Chicano! The history of the Mexican American civil rights movement. Episode 3, Taking back the schools Episode 3, Taking back the schools.

Streaming video - 1995

It covers the Los Angeles high school blow outs of 1968 thoroughly and with passion. Part 3 is also likely to be the most interesting to students because they can witness young people their own age forcefully agitating for change. It is also striking because the catalysts for the walk outs--high drop out rate, crumbling schools, lack of Mexican American teachers--still resonate today. This segment is visually interesting as well because the filmmakers made a conscious effort to interview actual participants (which they do in all the segments). Here they actually go back and forth between a photo or video of a participant from the 1960s to that same person being interviewed today, and it is insightful to see how that individual changed in th...e intervening thirty years. For example, at one point the video discusses how the students were trying to garner outside support for their cause in order to legitimate it in the eyes of the school board. Robert Kennedy agrees to meet with student leaders and offer his support (he was running for president at the time and was in California to meet with Cesar Chavez), and we see a picture of Kennedy surrounded by student leaders. The camera then focuses on a young Harry Gamboa--one of the walk-out leaders--standing next to Kennedy and the video then fades away to a current day interview with him. more