{"id":28712,"date":"2016-05-07T08:00:43","date_gmt":"2016-05-07T11:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=28712"},"modified":"2016-05-20T06:46:54","modified_gmt":"2016-05-20T09:46:54","slug":"brazils-student-spring-celebrates-two-months-as-movement-expands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=28712","title":{"rendered":"Brazil\u2019s ‘Student Spring’ Celebrates Two Months as Movement Expands"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas\"\"<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Students currently occupying public high schools\u00a0across Rio de Janeiro, S\u00e3o Paulo and Cear\u00e1<\/a>\u00a0took to the streets on the morning of May 4<\/a> in an act of solidarity.<\/p>\n

Street protests were staged outside occupied schools to refute government attempts to frame issues raised by students<\/a> as belonging to individual schools, rather than being symptomatic of a wider problem.<\/p>\n

From 8am, more than 200 students from Col\u00e9gio Estadual Visconde de Cair\u00fa and Col\u00e9gio Estadual Central do Brasil marched the length<\/a> of Rua Dias de Cruz, in M\u00e9ier, in Rio’s North Zone<\/a>. Other large protests took place in Tijuca<\/a>, Bangu<\/a>, Centro<\/a>, Ilha do Governador<\/a>, Niter\u00f3i<\/a>, Saquarema and Angra, with individual schools also protesting across Rio State<\/a> at the same time.<\/p>\n

\"Students<\/p>\n

\u201cToday is a unified act by the schools<\/a>,\u201d said Sarah, 17, leader of Col\u00e9gio Estadual Central do Brasil\u2019s occupation. \u201cWe organized this demonstration to show that we are all fighting for better education<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Protests in Rio also showed that public support for students is growing, with many bystanders congratulating students, shouting messages of support and joining in with the students\u2019 chants. Bus drivers and passengers recorded videos of the protests on their phones, smiling and waving to the students blocking the road.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s great,\u201d said Louisa, a young mother local to M\u00e9ier who had come out to buy groceries. \u201cThey don\u2019t have the resources they need in schools, and they\u2019re really fighting to change that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ruth, a bystander in her seventies, said she had been moved to tears seeing the student protests on television. \u201cOur youth have been completely abandoned. I support these demonstrations.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Students<\/p>\n

Teachers, who also\u00a0protested on May 4 at Pal\u00e1cio Guanabara<\/a>\u00a0to mark the 2-month milestone of their strike, said that the students’ protests could catalyze improvements to education in Rio State.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor the first time this strike is different. The students have woken up and they are fighting for better conditions for all of us. It gives me hope,\u201d said Thiago*, a high school teacher from Baixada Fluminense<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Late the following day, May 5, students\u00a0occupied the Rio State Education Secretariat<\/a> (SEEDUC) building\u00a0in the Port region\u00a0in a further attempt to make their voices heard and renew negotiations.<\/p>\n

SEEDUC has repeatedly\u00a0tried to undermine the movement<\/a>, calling it undemocratic and claiming that students behaved aggressively<\/a> and were unwilling to negotiate.<\/p>\n

\"Students<\/p>\n

\u201cThey never tried to negotiate with us,\u201d said Central do Brasil leader Sarah. \u201cThey refused to talk with a larger group of us and only wanted to talk with a designated leader. I was nervous in our meeting with them, but they only said we had to de-occupy and that what we are doing is disgusting.\u201d<\/p>\n

SEEDUC has also restricted mobility of protesting students\u2014blocking the bus cards<\/a> that permit students free travel to and from schools\u2014and encouraged other students to protest against<\/a> the occupations.<\/p>\n

The governing body has offered students against occupations the opportunity to move to different public schools to complete the academic year<\/a>, although it is unclear how schools with only 20-30%<\/a>\u00a0of teachers not participating in the statewide strike will manage to accommodate even greater numbers of students.<\/p>\n

