[URISP id=76659]
Dozens of Phoenix area high school students rallied in front of the state capitol Monday night to protest Gov. Doug Ducey’s proposed education budget.
Members of the group Stop Stealing From Our Kids organized a candlelight vigil and protest in response to what they see as shortcomings in Ducey’s budget.
The organizer of the event, Ernesto Bracamontes, said the goal of the vigil was to make a statement to legislators.
“We feel that the state has not done their job of providing adequate funding for students,” Bracamontes said. “We are here to deliver a message to Doug Ducey and others who have decided not to fully fund our education.”
The campaign has also called for the use of the state’s surplus and rainy day funds to fix what they describe as an “educational funding crisis.”
Audisey Alvarado, a member of Stop Stealing From Our Kids, emphasized how poor some of the conditions are at schools and expressed frustration with the idea that Arizona has a surplus and won’t use it on education.
“We have schools that have books from 1999, covers of textbooks are completely ripped off, the toilets are broken and we don’t have handles on some of our doors,” Alvarado said.
Fred Barlam, a member of the group and career educator of over 40 years said the group presented their goals to legislators in a pledge called Pledge A-B-C.
Barlam said this pledge was signed by several Democratic state representatives, but that many of the Republican representatives did not sign because they needed to review the pledge first.
Barlam also took a moment to call to attention a statute in the Arizona Constitution that calls for higher education to be as free as possible, a sentiment echoed by many of the event’s speakers.
One of the speakers at the rally was Alma Perez, a senior at North High School in Phoenix.
“We are fighting for education,” Perez said. “We want our money now, we don’t want it tomorrow. We want it now. We want our education system fixed.”
Perez hopes to attend ASU in the fall but fears that she won’t be able to afford it because of the rising cost of tuition.
The group plans to continue their protests by sitting in on the governor’s budget meeting Tuesday in the Senate Building.
“We are going to keep coming to the capitol, we are going to keep protesting, and we are going to keep asking Doug Ducey to talk to us,” Perez said.
Contact the report at Case.Smith@asu.edu
