Hello, and welcome to the bookmark.

I'm Christine Brown, your host.

Today.

My guest is James Ferreira, author of We Want Better Education the 1960s Chicano Student Movement, School walkouts, and the quest for Educational Reform in South Texas.

James, thank you so much for being here today.

Thank you so much for having me.

Well, that's that subtitle is a pretty good job of giving us an overview of what the book is, but can you maybe give us a little bit of a longer summary of what the book is about?

Sure.

Yes.

It was in the 1960s when you had people from different walks of life participate in the American civil rights, civil rights movement.

Right then the civil rights movement that had, of course, had a profound impact throughout the country.

And key among those participated were Hispanic, Mexican-American students.

And so it's interesting to see how to examine and learn how they were major participants in their own social movement for educational, public school reform and there's so much to, of course, traced back as far as what they were going through prior to the 1960s.

But in the book, you can learn about how the students became more vocal in expressing their desire for promoting their educational needs, whether it was wanting to have better access to resources to attend college, or whether it was wanting to have more effective counseling, or whether it was, wanted to have a better curriculum to prepare them for college level work.

you know, they really had their own concerns and desires, and at times they felt that their needs are not being met, educational needs aren't being met.

And so they, became, of course, disappointed, but especially by the late 1960s or high, the civil rights movement.

And it was also a time of what's known as a Chicano movement, Mexican-Americans overall throughout the country, involved in their own social protest movement.

And so they join that type of movement, the what they what they were known in the Chicano student movement.

And so they really had expressed their yearning.

You know, they're they're getting to a point where they said, yeah, Basta, enough's enough.

We don't want to put up with inequality anymore.

We don't want to put up with, substandard conditions or inferior education.

We want to have educational equality.

We want to have a sense of self-identity, you know, to to recognize their culture recognized in the public school and also the Spanish language that they have, opportunity to speak Spanish freely on school grounds, because in my studies, I found out that they were, though, and was also my interviews, that they were those students that were actually reprimanded for speaking Spanish in the school grounds.

And we're not talking about the classroom we're talking about.

And during recess, we're talking about on the MP class and in, in the lunchroom and things like that, that, that they felt was unfair, you know, like they're being denied, opportunity to speak their native language or what they call their mother tongue Spanish.

And, and you have to realize that many of them grew up speaking Spanish in the home.

That was a first language, as English was a second language to them.

And so it took them a while.

When they're growing up as children, you know, to learn the English language.

And so they also wanted understanding from teachers, you know, understanding where they're coming from, their culture, their language proficiency and so forth.

So can you, maybe expand on what the term Chicano means and kind of what the Chicano movement was just kind of broadly across the United States?

Yes, in my studies in, in my assessment, and this is my personal view, because I know that the various interpretations in the word Chicano.

But for me, the way I see it is there are two meanings, two meanings of the word Chicano.

first, the word Chicano for young Mexican-American students in the 60s reflects their desire to recall, to remember their ancestral roots.

We're talking about, their indigenous Mexican Indian ancestor roots, right.

The what's known as the original Indian identity.

And so they had an interest in history and discovering who they were, who their ancestors were.

Many, many years ago.

And the second meaning of the word Chicano reflects their desire to become politically active, to be more direct action involved in protest and to express their needs, and to be vociferous, and to have a voice in decision making process of their schools and other institutions as well.

And in America.

And so it was also a shift and you could say, a generational shift, because prior to the 1960s, there was a previous Mexican-American generation that, you know, were more, you could say accommodation as according to the eyes of the Chicano activist.

And so the Chicano activists felt that, well, we need to step it up.

You know, we need to, you know, quote unquote, up our game.

You know what I'm saying?

We need to really express our needs more and not go to the, quote unquote, through the system like we used to before, in previous years.

And we have to be more, like I said, directly involved in expressing our, you know, our demands or our desires for, for equality, for citizenship, to recognized as, students who are worthy of, of, being, being given assistance to go to college and to be able to to show that, that they are just as important as anybody else or just as American as anybody else.

