Volume 67, No. 23
WWW.PANAMERICANONLINE.COM
April 7, 2011
WALK IT OUT Students gather to protest program’s shaky future
By Lupe Flores The Pan American
The outcome of the Tejan@ Movement for Education rally, which took place on campus last week, has yet to emerge from unclear waters. Efforts to keep the Mexican-American Studies program alive at UTPA have clashed with those of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, which seeks to kill the program. At 11 a.m. on March 31, Cesar Chavez Day, students, faculty and staff walked out of classes and marched to the quad in support of the program that has been up and down since it began in 1981. Organizers, guest speakers and protesters were frustrated that THECB, the leading adviser to the Texas Legislature on higher education, is trying to cut the program for good because of its low-producing graduation rate, despite the fact that there is no state funding for the program. “It’s an excuse. The reality of the situation is that if you want a program to do well, you have to fund it,” said John Michael Torres, communication coordinator for LUPE (La Union del Pueblo Entero) and guest speaker at the event. “It needs more active support from within the culture of the university.” The two-hour event rallied more than 130 supporters, with additional spectators from the Student Union. From every corridor that corners the Quad, onlookers lent their ears – albeit for a shorter period than those participating in the rally itself – to the overall message given that day. “To be honest, I didn’t know this was going on until somebody told me ‘come and see,’” said sophomore PR/ advertising major Jairo Castro. “But I’m glad I came and learned, like we heard many times here, we can’t really move forward if we don’t know our past.” Representatives of national, local and campus organizations such as The Brown Berets de Aztlan, VOX (Voices for Planned Parenthood) and the MAS club, which sponsored the event, not
only spoke but listened to what others had to say about the cause. Tato Laviera, a renowned Latino poet and self-proclaimed Nuyorican best known for his meticulous use of Spanglish, was among the guestspeakers highlighting the importance of cultural and historical inclusion in education systems everywhere. The term Nuyorican was coined in 1974 and is a Spanish-English take on the term nuyorquino (New Yorker) and Puerto Rican by people of Puerto Rican origin residing in New York. “My main commitment to demonstrate and show my face for this movement is to let the university and system of Texas know how embarrassing it is for them to have a school at the bottom of the Western Hemisphere that doesn’t have the capability of teaching Mexican American studies to the more than 18,000 students here,” Laviera said. “I think that the neglect of this institution and its mother agencies to negate that right is a basic act against human rights.” 30 YEARS OF NEGLECT Up until four years ago, when a cohort of Chicana professors realized how undernourished MAS was on campus, little had been done to the program that would help it deliver substantial content to students. “We changed the entire curriculum to reflect a better understanding of what the field of Chicano studies is,” said Stephanie Alvarez, co-director of MAS. “For a degree plan not to change in 30 years is pretty astounding and it indicates what we already suspected, which was that no one was really taking care of this program.” For three decades, the program formerly known as Mexican American Heritage had only one graduate. In the past five years, that number rose to five. Additionally, two students are currently listed to graduate this summer under the new program while almost a dozen are listed as future majors or recipients of a newly added graduate certificate in MAS.
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Reynaldo Leal / THE PAN AMERICAN
UNIFIED – Supporters of the Mexican American Studies (MAS) program stage a walkout March 31 in the quad. (L-R) Freshman Misael Ramirez, graduate student Orlando Hinojosa, and allumna Ivete Kuete hold signs supporting MAS. Although the numbers seem low, Petra Guerra, assistant professor of communication who has worked alongside Alvarez to keep the field of study, said it is a good and usual start for a program that was never given attention. “(The program) was just there in the books. So we had to revamp the curriculum and then recruit students. And that’s where we’re at right now,” the Pharr native said. “Usually what happens to a program is that (THECB) will give them a certain amount of years to produce or not produce. They haven’t done that to us. We haven’t had
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that chance.” The chance to show existing interests, to ask for funding and to stay relevant in history was the overall argument blanketing the stage and crowd last week. “It delivered a clear and human message of the need to portray (MAS) in the annals of South Texas history as a means to justify the existence of this wonderful Mexican culture,” Laviera said. TIME TO OPERATIONALIZE But the green light for a chance might not be as dim now as it has
been in the past. After pressure from professors and students during meetings with UTPA President Robert Nelsen before the rally, he agreed to give money from his President’s Circle Funds to create a space for MAS on campus. “We are going to help it move forward and operationalize it,” Nelsen said in an interview from Austin. “We’re going to find a location for the center (on campus) and give its director release time.” The funds will come in increments
SEE WALK || PAGE 3
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