horne. We are going to ﬁght back) and “Our Education Is Under Attack, What Do We Do? Fight Back!” The bullhorns directed people to spread out to maintain the integrity of the chain and to elevate their voices. The young students enacted transformational resistance and displayed a political astuteness by reminding their fellow 644 L.R. Otero and J. Cammarota

protesters that “we want the world to hear us.” The central administration building became their space and public stage. Not surprisingly, Tom Horne canceled his press conference and decided to move it downtown to his state building offices. Students learned about the change of venue through the Internet. The Arizona Daily Star published an online news update that student protestors had prevented Horne from holding a gathering at the TUSD administration building, and that he had decided to move his press conference. Once the students learned of this change, they exchanged a flurry of information amongst themselves, exchanged text messages and relocated downtown around 1:00 pm. The authors, who left for 20 minutes to get a drive-through lunch around that time, returned to find the TUSD district offices void of any activity. It seemed surreal that such a large number of protesters had vanished, confirming the dynamics and effectiveness of “fast organizing” (Yang 2007). Again, text messages informed us that the protest had moved downtown. Historically, for more than four decades, the northwestern and southwestern cor- ners of Congress Street and Broadway Boulevard in downtown Tucson have served as sites to engage in political conversations with the larger polis (Otero 2010). Here, Tucsonans congregate to exercise their First Amendment rights to claim or reclaim their rights as citizens. Surrounded by Federal, State and County buildings, a con- glomeration of police forces are omnipresent. For the past month, those opposed to SB 1070 had congregated at this site. To the students and protestors who sought to confront Horne, this space was familiar territory and they transformed it to serve their needs. Many of the students who led the May 12th protests were actively involved in the anti-SB 1070 demonstrations. Although they did not lead or coordinate these events, they used them as sites of praxis. They spent public time reflecting on the injustice of anti-immigrant laws and participated in protests to try to eliminate them. Since the state building is the main structure located on this corner, two of the student protesters we interviewed had engaged in a number of expeditions in and out of the building to gather information. They had surveyed the interior and had mapped out the multileveled structure. Under the guise of searching for bath- room facilities, they learned about the building’s internal structure and security forces. They knew that the state’s education offices were located upstairs and they noted which entrance had the strongest police presence. They also deter- mined that law enforcement had a tendency to lock the front and side entrances

Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 when demonstrators congregated on the corner. Once protesters started to congregate on Congress and Broadway, law enforcement agents deployed a Mexican American ofﬁcer to contend with the growing crowd in front of the State building. Unfamiliar with the group, he sought “the lea- der” and talked to someone who agreed to conform and wait outside until things had been worked out. The ofﬁcer, thinking that he had communicated with someone in authority, turned and began to walk back to the State Building. He had not taken more than 10 steps before Dominguez blared into the megaphone, “Tom Horne is in the building and we need to talk to him.” Students did not use the main entrance but rushed about 50 feet on the south side of the building through what is consid- ered the back door, an entrance they knew was most likely to be unlocked. The crowd of demonstrators surprised the police and gave them limited lead-time to prevent their entry. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education 645

The authors were caught up in the wave of protesters who seemed to know where they were going. We witnessed the police attempt to intervene but were overwhelmed by close to 100 people with truthful energy and intentions to confront Horne. Almost instantaneously, police emerged from a side corridor and formed a line around the stairway. One megaphone blared, “Tom Horne is upstairs. Go up the stairs.” About 10 law enforcement officers could not stop the protesters from racing up the stairway. Once they reached the top of the stairs the protesters faced another obstacle as a police officer had arrived there just in time to lock the glass doors, thereby shielding Horne and his press conference. Instantly, the protesters locked arms, sat down and blocked the doorway. In the meantime Horne, insulated from protesters, offered reporters a blown-up photograph of about five Brown Berets members who had attended the 24-hour vigil a few weeks prior and offered inaccurate information:

This is a protest of my bill by students and teachers at Tucson High School and as you can see they’re dressed in revolutionary clothing. It’s a visual image that conﬁrms [and] conveys a revolutionary message, a separatist message, a message that makes students hostile to the United States.

