“We Are Here”: (Im)migrant Youth at the Center of Social Activism and Critical Scholarship

Abstract

Spencer Symposium on Immigration and Education “We Are Here”: (Im)migrant Youth at the Center of Social Activism and Critical Scholarship Lindsay Perez Huber, Yiching Huang, Rosa Jimenez and Veronica Velez UCLA Research Training Grant (RTG) Spencer Fellows 2006-2007 UCLA Research Training Grant (RTG) Spencer Fellows: Carine Allaf Nina Chien Octavio Estrella Yiching Huang Rosa Jimenez Julie Park Lindsay Perez Huber Veronica Velez Michael Viola Faculty Advisors: Dr. Rashmita Mistry Dr. Marjorie Orellana Introduction and Overview of Symposium During the winter quarter of 2007, the UCLA Research Training Grant (RTG) Spencer Fellows 1 and their faculty advisors began meetings to plan and organize a symposium that would focus on immigrant youth and education. The symposium would be sponsored by the Spencer Foundation and guidance would be provided by faculty advisors, but decisions about the conference structure, goals and focus would be left to the graduate students themselves. Following five months of planning, the Spencer Symposium on Immigration and Education entitled, “We Are Here: (Im)migrant Youth at the Center of Social Activism and Critical Educational Scholarship” 2 took place on May 3, 2007. In thinking about what we wanted this symposium to achieve, we reflected on the events that took place in the spring of 2006, when immigrant communities and their allies mobilized across the United States in defense of their human rights. One of the rally chants was, “Aqui estamos y no nos vamos!” [We are here and we will not leave.] In the spirit of solidarity and human rights engendered by this movement, we, as Spencer Fellows, wanted this symposium to address and transform the