And so for these, young students, Mexican-American, Chicano students, they also very much influenced, of course, by what was going on in the larger context, right, in the country with Martin Luther King Jr. and, and also his followers, what they were doing throughout the country and direct action, nonviolent civil disobedience, protests.

And that's what they adopted throughout much of the movement that Chicano students in South Texas, nonviolent peaceful civil disobedience protest and to to also make their voice heard as well, not just verbally, but also through what they did in their respective protest in their local areas.

Yeah.

To to jump ahead just a bit, though, what you're saying, they were very organized.

They they clearly watched and saw what was happening around the country and said, okay, if we want change, this is the way we do it.

We they had lists of them and demands, but they were we'll talk about, I'm sure, what they are reasonable but they would type up, here's what we want, here's how we're going to negotiate.

They weren't just, you know, walking out of school with no action plan or no demands or no direction.

They were very specific and clear about what they wanted and how to address what they needed.

Right?

Yeah.

And in my research, what I found out was and it's also through in my interviews that I do the former students is that they, of course, definitely were organized.

And the way they did that was to meet in in students homes and in different homes in the community and to also meet about, you know, meet about, what they're going to plan, you know, and that, of course, planning the protests right away.

But to plan and what they were considering in their school, what they want to improve in their school and, and to also meet with community activists.

And I mentioned this in the book about the Mexican-American youth organization Meio.

they were very influential.

And there are certain I don't want to get into details, but there are certain scholars that claim that Meio is responsible for the success of the students, the student walkouts protest.

And to some degree, that's true.

But I have done my interviews, of course, for years.

Right.

And and what I have, what I have noticed is that it wasn't all about Mexican-American youth organization, about my you know, it wasn't them doing everything for the students.

The students themselves took initiative.

They had initiative.

They had desire for change in the in the local communities, whether it was in Kelso or there's a West side San Antonio, whether it was in Crystal city or in Kingsville, the local students, should be credited for what they wanted to accomplish as well.

And, and for helping provide feedback for the demands, student demands that they presented to the school districts of their respective cities and that, and that they also were supportive, or I should say, also supported by their parents.

not all parents, unfortunately.

Yeah.

I wanted to bring that up.

there's in the book, there's kind of four case studies, almost of of different walkouts across.

You mentioned the cities in Texas, and there's a varying degree of parental support.

can you talk about how how that was received by parents?

Well, of course it it varied.

I know one of my first interviews I did, for the book was with, mighty set up Rodriguez Lozano, and she, of course, was she already had made up her mind.

You know, she already decided I want to walk out because of the condition of the school, and that, you know, differential treatment, unfair treatment in the school.

And so she, she had already agreed to walk out.

And when that happened, her mother got very angry and and basically told her, how could you do that?

How could you walk out, you know, you're going to you're going to forego your education and you're going to deny yourself the opportunity to graduate.

So that was a fear at that time from some parents.

But there were other parents, and I know I have a picture of that in the book.

A parent, Luis Chavez, who was a father of three students that walked out in that calculus, a Texas, and he met with, the school principal, Marvin Pipkin.

And at the time, of course, he only spoke Spanish.

And there was a translator, Juanito Mazzini, that translator for the principal, Martin Pipkin.

And so it's interesting, you know, to see that kind of of role that the parents play, that Luis Chavez and that couch Elsa.

And to express his support, even though he probably had his doubts about the children going out in the walkout and participated in the walkout, he he felt that he was doing the right thing, you know, to support his children that had protested and walked out of the school.

And I think if I was in Crystal city, where the students kind of got their parents to get up and come to the school board meetings to to show out.

So it's not just all these kids, it's their parents.

You know, we have the backing.

We're not just a bunch of children complaining.

You know, we have legitimate concerns and our parents are with us on this, right?

Yeah.

And what happened at Crystal city is that they had and it's difficult to assess or evaluate how, you know, how many parents are actually participating.