The Brown Berets were not students or teachers, but community members who had attended the vigil to support the students’ action. The deputy superintendent, Margaret Dugan, chimed in and added, “The curriculum advanced in these classes openly attacks the founding fathers and the free market enterprise that created our economy and made it strong.”1 Dugan somehow forgot that many of the founding fathers were in fact themselves protesters who advocated the use of dissent to foster democracy. After the press conference, protesters who sat and blocked the main sec- ond floor doorway, forced Horne and his supporters to exit through an obscure back entrance. In a nation borne out of protest, Horne and his supporters refused to concede that the students raised legitimate concerns about their education. In keeping with the political forms introduced by the “founding fathers,” these demonstrators con- sidered themselves citizens and they recognized that the First Amendment guaran- teed their right to protest and the right to air their grievances. In a conversation with a student activist several months after the protest one stated, “We wanted him [Horne] to face us. He avoided doing this. This was a press conference at a public state building so we had a right to be there and be heard.” Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 Information as to when each individual protester recognized that they could be arrested is elusive. Those sitting upstairs and who blocked the stairway, however, knew that they had placed their bodies at risk for either violence or incarceration. The number of protesters on the first floor started to grow and the media that had gathered for the Horne press conference refocused their energies on the protesters. Told numerous times to remain quiet and not to use the megaphone, the protesters insisted on their right to be heard. At one point one of the police officers informed the crowd that, “This is state building – reserved for state business.” One protester offered, “This IS state business.” Protesters morphed this into a chant to remind law enforcement agents that they belonged in that space and were there to conduct a legitimate transaction with the Arizona State Superintendent of Schools. The protesters continually reconfirmed to police officers that they were “insiders” and refuted essentialist portrayals of them as “outside” agitators (D’arcus 2004). 646 L.R. Otero and J. Cammarota

After the protesters sat in a circle and refused to move for about two hours, the police announced that they were closing the building and that all who remained would be arrested. They gradually and yet forcefully escorted about 80 protesters outside and locked the doors. They also removed all media, ensuring that no video documentary evidence of the arrests exists. Fifteen people were arrested that afternoon, two university Ethnic Studies professors, two community members, eight former TUSD MAS students all younger than 26 years old and three minors.

Implications This protest provides an example of technological “cultural citizenship” (Flores and Benmayor 1997). Through the use of social media networking, young people con- structed a community that sought progress for Latinos by elevating their political claims grounded on perceived injustice, and defending their ethnic identities. The young people at this protest demonstrated a commitment to exercising their rights as citizens within a cultural community and utilized old and new political forms to publicize their political claims to a global audience. Students incorporated a variety of media and new technologies (i.e. electronic texts, MySpace, Facebook, etc.) to manifest their citizenship claims. After the crowds had disbanded and the police had released the 15 arrested, the protest moved into virtual space. Various video postings (edited and raw) informed the world of the May 12th events in Tucson. In contrast to fearful predictions that the new technologies would cause young people to withdraw from civic space, in this case, new forms of communication brought students from different geographies together and enhanced their mobility. The act of consciously and collectively gathering to walk to the school district’s headquarters and moving downtown indicate that students located the nexus of power. The subtext of Horne’s statement three months after the May 12th protest when schools were out of session is tinged with projections of latent criminality and juvenile delinquency. “The last time we had a press conference on this subject [anti-Ethnic Studies],” Horne noted, “we had a lot of student demonstrators, but at that time they were able to get out of school. Today they can’t get out of school, so there doesn’t seem to be as much interest” (Huichochea 2010). As the head educator in the state, Horne’s statement provides insight into the ideology used to design and implement educational structures in Arizona. Far from believing in what bell hooks (1994) calls “education as a practice of freedom,” ’ fi ’ “ ” fl Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 Horne s ideology con rms Foucault s (1979, 266) carceral system. To brie y summarize, this educational scheme denotes one where delinquency is inherently inscribed, in this case onto young students of color, casting the need for surveil- lance mechanisms that ensure order. Horne’s politics do not allow envisioning that students could possibly value their education, and that they would be willing to fight to maintain and protect their Ethnic Studies programs. The May 12th demonstrations confirm that these students understood their larger role as citizens and sought to affirm their role in a political system they felt intended to deprive them of their education and violate their rights as student-citizens. The May 12th mobilization indicates that the student protesters did not perceive their classroom settings as spatially restricted from the larger city or nation. Walking out of their schools into the streets is a powerful statement. Previous research has linked the Ethnic Studies programs under attack as nurturing a critical consciousness in students (Cammarota and Romero 2006, 2009). What remained underappre- International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education 647

