Travel Bound Educators

October 26, 2011

Travel Bound Educators:

Casa de las Américas is planning their second annual trip to Havana during the February NYC public school winter break. The focus of the trip will be on exploring the educational system in Cuba. As such we will obtain an education license to keep within the State Department guidelines and requirements to travel to
Cuba.

We will build on last year’s experience to maximize the benefits this trip will offer – as we attempt to renew, or continue our efforts to create a better educational system here in the USA.

Cuba has had a legacy of quality education for its citizens that is well known and documented. Cuba, from the path it has embarked since 1959 called the Revolution, began its well known journey of eliminating illiteracy to guaranteeing higher education achievement to its citizens – within the context of its
own trials and tribulations for economic growth and sustainability – and the roadblocks imposed on it from the major capitalist economic giant to its north.

In this vein, we urge all interested travelers on our trip to read on Cuba’s educational system and achievements. We will make available a reading list to this end in the coming weeks before the trip. In addition we will plan a meeting on the trip’s logistics. We hope to make this as interactive as possible within the constraints of time and costs.

An itinerary will be made that will include different levels of educational institutions, educators, students and parents. We plan to visit a number of auxiliary educational settings such as museums and related points of interest.

In addition to the above and of primary importance are the details concerning the cost of the trip and subsequent steps. You will be asked to provide proper documentation proving US citizenship and identifying your profession.

You will be identified as an educator, retired educator, educational activists, or a concerned citizen for a better education in the USA.

In your RSVP, please indicate if more people will be traveling with you and their current passport name, the passport number, and state residence of the identifying categories mentioned above. For contact purposes please provide us with an email address and a cell phone number if possible. Right now there is no space limitation, but depending on the response, one will be drawn. Trip details will be provided via email, and other available social media.

Please RSVP as soon as possible to William Gerena, with the requested information.


Trip Coordinators:

William Gerena Rochet Gerena339@gmail.com

646.283.9666

Nancy Cabrero Nycgab95@yahoo.com

917.412.4451

Cuban Rebel Trial Starts

Brownsville Herald, May 18, 1958 (front page)

Cuban Rebel Trial Starts Here Monday

The trial in Federal District Court here of 15 Cubans charged with conspiring to violate U.S. neutrality laws is slated to being Monday.
The group under the leadership of Arnaldo Goenaga Barron was captured off Padre Island last March while en route to join the revolutionary forces of Fidel Castro in his fight against the regime of President Fulgencio Batista of Cuba.

After a hunger strike the rebel group was freed on bond, and many of them have stayed in Brownsville pending their trial. Barron returned from New York Friday.
Coincidentally with Barron’s return the rebels launched a wave of handbill propaganda, apparently to drum up popular support for their position.
The rebels’ newest “manifesto” asks that “the people of Brownsville be present at Federal Court when we stand accused of fighting for liberty and democracy in our country.”
The manifesto charges “the bestial assassin of Cuba” with the death of “more than 5,000 persons, especially among the youth.”