UI Students Use Spring Break to Focus on Human Rights Issues

 

MOSCOW - They didn't face police dogs, fire hoses and fists like the civil rights marchers of half a century ago, but a group of Hispanic University of Idaho students still used their spring break to stand up to the injustices they say remain in American society.

 

"Since I am an immigrant who came to the United States when I was 11 years old, I know a lot of the troubles that we live with," said 21-year-old Maria Torres, who recently traveled to Alabama for the annual commemoration of the Selma-to-Montgomery voting rights march.

 

Originally from Guanojuato, Mexico, Torres became a legal U.S. resident after her family settled in Nampa. She is now at the UI double majoring in Spanish literature and sociology, with an emphasis in criminology.

 

Torres said she has seen firsthand the difficulties and challenges many Hispanic children face when their families bring them to the U.S. Those experiences ignited a desire to work toward human rights in general, and fair immigration policies in particular.

 

"When we came, I had to learn the language, I had to learn the culture, I had to learn everything," she said, noting she has had to fight for things native-born Americans take for granted. "I think we all deserve the same rights: the right to an education, the right to a job, the right to be treated in a fair way."

Victor Canales, 21, also came to America from Guanojuato. His father secured a green card and was working in southern Idaho when he applied for visas for his wife and seven children. But the application was denied, pressing the family into a desperate situation.

 

"We had to come illegally," by swimming across the Rio Grande into Texas, Canales said. He was 9 years old. "I almost drowned, so it really angered me that they wouldn't give us visas."

 

Canales is now a U.S. citizen from Mountain Home studying criminology and Spanish. And rather than seethe with anger, he has molded it into activism. He spent his spring break attending a conference of the National Council of La Raza in Washington, D.C., to learn about how to approach immigration issues.

 

He also met with Idaho's congressional delegation in an effort to convince lawmakers to support the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, which would grant conditional permanent residency to certain children of illegal immigrants.

 

The trips of both students and their classmates were sponsored by the Idaho Community Action Network, the Alliance for a Just Society, the Movimiento Activista Social, the College Assistance Migrant Program, the UI Office of Multicultural Affairs and the UI office of the vice provost for student affairs.

 

Torres said she spent two days in Alabama, participating in the re-enactments of civil rights marches and attending various rallies. A large part of this year's commemoration focused on Alabama's new anti-immigration law, HB56, which has been called the toughest in the nation.

 

"HB56 is not just a Latino issue, or just a labor issue," another UI student, Maricela Avila, said in a statement about her participation in the Alabama trip. "It is affecting everyone and sets a dangerous precedent for other states. Not only has it legitimized racial profiling and terrorized people of color regardless of legal status, it is also harming the state's economy."