ciated, however, is how heightened insights into intersecting social relationships embolden students to resist spatially ﬁxed territorial boundaries that have served to separate nations and enforce social difference (McDowell 1999). The protests, like those that have recently taken place in the Middle East, indicate the power of social networking media technologies to transform local events into global ones. The local news networks continually sought adults to interview. Both authors refused offers and directed reporters to talk to students. One reporter stated outright that he wanted to talk to only adults and “someone in charge.” Indicative of attempts to portray adults as key organizers, one blogger asked, “Why aren’t the adults who organized these children arrested for misleading and inciting them? I work with this age group and they don’t get this organized without help!” Although no one individual organized this protest, young people, such as Kim Dominguez, did step up and took charge. Our observations and the determination we witnessed that day have convinced us that these students will continue to ﬁght for and defend their Ethnic Studies programs long after naysayers and reactionary politicians have exited.

Update In November 2010, the Arizona electorate selected Tom Horne as their Attorney General. His support for SB 1070 and his anti-Ethnic Studies stance formed the main tenets of his platform. His successor John Huppenthal is currently auditing TUSD’s MAS program and the interpretations of the data gathered will largely affect its fate. As an indication of the subjective application of legal justice, elabo- rate trials were held for those arrested and charged with third-degree criminal trespassing charges. Five protesters were found guilty, two were acquitted, and the rest are pending. In October 2010, 11 teachers ﬁled a lawsuit that challenges HB 2281 in the courts. Students continue to mobilize to defend their MAS programs, and on 26 April 2011, they carefully choreographed the take over of the TUSD school board meeting.

Note 1. http://www.kgun9.com/Global/story.asp?S=12474068.

Notes on contributors Downloaded by [University of Arizona] at 09:25 26 September 2011 Lydia R. Otero is an associate professor in the Department of Mexican American Studies at the University of Arizona where she specializes in urban environments and cultural history. Otero is the author of La Calle: Spatial Conﬂicts and Urban Renewal in a Southwestern City, published by the University of Arizona Press in 2010. Her work on claiming place, historical preservation, and Mexican American resistance in the 1930s has appeared as contributions to various anthologies.

Julio Cammarota is an associate professor in the Department of Mexican American Studies at the University of Arizona. His research focuses on participatory action research with Latina/o youth, institutional factors in academic achievement, and liberatory pedagogy. He has published articles on family, work, and education among Latinas/os and on the relationship between culture and academic achievement. He is the co-editor of two volumes in the Critical Youth Studies series published by Routledge/Falmer Press: Beyond Resistance! Youth Activism and Community Change: New Democratic Possibilities for Practice and Policy for America’s Youth (2006) and Revolutionizing Education: Youth 648 L.R. Otero and J. Cammarota

Participatory Action Research in Motion (2008). Cammarota has published an ethnography on Latina/o youth entitled, Sueños Americanos: Barrio Youth Negotiate Social and Cultural Identities (University of Arizona Press, 2008). His work has been instrumental in advancing social justice in education and youth development. Currently he is the co-director of the Social Justice Education Project in Tucson, Arizona.

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