Before Uvalde school shooting, Mexican-Americans fought for decades to improve school system

UVALDE — Students across the United States walked out of classes Thursday to protest gun violence and show support for the students and teachers killed in Uvalde – schools that have a little-known history of activism and walkouts.

Robb Elementary School is now the site of the second most-deadly school shooting in U.S. history. Five decades earlier, Uvalde schools were the site of one of the longest school walkouts in Texas history, prompted by discrimination against Mexican-American students.

As parents press law enforcement agencies for accountability following the shooting, Uvalde residents and past civil rights leaders remembered how they questioned authority to improve education for Mexican-Americans.

Read my story from May 2022 with Nicole Foy, published in the El Paso Times and the Austin American-Statesman.

Photo courtesy of Alfredo Santos.