Beyond the Bell: Organizing for Education Justice

In this episode, Elsa Bañuelos-Lindsay, the Executive Director of Movimiento Poder and Leidy Robledo, the National Co-Director of Alliance for Educational Justice discuss the legacy of the Chicano and ethnic studies movement and its connections to the experiences of immigrant students in Denver, Phoenix and around the country. From English-only language mandates, to the criminalization of immigrant students, to school closures and ICE and police collaborations,Leidy and Elsa help us see the legacy of power building by immigrant youth who have fought back school closures, Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s immigration/ICE raids, and to remove ICE and police from schools.  

In Part Two of this special two-part episode of Beyond the Bell, host Manuela Arciniegas reconnects with Marika Pfefferkorn for a powerful, real-time update from the Twin Cities amid what organizers are calling the Minnesota Rebellion.Recorded on February 2, 2026, months after their first conversation, Marika shares firsthand stories from the ground as communities confront escalating ICE activity, surveillance, and family separations. She describes how neighbors are organizing block by block, young people are leading walkouts and mutual aid efforts, and rapid response networks are emerging to protect one another through distributed leadership, digital vigilance, and deep community care.Marika also lifts up the leadership of the Twin Cities Innovation Alliance, the rise of “Aunties in Vests,” and plans for a National Summit on Digital Liberation and Movement—creating space for young people across the country to strategize, heal, and build power together.Dig Deeper: Local police aid ICE by tapping school cameras amid Trump’s immigration crackdownWe keep us safe!

Host Manuela Arciniegas (Communities for Just Schools Fund) sits down with Marika Pfefferkorn, the Co-Founder, Solutions and Sustainability Officer, & Executive Director of the Midwest Center for School Transformation,  and Aasim Shabazz, Co-founder and President of Twin Cities Innovation Alliance (TCIA). In this episode, Marika Pfefferkorn and Aasim Shabazz discuss how large language models and algorithms, known as AI, connect with the use of data as tools for surveillance and criminalization of students in schools and communities. They invite us into exploring the shifts systems and communities must make at the cultural, political, and practice level to live into Afro-Indigenous futures where youth and communities have the power to design and use technology for the public good.Dig Deeper: A Roadmap for Responsible AI in Education

How do teachers, caregivers, and youth build power in the most inequitable and colonized spaces of our nation? In this episode, Mercedes Martinez, president of La Federacíon de Maestros de Puerto Rico (FMPR) shares the inspiring legacy of solidarity and powerbuilding between Puerto Rico and the US communities amidst climate, governmental, and economic crisis. Mercedes shows how the massive defunding of public schools is part of a larger strategy to privatize and capture public budgets and segments of the commons. By connecting the dots between the labor movement, education justice, and privatization, Mercedes uplifts the enduring people-led efforts built to counter catastrophic attacks on the public safety net. As one of the testing grounds for what communities are facing post this federal administration, we learn how to disrupt colonial extraction to protect teachers, young people, and communities and their schools. 

In this episode, Juniper Gia Loving from GSA Network and Tyrone Creech, Jr. from G-SAFE talk about how to support trans, queer, 2-spirit (TQ2S) youth in Wisconsin, Texas and across the country. Through leadership development, community organizing, and impact litigation, they break down how attacks on young peoples’ gender and sexuality and attacks on their access to civil and human rights as queer students are foundational to the erosion of democracy, equity,  and access to public education for all.

On this episode of Beyond the Bell, Zakiyah Shaakir-Ansari, Co-Executive Director of Alliance for Quality Education and Hiram Marcano from Community Resource Hub talk about the power of youth and caregivers and parents in New York and Philadelphia, the legacy of the black power, civil rights and abolitionist movement, and how they have shaped a national education justice movement. From intergenerational organizing, to activating youth and parent power, Zakiyah and Hiram reflect on the unique contributions of Black and Brown intergenerational organizing that helped set the largest victories of getting police out of schools since the movement began.

On this episode of Beyond the Bell, Moira Kaleida from The Alliance to Reclaim our Schools and Kyle Serette from the National Education Association- the largest union in the country- have come together to defend public education from school closures and defunding- building a national movement of educators, youth and caregiver organizers and allies. What does it look like when the labor sector unites with the education justice sector to stop school closures and privatization and address the widespread defunding of the public safety net across IDEA disability funding, SNAP benefits, and more?

On this episode of Beyond the Bell, Jenny Arwarde and Meyiya Coleman from Communities United and VOYCE tell us about the work they did to center youth voices in designing and implementing the Whole School Safety Framework, which was embraced by Chicago Public Schools, ultimately removing police from schools and building a holistic safety and healing framework that recognizes organizing as a healing and transformative practice, while empowering young people to design the systems transformations they want to see across systems and communities in education, public safety, health, and more.

Host Manuela Arciniegas (Communities for Just Schools Fund) sits down with Joseph Williams, executive director of Students Deserve, and youth organizer/scholar Kahlila Williams, to spotlight how Black, queer, and immigrant students in Los Angeles are organizing for real safety and belonging. From defunding school police and defending the Black Student Achievement Plan to winning investment in LGBTQIA+ studies and Dream Centers, and building community self-defense against ICE: This debut episode traces the strategies, coalitions, and abolitionist vision powering youth-led education justice in 2025. A moving conversation about transforming schools from sites of control into places of care, dignity, and love, led by the young people living it.