CA Schools Hold Cesar Chavez Appreciation Day
OAKLAND, CA - Civicorps Schools will host a community appreciation event on March 31st at 6:30 in honor of Cesar Chavez Day. Civicorps, which serves children in grades K-5 and young adults 18-24 in their charter schools in Oakland, will host the commemoration and enactment of the intention of Cesar Chavez Day at 101 Myrtle Street in Oakland, and will honor many community partners. Dinner will be catered by La Calaca Loca. A live auction, not of take away items, but of program needs, will be held.
“The love for justice that is in us is not only the best part of our being, but it is also the most true to our nature,” Cesar Chavez famously stated. Civicorps Schools celebrates Chavez’s commitment to gaining rights for the disenfranchised, and works every day to achieve his dream of justice.
As President Obama stated when he made Cesar Chavez Day a national holiday in 2010, “Since our Nation’s earliest days of independence, we have struggled to perfect the ideals of equal justice and opportunity enshrined in our founding documents. As Cesar suggests, justice may be true to our nature, but as history teaches us, it will not prevail unless we defend its cause.”
Over the course of 28 years, Civicorps has done just that. They have educated and employed an average of 200 disadvantaged youth in the East Bay per year. They help people get their diplomas while learning a commitment to civic and environmental ideals.
A wide scope of community partners are being recognized and will be at the event: Alameda County Flood Control, Cal Trans, City of Fremont, City of Hercules, City of Oakland, City of Pleasant Hill, City of Walnut Creek, East Bay Municipal Utility District, East Bay Regional Park District, Eco Village Learning Center, Experience Corps, Extreme Learning, Muir Heritage Land Trust, Oakland Fire Department, Oakland Housing Authority, Peralta Colleges, Playworks, Revolution Foods, San Francisco Shakespeare Festival and Stopwaste.org. Community partners will be honored with framed pictures of Civicorps students.
Civicorps Schools is a conservation corps in the East Bay that promotes citizenship and builds a civil society by creating educational models that draw upon the power of service as a way of learning. An educated citizenry is the cornerstone of a healthy democracy. Students who learn not only academic knowledge but also their potential for changing the world become capable, caring citizens. These beliefs shape the guiding principles of Civicorps Schools and are embodied in the model they create through academic excellence; artistic literacy; values, ethics, and spiritual development necessary to thoughtful citizenship in a pluralistic, democratic society; service as a way of learning; participation in the life of the school and the community through stewardship of the environment; and creative partnerships in sustaining public education.
Civicorps’ core programs include the high school recovery program Civicorps Academy, an East Bay charter schoolwhose programs helps young adults earn their high school diplomas while learning skills in natural and urban resource fieldwork; the Recycling Services Team, which provides collection and sorting services to municipalities and private businesses; and the Civicorps Elementary School, which focuses on rigorous academics, artful thinking and service learning for K-5 children.