Context<\/h3>\n

Students across Rio State are protesting against cuts to state school funding<\/a>, which mean a decline in standards of learning and teaching environments. Under government proposals to counteract the education budget deficit, school infrastructure will further diminish, free lunches provided to students will be substituted by\u00a0nutritionally deficient snacks<\/a>, and school personnel including cleaning and security staff will face arbitrary firings.<\/p>\n

\"Students<\/p>\n

Since occupations began, students have discovered school resources that had previously been restricted due to lack of funds, including science and computer laboratories and libraries.<\/p>\n

Students report that in their individual schools, thousands of new mathematics, Portuguese, science, music and politics textbooks had been stored in classrooms.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey didn\u2019t have the capacity to teach classes in the chemistry lab because it was being used to store those,\u201d said Alan, an 18-year old alum of Mendes de Moraes, in Ilha do Governador, gesturing to piles of books lining the school auditorium.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there are books, normally they are distributed but this time they didn\u2019t have the staff to give them out. Because of the cuts, we don\u2019t have doormen, inspectors, librarians\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Students<\/p>\n

Many occupied schools are receiving support from local communities in the form of donated cleaning materials, food and other supplies, as well as academics volunteering to participate in student-led educational activities.<\/p>\n

Pop culture figures have also been showing support for the occupations over the last month. Most recently, Brazilian pop legends Marisa Monte and Leoni visited Col\u00e9gio Estadual Andr\u00e9 Maurois<\/a>, in G\u00e1vea, and gave a free performance to occupying students. Tom Z\u00e9, Criolo and MC Carol have also voiced their support for the movement on separate occasions.<\/p>\n

The \u2018student spring\u2019<\/a> is now spreading beyond S\u00e3o Paulo and Rio State\u2019s borders, with reports of students holding demonstrations in Bahia, Rio Grande do Sul, Par\u00e1, Distrito Federal and Goi\u00e1s, though there are no currently occupied schools in these states.<\/p>\n

With the number of school occupations growing rapidly<\/a> over April, there are currently 75 public high schools occupied in Rio alone, according to activists, plus a number of technical colleges. There are also 5 schools that have been occupied in Cear\u00e1 State and 15 schools that have re-occupied in S\u00e3o Paulo as of April 29.<\/p>\n

Although S\u00e3o Paulo State agreed not to close public schools in early 2016, students there are now facing the same learning conditions as those in Rio State and say the state has violated its agreement with them.<\/p>\n

Students in Rio and S\u00e3o Paulo states have faced aggression<\/a>,\u00a0violence\u00a0and intimidation<\/a> from individuals<\/a> and Military Police on multiple occasions.<\/p>\n

*Some names have been changed to protect the identities of sources afraid of repercussions.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas Students currently occupying public high schools\u00a0across Rio de Janeiro, S\u00e3o Paulo and Cear\u00e1\u00a0took to the streets on the morning of May 4 in an act of solidarity. Street protests were staged […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":103,"featured_media":28733,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1288,1290,1333,335,1329],"tags":[460,317,1261,168,756,397,1197,25,1996,673,551,37,18,301,270,1938,1132,1350,21,259],"writer":[1956],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-28712","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-highlight","8":"category-civilsociety","9":"category-event-reports","10":"category-policies","11":"category-by-international-observers","12":"tag-baixada-fluminense","13":"tag-bangu","14":"tag-central-rio","15":"tag-centro","16":"tag-community-organizing","17":"tag-education","18":"tag-greater-rio","19":"tag-human-rights","20":"tag-ilha-do-governador","21":"tag-misplaced-public-priorities","22":"tag-niteroi","23":"tag-north-zone","24":"tag-protest","25":"tag-public-policy","26":"tag-resistance","27":"tag-rio-2016","28":"tag-strike","29":"tag-tijuca","30":"tag-west-zone","31":"tag-youth","32":"writer-ciara-long"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/103"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28712"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28712\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28712"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=28712"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=28712"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=28712"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=28712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}