But they were they were more parents involved in supporting the Crystal City High School walkout as 69.

And there were those and I have a picture in the book, a picture of parents, mainly mothers.

providing food to the participants of the walkout at Crystal city, you know, and, and there were also those that helped make signs for the students, protest signs for them to picket.

And so they're out of all the communities I examined more, there was more parental support in Crystal city.

And you also have to understand that there was also a whole San Diego terrace, very much involved in organizing the parents.

And of course, he was an inner Crystal city, Jose Gutierrez, and he was very influential in persuading the parents, you know, to support the walkout.

And and what I found out about Gutierrez is that he would try to convince the fathers about, the daughters.

You know, that the daughters, you know, the daughters are not being allowed to, you know, to become cheerleaders that was emanation.

Crystal city is that they're being denied opportunity, the fair, equal opportunity to try out and become a member of the cheerleading squad.

So what are you going to do about it?

You know, that's how it kind of challenged, the parents, especially the fathers, kind of appealed to that machismo streak.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Yeah, exactly.

Which was a very smart strategy.

There was, what was one thing I noticed throughout the book is that the all the activists really did a good job of kind of appealing to, to their own people in their own way.

You know, it's so interesting when you read about civil rights, the differences between this with, say, the black civil rights movement, because they know their community, they know well, this is what's working there.

We can take some elements and but then mix it in with our culture and have our own, our own protest here.

Right.

I do want to ask you though, because the, the condition of the schools, it's such an interesting the way that Mexican-American students were treated, the segregation issue was slightly different because legally, technically they were considered white.

So it's not the same as the black students were encountering.

But there was I think you called it something like in practice or de facto segregation because, they, they, they were still being segregated, if not to the same degree that African American students were seeing.

Right?

Yeah.

That's what, readers may not acknowledge at the beginning when they start to read the book that just like African-Americans, Mexican-Americans, Hispanics were also divided.

And this this occurred, you know, to the 1970s, it would occur all the way up to the 1970s before finally that residential, segregation was, was, ended.

Right?

I mean, you had, segregation going on for a long time up until I say the 70s.

And so what I have what I have noticed in my studies and research is that and I also heard this from my father, because my father remembers this as well, growing up in Pharr, Texas, and also in the South Texas.

And he remembers that there was the Anglo part of town and the Mexican part of town.

Normally the railroad tracks would divide the people, and it was usually Mexican-Americans or Mexican immigrants in the Mexican part of town that would work as migrant laborers or may have jobs on the other side of town.

For Anglo American employers.

And so there wasn't very much socializing among those people at the time.

it would just mainly work relationship.

And that was it.

If you had to go on the other side of town, you did it because you had to do a job for an employer.

And, and with the schools on their part of town, the so-called Mexican part of town, the Hispanic students notice that, well, our, our schools are rundown.

The facilities are lacking.

they're not as fully equipped as the other side of town where you have predominant Anglo Americans students.

And so that's where they began to question about, I mean, why, why are we having to go to the schools that are substandard or below standard and why are we having to to get an education that's not up to par to the other side of the city, where they're having more access to college level courses or preparatory courses.

On the other side of town there they have guest speakers that are encouraged, encouraging them to go to college while on the other side of town.

And this this also occurred.

And why side San Antonio?

What I found out is that there were a few guest speakers are prison inmates that would encourage them to all be careful not to break the law, you know, which is I mean, that's that's okay.

But what about other speakers?

That's what they question.

The students question what about other people coming in from professional fields?

And and you get the sense they're becoming really disappointed and really upset and annoyed because they felt that they're not able to have access to better quality education.

And, and they also felt that they were only being tracked or the only being allowed to focus on vocational fields or vocational training or schooling that prepare them for vocational trades.

And by the late 1960s, Chicano student movement, they felt, okay, we're not going to we don't want to do that anymore.

You know, if there are other students that want that, that's great.

