Book Tour Chronicles: Back from the bay, on to LA

It was a busy, yet very refreshing week for the Underground Undergrads publication team.

We started the week with the group Dreams to be Heard in Cal State Northridge. There were two student testimonies from club president Pedro, who shared a powerful story of how he came to be an activist for his dreams and from Gabby, who went to UCLA as an underground undergrad and is now pursuing a Master's in History at CSUN. The event was hosted by Professor Josh Sides and the Center for Southern California Studies.

On Wednesday, we visited Santa Barbara. Our first stop was the beautiful Santa Barbara City College, where folks from their ESL department hosted a discussion that included Grecia, a former underground undergrad who is now an organizer for a community organization named PUEBLO, and Celeste, who is a member of IDEAS at SBCC.

Later on that day, we visited the campus of UC Santa Barbara, where we were hosted by Professor Nelson Lichtenstein, director of the university's Center for Work, Labor, and Democracy. Marla, a Ph.D. student, shared about a different aspect of immigration in her discussion of how undocumented immigrants can ask for benefits under the Violence Against Women Act. The event also counted with the presence of Dream Act students from the group IDEAS at UCSB.

Thursday brought us to the campus of San Francisco State University, where Cintia, a leader of the recently formed IDEAS at SFSU, encouraged other AB540 students to join the group's efforts. In addition, two staff members shared their experiences as Leticia A students, attending the university as undocumented students in the 80s and progressing to become US citizens and leaders in education.

Later that day, we visiter the Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union, on the campus of UC Berkeley. Our hosts were RISE - Berkeley, the immigrant rights group there, as well as a myriad of student groups and academic offices. Maria Blanco, executive director of the Chief Justice Earl Warren Institute on Race, Ethnicity, and Diversity, spoke of her experiences as a legal advisor during the crafting of AB540, and urged Berkeley administrators to become involved in the fight for student immigrant rights. Also, Joel from RISE spoke of the parallel trajectories of highly relevant immigration legislation in the last 25 years and a particular family's struggles to make their dreams true, reflecting on how much the DREAM Act would mean to those lives.

Friday had a very powerful event in UC Santa Cruz hosted by SIN (Students Informing Now) and the Ethnic Resource Center. Nearly 100 banana slugs packed the Cervantes conference room to hear the stories of undocumented students at UCLA and in their own campus.

As always, endless gratitudes goes to those who gave us food, a place to crash, or a word of encouragement. This week we have 5 events in the Southern California area, which we will preview tomorrow.

Stay tuned, spread the word, fight hard, smile much.