The Providence Student Union (PSU) rallied outside the Providence School Department Wednesday to demand Ethnic Study classes be taught for credit in high school. The event served as a kickoff to the PSU’s #OurHistoryMatters campaign, to counter the lack of representation of the Latino, Black, Southeast Asian, and American Indian population in the school’s classes.
PSU was joined in their effort by representatives from PrYSM, the EJLRI, Youth in Action and DARE as well as community and labor leaders.
Recent studies have shown that high school students perform better when race and ethnicity classes are offered. A Guardian report on a Stanford University study said, “Student attendance increased by 21%, while grade-point averages surged nearly a grade and a half for those enrolled in the class – striking results, according to the researchers.”
Students spoke passionately about the lack of representation in their history classes (see video below). They also resented having to learn real history outside of school. “I just recently learned the truth about Columbus Day,” said Diane Gonzalez from Central High School. “I didn’t know who Columbus really was, until I learned it with Providence Student Union, in one of our mini workshops about oppression… I’m Guatemalan, and I have no idea about our history at all.”
“This is an undeniable problem,” said Afaf Akid, a senior at E-Cubed Academy and a PSU youth leader, in a statement. “We did an analysis of the American history textbook we use in Providence, and our results were shocking. Of our textbook’s 1,192 pages, fewer than 100 pages are dedicated to people of color. That’s less than 10% of our history curriculum, in a district where 91% of the students are people of color. That is unacceptable. And, of course, the few references to people of color are problematic as well, often treating issues like slavery and colonialism as neutral or even positive developments. We deserve better.”
“The oppression of enslaved African-Americans and Native Americans is disguised as… ‘cultural exchange,'” said Licelit Caraballo, “the hardships that Asians had to endure as they migrated to the US is viewed as just ‘seeking work’ when they were also treated as slaves. Our history books don’t cover these topics.”
A very interesting part of the presentation consisted of holding up black and white posters of famous activists of color, and asking those in attendance if they knew the people pictured. First up was Bayard Rustin, a leader in civil rights, socialism, nonviolence, and gay rights written out of civil rights history because of his homosexuality and atheism. Also held up was Fred Hampton of the Black Panther Party, Grace Lee Boggs, author, social activist, philosopher and feminist born here in Providence, Dolores Huerta, labor leader and civil rights activist and Ella Baker, civil and human rights activist.
“We think it should be pretty self-evident that Providence students need a more culturally relevant curriculum,” said Justin Hernandez, a junior at Hope High School and a PSU school delegate. “But if those in charge of our school system need convincing, we are ready. We’re used to tough fights, from ending the unfair NECAP graduation requirement to expanding bus passes. And we are excited to do whatever it takes to win ethnic studies courses and move our schools a little closer towards providing us the education we deserve.”
“A 14.3 percent poverty rate is the story for this year,” said Richman, “but it need not be the story for next year.”
Also, as they have asked nearly every year and to no avail, the Coalition would like the General Assembly to take action to reform PayDay loans. This is unlikely as long as Speaker Mattiello continues to 
Despite growing consensus that out-of-school suspensions should only be used as a discipline of last resort, Rhode Island school districts continued to overuse suspensions during the 2014-2015 school year, a report by the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island has found. The report, 
The letter acknowledged that Pawtucket should not be singled out for such problems. A 2011 review by the ACLU of SRO use across the state found that many school departments had similar “one-sided” MOUs and that there were many incidents in which the presence of a police officer escalated a student’s minor infraction, such as wearing a hat in school, into an arrest for disorderly conduct.
The twenty people, parents, activists, concerned citizens and students, gathered in the meeting room at the Pawtucket Public Library Tuesday night agreed that the police officer violently arresting two brothers at Tolman High School last week used, “too much force.”
An activist countered that, “safety is different from policing” and then worked to disentangle the two ideas. “Developing forms of keeping each other safe is important,” he said. “We need to ask ourselves ‘Why are our schools unsafe?’
Back in the meeting room at the Pawtucket Library, someone suggested educating high school kids about their rights and teaching the youth to prevent the kinds of situations where they might be targeted for arrest by police officers. An objection to the second part of this idea was immediately voiced: Framing this as “how kids should behave puts the blame [for police violence] on the kids.”
“I don’t know how to defend myself and my children as a Hispanic woman,” said a mother. She has come to this meeting because she can imagine her children being arrested by police officers as shown in the video, and she worries. Like everyone in the room, she knows the statistics about students of color being disproportionately suspended from school. She is aware of the school to prison pipeline, and she wants to keep her children out of it.
Students held signs and talked to the media after school today in support of a teacher suspended for his comments about birth control in a tenth grade class.