But for those of us, you know, the Chicano Act that was we want to go into go into the professional fields.

You want to pursue education, prepares you for college, you know, and to be able to have opportunity to become doctors and lawyers, other professionals, and to really show their intelligence, because that's what they also felt that they felt they weren't being treated fairly.

They felt like, well, we're not showing ourselves as capable of doing a good job in our studies.

like having honors classes or having more advanced coursework in the schools.

Where is that?

You know, why don't we have that in our schools like the other part of town?

And or they were being encouraged to join the military?

Exactly.

Yeah.

1968, which is a dangerous thing to do.

So why can't we go to college?

Why can't we?

Why can't we do it the English students are doing.

Right.

Yeah.

Because at the time of the 60s and also the early 70s, it was a Vietnam War.

And there was concern, especially among the Mexican-American men, the young men that what if I go to, if I'm drafted I go to war, if am I going to come back home, I might not get back home.

And so, I mean, there were there were those that did want to go into the war.

it it wasn't.

Everybody wanted to avoid the war or avoid being drafted.

And there are studies other studies that, that show that, that those are willing Mexican-American men willing to go to, to the war and, you know, being drafted.

But they were still those that fell.

When I want to go into I still want to go to college, I want to have an opportunity to go in a professional field and show, what I can accomplish with a college degree.

And so that there was that interest.

I see that desire to want to show that they're capable, that they are competent, and that they are just as skillful as anybody else in society.

I mean, there were various walkouts that had various degrees of success.

But can you kind of talk about, the what happened afterwards, or were there demands met?

what I have notice is that it took time.

it didn't happen overnight.

Obviously, but I recall in one of my interviews with Richard Herrera, a West side San Antonio, who who attended the Edgewood High School walkout, or he was at Edgewood High School, was part of the Edgewood High School walkout.

he remembers within a year that they had had done various refurbish, they refurbished the gym, they had remodeled the building and made in various improvements over time to the school facilities.

And so is within a year or two.

And they're being made these improvements and and of course, there are other places it may have taken a few years longer, but it also was a time by the end of the 1960s when you have more Mexican-Americans, get involved in school elections, school board, become school board members, to want to finish their college degree, to become school teachers and and want to and for the school district to hire more Mexican-American faculty, Hispanic faculty, which they felt was lacking at the time.

By the end of the 1960s.

And so it definitely was a quote unquote, political awakening for, for Mexican-Americans, Chicanos.

And that they, you know, they really wanted to express our desire for that social political change and also involved community activism and to be vocal and to be more, you can say more, vociferous about their desire to, to become participants because that's all they wanted to do is they they desire to follow the school rules.

They desire to work within the school system as best they could, and gaining a better understanding of the school system and its procedures.

And they also wanted to understand more about school board elections, about hiring practices of the school, the students themselves.

They wanted a more active voice in the student council and extracurricular activities.

the students, I guess, like I mentioned earlier, they wanted access to to coursework that prepare them for college.

And they also wanted, I said, to have speakers, guest speakers.

They would that would encourage you to pursue professional fields.

And they wanted more of graded curriculum.

And so it was that kind of reform that really made a made a very drastic impact.

You know, a very significant impact on the school systems themselves.

And where you see Mexican-Americans going from, you could say, a so-called silent majority to a more vocal majority and, and more, passionate, you know, more focused on what they want to accomplish in the schools and to, quote unquote, make the schools their own, so to speak, and to, you know, and to be proud of that, you know, be proud of of Chicano being Chicano, their identity, as you know, it was also a desire for them to to want to preserve their cultural identity and to be recognized as, speakers of Spanish, not just English.

And of course, they were bilingual.

And like I said before, someone that grew up only speaking Spanish at first.

So it took time for them to learn the English language.

But still they felt that they want to preserve their cultural identity, but at the same time, to appreciate the opportunity that they had in the American public school system and to show that they could accomplish their goals or academic goals and not just that, but also their career goals in the future.

And so it's really amazing how this history helps us understand the trajectory.

