Indigenous youth speak out, seek support from the United Nations and international Indigenous Peoples

SemAnahuac Delegation - Anahuacalmecac International University Preparatory High School of North America Special Mission to the United Nations

Four Indigenous young women who are students of Anahuacalmecac International University Preparatory High School of North America in East Los Angeles between the ages of 14-17 have traveled to New York this week to engage in the upcoming 12th Session of the United Nation Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues as a part of the first annual Anahuacalmecac Special Mission to the United Nations to be known as the  SemAnahuac Delegation. Unlike any other typical high school trip to New York, these students and their teacher chaperones intend to present various interventions before the Permanent Forum, its members and several preparatory caucuses of indigenous peoples assembled to address the issues and demands of indigenous peoples around the world. Anahuacalmecac's delegation will carry the demands raised by its school's community assembly in defense of indigenous peoples' rights to culture and education. In particular, Anahuacalmecac's delegates will present interventions on the interdependent relationship between education, youth, language and cultural revitalization by Indigenous Peoples, especially in the urban context, for Indigenous Peoples living outside of “traditional territories”. Specifically calling attention to the unjust actions of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) which is on the verge of revoking the charter of Anahuacalmecac, the only Indigenous Peoples’ high school in Los Angeles, California, due to a “Papers Please” policy against Mexican Indigenous charter school petitioners and parents.

While similar issues are commonly faced by indigenous peoples the world over, this experience will also offer an opportunity to cultivate intergenerational leadership to advance the rights of indigenous peoples in the global context. The Permanent Forum is an advisory body to the Economic and Social Council with a mandate to discuss indigenous issues related to economic and social development, culture, the environment, education, health and human rights. The Permanent Forum aims to provide expert advice and recommendations on indigenous issues to the Council, as well as to programs, funds and agencies of the United Nations, through the Council, raise awareness and promote the integration and coordination of activities related to indigenous issues within the UN system and prepare and disseminate information on indigenous issues. The Permanent Forum holds annual two-week sessions. The first meeting of the Permanent Forum was held in May 2002, and yearly sessions take place in New York.  The Permanent Forum is one of three UN bodies that is mandated to deal specifically with indigenous peoples' issues. 

Traveling from May 16-May 22, 2013, the Anahuacalmecac Special Mission to the United Nations to be known as the SemAnahuac Delegation, the four indigenous young women and student leaders from Anahuacalmecac have already participated in the Global Indigenous Women's Caucus, the Global Indigenous Peoples' Caucus and the Global Indigenous Youth Caucus. These four indigenous young women have prepared for this delegation for over four years through training sessions of the Model United Nations conferences hosted by the University of California, Los Angeles, and through participation in the Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery at Arizona State University in April 2013, as well as through traditional ceremonies held for our schools and community. All four delegates participate in a unique course in Anahuacalmecac called Traditional Aztec Knowledge Huehuetlamachilistle. Three of the young women are students of Anahuacalmecac's Nahuatl Language and Culture programs as well while one of the students is a Zapoteca delegate of her community originally form Oaxaca, Mexico. Two educators join the students, one is an indigenous International Baccalaureate Humanities teacher and Model United Nations club sponsor, Cynthia Garcia, while the other is a co-founder of Semillas Community Schools and its executive director, Marcos Aguilar. The entire SemAnahuac Delegation are members of the traditional Aztec dancer society of the school community. 

The SemAnahuac Delegation will specifically be advancing the following intervention asking for support from the bodies of the UNPFII and attending indigenous organizations and peoples:

1. That the UNPFII recognize that the rights of Indigenous Peoples and youth to mother language, cultural revitalization, autonomy over educational institutions and access to all levels of education reflected in Articles 3, 4, 13, and 14 of the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples must also defend actions taken by Indigenous Peoples in acts of self-determination, particularly as related to the establishment and maintenance of autonomous Indigenous Schools using whatever mechanism of legal policy available to them, including local, state and national mechanisms accessible to non-Indigenous Peoples such as “charter schools” in the United States or “escuelas piloto” in Mexico;
2. That the UNPFII  protest the acts of Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendant John Deasy, and members of the LAUSD Board of Education against our community in violation of civil and Indigenous Peoples' rights to education based upon maternal language, community autonomy, autocthonous culture and access to all levels of education by demanding renewal of the charter of Anahuacalmecac through 2018 AS THE ONLY EXAMPLE CURRENTLY IN OPERATION IN THE ENTIRE CITY OF LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA.