Read full newsletter here: https://mailchi.mp/7bce6da83f52/celebrating-our-10th-year-anniversary-and-first-winter-2020-advance-parole-approval
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The CMSC is celebrating our 10th year anniversary and the first Advance Parole application approved for our Winter 2020 California-Mexico Dreamers Study Abroad Program
The California-Mexico Studies Center (CMSC) celebrates this month our 10th year anniversary as an educational and cultural 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, whose mission is to research, develop, promote, and establish policies and programs between higher education institutions and cultural organizations, to enhance the teaching, mobility and exchange of faculty, students, and professionals between California and the U.S. with Mexico and other nations in the Western Hemisphere.
The CMSC was established by California State University Long Beach (CSULB) Professor Armando Vazquez-Ramos in December 2010, as an extension of the California-Mexico Project that he founded in 1998 at the CSULB Chicano and Latino Studies department.
During the last 10 years, the CMSC has hosted numerous international seminars, conferences, and binational educational programs focusing on Chicano Studies, the Mexican Diaspora, Ethnic Studies, immigration, cultural and educational exchange between California and Mexico.
However, the project that defines our legacy the most as a pro-immigrant, pro-education binational organization is the creation and implementation of our California-Mexico Dreamers Study Abroad Program, which has given the opportunity to study in Mexico to over 160 DACA recipients through 6 different travel-study classes, and returned ALL of them legally to the U.S. through DACA’s Advance Parole provision.
In 2014, Prof. Armando Vazquez-Ramos took the first two DACA students to Mexico as part of a CSULB Chicano Studies study abroad class. After their successful return to the US, he then created an all-DACA students pilot class in Spring of 2015, which later became the precedent-setting model for our Dreamers Study Abroad Program. This led to 5 additional travel-study classes from 2015 to the Summer of 2017, until the Trump Administration rescinded the DACA program and its Advance Parole provision on September 5, 2017.
Ever since, during the past 3.5 years, the CMSC has been the only organization fully dedicated to the restoration of DACA's Advance Parole at the national level. In 2019 alone, the CMSC took a total of 90 DACA recipients, allies, and Dreamer moms from across the United States to Washington, D.C. during 3 trips in January, June, and November to defend and advocate for the restoration of DACA’s Advance Parole.
Culminating today, we also celebrate the approval of the first of 85 Advance Parole applications for our Winter 2020 California-Mexico Dreamers Study Abroad Program participants.
However, since the year is coming to an end we still need to seek approval for the Advance Parole applications for all 85 participants. Please consider donating to the CMSC in recognition of our 10th year anniversary, our 3-year Campaign to Restore DACA’s Advance Parole and to support our Winter 2020 program !
Your support matters, and makes a difference!
The CMSC launched a new fund drive initiative until December 31, 2020 to solicit sponsors and grants in support of the Winter 2020 California-Mexico Dreamers Study Abroad Program.
We need to raise about $50,000 to cover the increased costs of the program and ensure the safety of all participants while traveling in Mexico during the pandemic. The additional costs are related to increased expenses due to doubling the cost for single-room hotel accommodations and all transportation costs due to social-distancing, COVID-19 pre- and post-testing, and 24/7 medical attention and prevention protocols.
Thus, we urge our community, Dreamers’ supporters, corporate and business sponsors, community and church groups, and academic colleagues to help us raise $50,000 by the end of the year with donations of any amount, or by sponsoring at least one Dreamer participant at $500 each.
MAKE YOUR TAX-DEDUCTIBLE DONATION TODAY!
DONATE
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ADVANCE PAROLE VOICES
Please watch the following videos from our Advance Parole Voices series, featuring current participants of our Winter 2020 California-Mexico Dreamers Study Abroad Program.
Please share these videos and donate to our Winter 2020 California-Mexico Dreamers Study Abroad Program Fund Drive Initiative.
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LATEST NEWS
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COVID infects Latinos at more than double the rate of others (Los Angeles Times)
Latino residents are bearing the brunt of an unprecedented surge in coronavirus infections, underscoring the racial and economic inequities the pandemic has had in California, and particularly in Los Angeles County... Read More
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Biden should nominate Eloy Ortiz Oakley to lead the Education Department (Cal Matters)
President-elect Joe Biden won the election with the most ambitious education agenda in the modern era. From tripling Title 1 funding for low-income schools to eliminating tuition for most families, his plans will need an Education Secretary with the savvy to match the boldness of the agenda... Read More
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DACA program for immigrants could end in Houston court case (ABC13 Houston)
A federal court on Tuesday will consider whether to invalidate a program that shields from deportation immigrants brought to the United States as children, potentially creating complications for the incoming administration of President-elect Joe Biden...
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Native American activist Leonard Peltier has served 44 years in Federal Prison. In the 1977 trial, which was almost universally recognized as controversial, he was given two consecutive life sentences for the murder of two FBI agents (Ronald A. Williams and Jack R. Coler). The verdict was related to the June 26, 1975 shoot out at the Pine Ridge Reservation... Read More
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More than 40 Hispanic civil rights and policy groups, including the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute, are urging President-elect Biden to pick a former National Education Association president, Lily Eskelsen García, as education secretary... Read More
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What Americans don’t know about Latino history could fill a museum (LA Times)
On Thursday, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) blocked a bipartisan congressional effort to establish a new Smithsonian National Museum of the American Latino, declaring that “the last thing we need is to further divide an already divided nation with an array of segregated, separate-but-equal museums... Read More
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SDSU and Mexico Education agencies sign pact for future collaboration (SDSU Alumni)
San Diego State University has entered into an agreement with the government of Mexico that paves the way for the expansion of binational cooperation across a wide range of initiatives that will serve as a framework for future collaborations in research, academic and educational activities... Read More
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While I am skeptical of the “Latinx,” I believe Francis-Fallon’s article is important because it contributes to the discussion about “what we call ourselves” and, inevitably, what others call us... Read More
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Read full newsletter here: https://mailchi.mp/7bce6da83f52/celebrating-our-10th-year-anniversary-and-first-winter-2020-advance-parole-approval