You know, how they've come such a long way, these young students from where they're going, when they're going to school up until their their adult life, and to notice how they're activists and really made an impact, really made a difference in and improving the schools.

And of course, there's still room for improvement.

But that said, that Chicano student one was definitely, very profound and very, very important movement.

And I would argue that's also part of the overall civil rights movement tie to civil rights movement that was happening around the country.

And so it, definitely the student movement definitely reflects the students desire to want to, to, show that they that they valued their education, they wanted to make the most of their education and that they cared about their education.

A good example of that, to me is I forget which school forgive me, but one of the when they walked out, they were out for a little while.

They had what they called a teachin so that they could still continue studying, even though they had walked out of school and they weren't attending classes.

They didn't want to fall behind, so they got together and they studied so that they could, when they eventually did go back to school so that they wouldn't be they wouldn't miss anything.

I mean, they just that just shows how much they wanted to learn.

They wanted their education, as the book title says, and as the picture of them holding the sign says, they just wanted a better quality of education, which is a wonderful thing to want, right?

Yeah.

And there's a picture in the book that shows miss again teaching a class outside the school.

When the protest occurred.

And you would think that in that kind of instance, students I want to skip, they want to just go home.

But the students, they had the option of protest, which is you know, their their decision.

But there were those that said well we want to make the most of our education, we want to still have class outside the school.

And this was outside Edgewood High School in 1968.

And there's a large gathering of students around this teacher who's holding a I think it's a notepad and and trying to give instruction and teacher teaching the students and and so it's amazing to to see that they did really want to continue their education.

And the same thing happened at Crystal city as well.

And and also Epcot shows.

I know they got show.

So after the walkout began, they were about 30 students that continue their education.

La Hoya High School, up until they were allowed to go back into the school in early January, 69 and in, in Crystal city.

They were those that were recruited to teach students that had walked out, but they met in in a few areas and Crystal city, and I forget the name of the area, but but they had, they had those that were hired, as you, you can say, temporary teachers, to come in and to teach the students.

They walked out, until they can go back to school officially, you know, they can go back to school or reenroll, and that was about, I would say a few weeks after the walkout began, the students were allowed to go back.

But in the meantime, they said they were being taught by students, are recruited to help them out, and making sure they continue their studies and not fall behind or fail.

Yes, because it was that important to them.

Now, unfortunately, we're running low on time here.

So in our in our final minute, what do you want people to take away from your book?

Well, I would I would appreciate if, if the readers would, understand that this is a book meant for everybody.

It's not for Chicanos or Hispanics, even though it does feature them, but to also realize that it's a part of the history of Texas, you know, part of the history of America.

And as I mentioned in the book, I tie it to the overall civil rights movement.

You know how civil rights movement and the country influenced the students themselves.

And and this happened in Texas schools, right.

And how, how these students were so passionate, like I said, they were so concerned, you know, about wanting to achieve and and accomplish their education and that they wanted to be part of the decision making process and their parents as well, the parents that support it, they want to become part of the decision making process.

And so they definitely were active in that movement to show their voice, their political voice in that.

And, and, and also show that they were community activists.

And we're not going to to settle for second best, so to speak, that they really wanted to, to get the best quality education that they could in their public school system.

And so so I think it's also important for the readers to realize that, that this is also important in understanding, culture, you know, though.

So another culture like the Hispanic culture and their unknown or their various other cultures in Texas as well, an opportunity to understand where people were coming from, how they grew up and their culture and what language they spoke growing up.

And to, you know, to be more aware of how this history can tell us how, how the students and their parents and supporters were very, very influential and very instrumental in making that school reform, become reality.

And we're going to have to leave it right there.

but thank you so much.

This is such an interesting book and interesting topic.

I really appreciate you being here.

Thank you so much for having me again.

That's all the time we have for today.

Again, that book is called We Want Better Education by James Ferrera.

I'm Christine Brown.

Thank you so much for joining us.