Community Rights Campaign

Delona Washington, an intern with the Summer Youth Organizing Academy, writes about her experience as a young black woman newly graduated from high school.

We had a great rally to set the tone for the new school year. We urged LAUSD to adopt a more comprehensive plan to protect youth from discriminatory ticketing and overpolicing. There had been some solid progress earlier in the summer in our meetings with LASPD and LAUSD. But with students coming back to school, we need the District to take more concrete steps forward.

Community Rights member Ezinne Nwankwo writes about her trip to Ohio for the Children's Defense Fund Conference.

SYOA intern Khushboo Gulati wrote this essay on the importance of Art as Resistance. "Resistance art is the product of stories unheard, resilience ignored, and ideas suppressed. It is a vessel through which people unite, histories are documented and through which one can learn. Recording our work, our struggle, our losses and our victories is the only way we can keep our unheard histories and herstories alive as US hegemony controls our textbooks and classes."

As the Summer Youth Organizing Academy begins its program, we asked the youth to write about their experiences. First in the series is summer intern Stephen Samayoa.

A coalition of parents, students and civil rights groups are working together to reform school discipline. Right now in California there are bills in the State Assembly that address school discipline policy and we are working with our Dignity in Schools allies to support this vital reform.

On March 2nd a historical gathering was held by members of the California State Assembly. Focusing on the issues facing boys and men of color in California communities, it was one of 5 regional hearings held.