Student Walkouts Spread in U.S.

STUDENT WALKOUTS SPREAD, March 27-April 1, 2006

Here in North Carolina, 30 students walked out of Smithfield-Selma High School and marched through town Wednesday, joining protests nationwide against a proposed crackdown on illegal immigration being debated this week in Washington. The teens, nearly all Hispanic, charged down Booker Dairy Road and U.S. 301 toward the Johnston County courthouse, waving Mexican flags and chanting "Latinos United" in Spanish. Their crowd swelled to 50 as young Hispanic women pushing babies in strollers and other passers-by joined the march. [Raleigh News & Oberserver, 3/30/06, full story]

In Los Angeles on Mar. 27--the Monday on which California
celebrates Cesar Chavez day, but which is not a school holiday--
as many as 36,000 students from 25 Los Angeles County schools
walked out of class to protest anti-immigrant measures being
debated in the Senate and demand legalization for immigrants.
Officials at Huntington Park High School locked the gates after
classes started to prevent walkouts, but students climbed over a
chain-link fence and joined the march. More than 1,000 students
encircled the Los Angeles City Hall, and a group of six met with
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa in his office. Villaraigosa then
stepped outside and addressed the crowd of students, telling him
he supported their goals but urging them to return to class.

About 300 students and other protesters took over several lanes
of a freeway in downtown Los Angeles. The demonstrators walked
about a mile before they were escorted off, the Highway Patrol
said. [AP 3/27/06, 3/28/06; Dallas Morning News 3/28/06; NYT
3/28/06]

The Mar. 27 student walkouts quickly spread to San Diego,
Riverside, San Bernardino, Orange and Ventura counties. In San
Diego County, two dozen protesters were arrested in Escondido
after refusing orders from police to disperse. In Riverside,
seven people were arrested across town after scuffles with riot
police, authorities said. [LAT 3/28/06] Other student protests
were reported in Fresno, Oakland and Watsonville, California. [AP
3/28/06]

An estimated 400 students walked out of high schools in Phoenix,
Arizona, on Mar. 27 and marched to the Capitol to support
immigrant rights. [AP 3/28/06] As many as 4,000 students walked
out of high schools in the Dallas, Texas area on Mar. 27 to
demonstrate at a park and at Dallas City Hall. [DMN 3/28/06]

Hundreds of students walked out of class on Mar. 27 and 28 in
Houston, San Diego, Denver, Las Vegas, Detroit and in northern
Virginia. [DMN 3/28/06; AP 3/29/06; Washington Post 3/29/06;
Rocky Mountain News (Denver) 3/29/06]

Students from a dozen North Texas school districts walked out of
class on Mar. 28, and several hundred students stormed the lobby
of Dallas City Hall and disrupted a council meeting. Dallas
School District Superintendent Michael Hinojosa warned students
that further protests could lead to in-school suspensions, parent
conferences or even truancy arrests. [DMN 3/28/06]

On Mar. 28, thousands of high school and some middle school
students walked out of class in Phoenix and its suburbs. By
midday, Phoenix police estimated 2,000 students had gathered at
the Capitol. [Arizona Republic 3/29/06] Nearly 800 high school
students staged demonstrations in Tucson, Arizona on Mar. 29.
About 500 students at Sunnyside High in Tucson began a three-mile
march about a half-hour before dismissal time. The principal and
staff helped organize the action. [Arizona Daily Star (Tucson)
3/30/06] At least 1,150 students from 18 Tucson area schools--
including elementary and middle schools--walked out of class on
Mar. 30 and marched through the streets. [Arizona Daily Star
(Tucson) 3/31/06]

Some 6,000 students walked out again on Mar. 28 in the Los
Angeles School District. [El Barlovento 3/28/06] The walkouts
slowed in Los Angeles on Mar. 29, but continued elsewhere in
California. In Kern County, California, about 3,000 students
walked out. About 1,800 students took to the streets in and
around Bakersfield. In nearby Arvin, 1,000 high school students
marched to the town's city hall. At Oceanside High in San Diego
County, California, some students defied a school lockdown and
tried to leave for a protest. Police arrived and sprayed mace at
students to keep them from climbing a fence. A number of students
were detained. The Oceanside Unified School District decided to
close middle and high schools for the rest of the week. [LAT
3/30/06]

In Yakima, Washington, 660 students at Davis high school and
dozens of others at Eisenhower high school walked out on Mar. 27.
On Mar. 29, Davis administrators at decided to punish the 660
students who walked out by suspending them. Eisenhower students
were not punished. [Email message from Yakima resident Maria
Cuevas 3/30/06] On Mar. 30, police arrested 26 students who
walked out of classes in the Houston Independent School District
for curfew violations. Another 33 students from Dowling Middle
School and 34 from Madison High School got truancy citations the
same day. [Houston Chronicle 3/31/06]
About 700 high school students walked out on Mar. 29 in El Paso,
Texas, and marched for several miles. On Mar. 30, more than 2,000
El Paso area students skipped out of class and marched through
the streets all day. [El Paso Times 3/30/06, 3/31/06] Students
also walked out of class in Austin, and again in Dallas. [AP
3/30/06]

Demonstrations among high schoolers and middle schoolers spread
on Mar. 30 in the suburbs of Washington, DC. Ignoring threats of
disciplinary action from school administrators, 1,500 students
walked out of class or skipped school in Northern Virginia and
about 300 students did the same in Kensington, Maryland, to march
for immigrant rights. [Washington Post 3/31/06]

In Los Angeles on Mar. 31, more than 100 students rallied again
at City Hall. [La Jornada (Mexico) 4/1/06] Some 2,000 students
demonstrated in San Diego and another 1,000 did so in
Bakersfield. In Las Vegas, Nevada, some 4,000 students walked out
of classes at 22 schools and met in the center of the city. More
than 1,000 walked out again in Tucson and marched through the
city, and the walkouts also continued in Maryland and Virginia.
[LJ 4/1/06]