A student-led protest marched through the streets of Santa Clara on Feb. 10 as a few hundred teens from Wilcox High School spoke out against the deportation of immigrants. Led by sophomore Dayarely Amaya, the students walked off the campus during fifth period and raised their voices with chants of “Sí, se puede.”
For Amaya, this march was about standing up for what she believes is right and for her family.
“[Some people] think that we don’t know, we’re immature, and all of this, but the truth is, a lot of us are actually directly affected by this,” said Amaya. “A lot of the students are immigrants. They’re children of immigrants. They’ve seen all the challenges that immigrants face firsthand. They’ve been through it. We want to change the future of this country.
“I want to fight for my parents’ future as much as they fought for my future because they came to this country with nothing,” continued Amaya. “They were much younger than I am right now when they came to this country to fight for my future.”
One ambitious student, Wilcox senior Fareed Feno, brought a bullhorn to amplify the message: “Stand with your community. Stand with your friends. Stand with your neighbors.”
Feno, a student of Palestinian descent and an American citizen, is well aware of what’s happening in his country.
“The message that they’re trying to put out is, ‘Oh, we’re gonna get rid of the criminals. We’re gonna get rid of the rapists. We’re gonna get rid of the people that make our country bad.’ But most of the people they are getting rid of are the people that make this country good,” said Feno.
“The people that help our country build up. The people that are essential workers. The people that support us. The people that hold the bottom of our society together,” Feno continued. “A lot of those people are underrepresented. They don’t have a lot of that representation that would help them in any other way. So, this is our way of showing our support for them, for a lot of people who can’t.”
Amaya worked with the school administration to take steps to ensure the signs were appropriate and the students remained safe.
Principal Kristin Gonzalez advised Amaya to keep the protest on campus and stick to the safe space administrators created for them in front of the school. But the district was also prepared for the possibility that students would decide to march, which they did.
“We hoped that they had stayed. We designated a space on campus for them. We hoped, because it is a closed campus, we want them to be safe and supervised while they exercise their activities,” said Jennifer Dericco, SCUSD Public Information Officer. “But we have great partnerships with our local law enforcement, too. So, we know that when they leave our supervision jurisdiction, when they leave campus, we know that the Santa Clara Police Department is also monitoring.”
The students marched from Wilcox to Lawrence Expressway and then south to Santa Clara High School. Some students from Santa Clara also joined as the march returned to Wilcox.
Afterward, Amaya was proud of her fellow students.
“I’m really proud that a lot of our students came out to support us,” said Amaya. “I didn’t think that there was going to be this much people because not everybody believes in what I believe in, but there was a whole lot of people and it just, it made my heart really happy.”
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Have any of these students or their families been ripped apart? How have the students determined that most of the people they are getting rid of are the people that make this country good,” and are not rapists and criminals?
They don’t know anyone that has had their families ripped apart. This is what’s wrong with the school system. Instead of teaching the children they focus on indoctrinating them. That’s why California schools are some of the worst in the country. Teach kids how to think, not what to think!
Stuff it, Bob.
I think it’s sad that one of the only two students interviewed for this story hails from a “country” where people are attacked, burned, mutilated, raped and murdered for being Jewish. The government in charge of that stretch of land is still holding dozens of Jews hostage, including the youngest hostage in the world, who was only nine months old when he was ripped away from his family by terrorist butchers. Now we’re beginning to see how the hostages are being crippled, starved, and tortured; again, all for being Jewish.
I’m glad the student interviewed is here, safe, out of that area of the world, and hopefully away from those who would brainwash him and indoctrinate him into believing in such hate barbarism. But no one who believes in such terrorist ideals should be allowed into this country. Those who come to America should defend American values.
The people who are attacked, burned, mutilated, raped – also starved – and murdered are Palestinian civilians, mostly children. The government in charge of that stretch of land is still holding thousands of Palestinians hostage – in “prisons” that are torture chambers. The hostages you refer to who have been released are healthy, in good spirits, and thank those who had been holding them for taking good care of them. The Palestinian hostages who have been released have been abused, often for many years. They were ordered to have no celebrations upon their release, unlike the Jewish hostages.
Do you know that history didn’t start on October 11, 2023? That the Palestinian people and their land have been cruelly decimated in a barbaric process starting even before 1948? In 1897 a political ideology arose which has since used propaganda and indoctrination systems to dupe world leaders and its followers into what is now a global disaster. Listen to Jewish Voices for Peace (for example), read up (Ilan Pappe, for example), follow non-Western mainstream news (use NewsCord, for example). And spit out the tainted KoolAid – for the sake of all humanity.
Sorry, I meant October 7, not October 11.
Thank you for your racist, pro-terrorist, pure Hamas propaganda words. The only bit that’s true is that this war didn’t start in 2023, or 1967, or 1948; it started 2,000 years ago when the Jews were expelled from their indigenous homeland, and have been trying to return and live peacefully with their neighbors ever since. Just yesterday a rocket was fired from the Gaza strip, but landed in the strip and killed a 14 year old boy…but you’re not going to see that, because somehow when Hamas kills children it’s always justified, even when they murder their own people.
I wish you were neither a parent nor an employee of SCUSD, but I think we all know you’re at least one. Your words serve as a shining example why Jewish students feel unsafe at SCUSD schools.
Get a grip….you know nothing about them and they know nothing about you. No one, no one feels unsafe at school – they are busy learning.