AFT CONVENTION REPORT: Human Rights luncheon highlights Chicago outreach other issues
One of the highlights of the conventions of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) is the Human Rights luncheon. And this year, it was a major event for the Chicago Teachers Union as two of the five panelist during the Los Angeles convention were from Chicago, Karen Lewis, President of the Chicago Teachers Union and Jitu Brown, who began with the Kenwood Oakland Community Organization. The luncheon was held on July 12, 2014 during the AFT convention in Los Angeles and is being reported here now for the first time.
Panelists at the AFT Human Rights luncheon. Substance photo by Jean Schwab.The AFT Human Rights Luncheon and the Bayard Rustin Human Rights Award was held on July 12, 2014 during the AFT convention.
The moderator was Baltimore's Lorretta Johnson, Secretary-Treasurer of the AFT. Speakers were Karen Lewis, President of the Chicago Teachers Union, Jitu Brown, national director of the Journey for Justice Alliance, Marielena Hincapie, executive director. of the National Immigration Law Center, and Kent Wong, director of the UCLA Labor Center. The 2014 Bayard Rustin Human Rights Award was presented Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, who has been leading the Moral Monday movement in North Caroline.
"We started to work with community members as a caucus (CORE of the CTU)," from the beginning [in 2009], Karen Lewis told the group. "We were horrified with the closing of schools in the city; we started talking to community members, organizations and we began exposing the proliferation of Charter Schools. We talked to Jitu Brown, of the Kenwood Oakland Community Organization (KOCO), early on. We had a goal of people working hard, not only at the union, but out in the community. We knew that we were making headway when we looked out of the window and saw a sea of red at one of our rallies."
Jitu Brown told the group: "I worked as a volunteer for KOCO, one of the oldest community organizations in Chicago. People need a safe place to express how the city worked. I saw young people at every corner late at night. I started working with youth. In 1998 CPS started closing schools and we began to organize because our very existence in the neighborhood was in danger. We started working on affordable housing. We started working with organizations in our city to stop the closing of schools. Out of necessity, communities that didn�t work together for fifteen years started to work together. Now people that never worked together can sit down and work together. We needed an organization to take the lead and Karen took that over. Last week we shut down traffic on La Salle Street in Chicago. Seventeen year olds saying, �If we don�t get it, we will shut you down �Our base income is $35,000 and we have 800 members and they are serious. We will shut this city down.�
Lorretta Johnson told the group that It has to be a movement reclaiming a promise an advancement of public education and we can�t do it on our own. We need unions, women, men and a vision for a broader social justice.
Kent Wong said that the labor unions need to take up the fight for public education.
Marielena Hincapie We help get legal support for women arrested during civil disobedience. We believe in the promise for the immigration movement. I brought fifteen lawyers for non citizens women who risked being arrested for civil disobedience. I told the women that if they stood up for civil rights they may be arrested. One woman responded, �I take that risk every day when I get in my car and take my child to school.�
Ken Wong added, "This is our work to challenge when children are being turned away. These children who are seeking a better life are struggling, mainly, because of a situation caused by our administrators and our policies."
Jitu Brown noted that the movement is broader. In Camden, New Jersey, one thousand students took to the streets to defend their teachers that have been fired. It is amazing what we can accomplish."
Lewis added: "Our responsibility as leaders is to listen. We are so used to fixing. It is not our job to reinvent the wheel. We need a place to go to find information and change the leadership. We can�t continue having austerity for most and a lavish life style for a few. Example:
Nurses that can not spend enough time with each patient, the bosses are the Insurance companies, not the patients. Lewis added that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel told her that �25% of our Chicago students are not going to make anything of themselves�. The systems are ranking and sorting people, and we have to end that.
Jitu Brown continued citing examples. He told of a Master Teacher at Fuller Elementary School in Chicago used to say that,� you have the potential, but you have to apply yourself.� She looked at a child as having potential. We have to look at our own kids and teachers and see the potential. We can�t categorize them. We need a movement with a redefinition of our reality to injustice everywhere."
Wong said that to rebuild America "we have to bring everyone together, we show a common enemy, the one per cent. These people pour millions of dollars into privatizing prisons. This negatively affects our youth."
Marielena Hincapie told the group, "We have a refuge crisis at our borders. President Obama is going to give in to an immigration bill that will send children back to be killed. There is a two year old child held in a prison and cared for by a ten year old child. If we send these children back, we will be taking a step back on immigration reform."
Karen Lewis added: "Immigration is not a police problem. It is a personal responsibility. People in certain neighborhoods do not feel protected in their neighborhoods. They take up arms to protect themselves. There are neighborhoods that have been disinvested for many years. There are communities that live in poverty. In Chicago it�s the most segregated because this has been policy driven since World War II. We have to teach our history."
Brown added that segregation that allows destabilization of communities, destabilizes services by closing hospitals and fifty schools. This has all created a powder keg in Chicago. In our neighborhood we are devalued so instead of a grocery store, we get a liquor store for our grocery store..."
Wong reminded the luncheon that the U.S.A. is the richest country in the world and we can take care of all our children. There are countries that are not as wealthy as us yet they do a better job of taking care of their people..."
