The Fight for Educational Justice in Chicago: Learning from Activism from our Elders and Ancestors

• In Event: Justice as Praxis: Intergenerational Struggles, Place, and Pedagogy

Abstract

This paper will focus on educational justice movement building, aiming to reveal the cultural wealth (Yosso, 2005) of activists from Chicago. Their activism demonstrates the power of leveraging community cultural wealth to resist the deficit and racist ideologies that tend to inform the policies and practices of schooling and education Anchoring the work of the Chicago young lords (ChYLO) and other activists to community cultural wealth offers a space for scholars and practitioners to explore the implications for other social movement building; specifically in the field of education. The assemblage of ChYLO was a critical and self-affirming act of resistance and organizing first taken on by young Puerto Ricans in Chicago seeking to free themselves from a colonial existence. Their work addressed overarching social issues across a myriad of populations, facilitating our understanding that the struggles of Puerto Ricans were intertwined with the struggles of many other marginalized and oppressed peoples.

Authors

• Erica Davila, Lewis University

• Elvira Pichardo, Lewis University

• Valentina Gamboa Turner, CPS Parent