Chilean student leaders inspire U.S. activists (Camila Vallejo in NYC)

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http://www.peoplesworld.org/chilean-student-leaders-inspire-u-s-activists/



(Libero, Jarvis, Camila & Lisa, great looking bunch of comrades!)

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During the panel, all the student speakers emphasized the importance of democratizing their societies, expanding ethnic studies, access to higher education for youth of color, and the need for the composition of student bodies to reflect the economic and racial diversity of the societies in which they exist.

Both Titelman and Vallejo spoke from a unique perspective of young visionaries who are helping to lead their generation out of a post-dictatorship period. Vallejo explained that the Chilean student movement, which mobilized 90 percent of Chilean students in 2011 to protest government attacks on higher education, was not only a the largest protest movement in recent history, but a massive civics lesson, where thousands of students learned how political structures of the country are organized and can be affected.

Vallejo explained that under Augosto Pinochet's brutal regime, which began with a coup in 1973 and did not officially end until 1990, one of the first casualties were civics classes. Pinochet's goal, she said, was to eliminate democratic participation and knowledge in the country. While the dictatorship is over, Vallejo said, many of the anti-democratic institutional designs still exist. For example, 70 percent of Chilean students don't know how the president or other political leaders are elected. Or at the University of Chile, one of the most prominent universities in the country, there is no department of political education but there is a business school.

These reasons are why the Chilean movement is educating young people about local and national elections, expanding democratic participation in the education and political systems and addressing class discrimination in education access. Chilean student movement demands include introducing a progressive tax on the wealthy, expanding quality education to the poor, and ending privatization of "knowledge production" so national investment in public education benefits everyone.

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