NEW YORK CITY, March 17—Students led the Education for Liberation conference in a local college to discuss how to fight for workers’ power while getting educated in the bosses’ school system. True to Progressive Labor Party’s commitment to youth-driven leadership, both teacher and student comrades led two workshops on the critical topics of racial integration inside schools and the concealed issue of the school-to-prison pipeline (STPP). With an emphasis on militant fight back against racial inequality as the best “therapy.” the conference succeeded in not only strengthening the political understanding of young comrades while also widening the number of workers who are now supportive of PLP’s fight for a better world (see below).
After PLP members opened the conference by placing our fight for communism in the larger context of revolutionary history around the world, a group of high school students presented their understanding of how capitalist culture shapes emotional and psychological stress within schools using tactics like standardized testing. Other students also shared the racist ways in which capitalist school culture is organized to alienate Black students in particular.
Even though we had a definite set of values that we were putting forward, all participants were encouraged to voice their opinions. A professor stated how hard he had worked to receive his degrees, and that we should celebrate the opportunity that people have to work hard. In response, a PLP member exposed how the bosses’ education system utilizes the illusion of meritocracy to instill capitalist values in students. Everyone appreciated the productive exchange, and the professor who advocated for meritocracy was able to perceive a more critical perspective on the topic.
In one of the groups led by teachers, students were asked what role STPP plays in society. STPP is retooling classroom management and discipline to be more punitive to serve as an avenue for masses of working class children, especially Black and Latin, to eventually be criminalized and cut off from many career opportunities as adults. This invisible mechanism in turn has afforded bosses the opportunity to justify their racist portrayal of Black and Latin workers and divide the working class.
The other group, led by teachers and students, taught us that bosses make segregation seem like natural and the moves they take to entrench it seem invisible. As the panelists explained the nature of segregation at their school, participants recognized the aspects of that contradiction and discussed the steps they took to organize multiracial fightback.
Worldwide, working class youth are being exposed to capitalist exploitation everyday. This conference demonstrated that given the opportunity to teach us about the oppression they see, youth from Brooklyn to Haiti around PLP will energetically provide leadership and learn with us to fight back. More teachers and students on the forefront of class struggle in their schools and colleges will be able to add to the panels and discussions that PLP sponsors.
For now, we turned racist, anti-communist attacks in the NYC school system into the basis for a larger, wider campaign to unite more workers than ever around an agenda that will give our young people a real education. Join us in the streets on May Day!
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Letters from Students
Participating in the walkout was eye opening. Never before have I witnessed so many young people united under a common goal and demanding that the government change. The conference further affirmed the need for more youth fightback.
The school integration fight shows the power of multiracial unity and worker mobilization. Resistance against capitalism has never been tolerated in the U.S. Still, we are ready to combat these regimes.
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I felt like an active participant in a larger revolutionary movement currently making strides to abolish the capitalist order of U.S. society and establish equality on all fronts.
The conference allowed me to gather with like-minded individuals and discuss how communism would eradicate problems in schools. By looking at similar communist movements from the past, I learned new methods of mobilizing and building on current movements. What’s next for us is more student-led movements dedicated to overthrowing capitalism.
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I felt a mixture of cynicism and hope. At the walkout, I was met with a sense of apathy and confusion among the crowd; many used this as a chance to skip school. Yet, it was empowering to march down to Borough Hall, all chanting, all washed in energy. The conference showed us a closer, firmer community willing to support us.
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The walkout and the conference have one thing in common: ambition. Hope itself doesn’t do what we did because hope is noncommittal—a sort of expectation that change will happen on its own. It won’t. The diverse community at the conference continued what students did at the walkout. It proves our inherent determination to fight for change, even in the face of passivity.
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The walkout was a much-needed step for change in our capitalist society. As the next generation, we must fight for people’s rights as they are undermined by money and power. At the conference, we learned in depth about the School to Prison Pipeline, gun violence, and student fightbacks at other schools.
I hope individuals realize that gun violence and incarceration amongst Black and Latin youth is directly linked to the domineering rich white men. It was empowering to see so many gathered for the same cause. The fight for justice is never over.
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Playing a local role in a national walkout was a cathartic experience. I felt I was a part of something bigger than myself, something historical. Yet, I felt that young Black and Latin students and the working class have been engaging in protests for decades, and those protests have been sanctioned, shut down, and criminalized. I realized politicians mustn’t use our future fightback as photo-ops.
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Participating in the walkout was a transformative experience. I realized the potential of a communist insurgence. I was reminded that when we harness the power of education, capitalism can be torn apart; and that students, oppressed by the mechanisms of finance capital, still have an innate calling for a freedom only to be realized on the communist horizon.
For the first time in my life, I saw kids discarding the foul education that capitalism imposed on us in lieu of organic communist mobilizing. The epigram of the day: the specter of communism haunts the U.S.
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