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Jan 13, 2009 10:50 pm US/Eastern
Parents Stage Hunger Strike Over Education Cuts
DORAL (CBS4) ―
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Parents staged a hunger strike outside Doral's Ronald Reagan High School
CBS
Outraged parents are planning to descend on Wednesday's budget meeting held by Miami-Dade County Public Schools. But before that takes place, two mothers have staged a hunger strike outside a school in Doral to protest drastic cuts in the state's education budget.
Monday evening when temperatures cooled, about 20 people held up signs outside the high school in support of the mothers, protesting cuts in education. The women, and one high school student, spent the night camped out.
On Tuesday, their tents and signs were visible outside Ronald Reagan High School, located at 86 hundred NW 107th Avenue.
The mothers said their hunger strike was a symbolic protest of budget cuts that affect the classroom. They hoped it would send a message to the school board. "Our position is that we can be without food, but we cannot afford not to feed children's minds," said Viviana Salmon, one of the mothers on the hunger strike.
Student Camille Spencer said she's proud of her mom. "I believe in what she's doing. I think it's important to stand up to what the school board wants to do to the school."
"The message is that we are absolutely desperate," said Salmon. "We are beyond ourselves with concern; we are terrified of what we are leaving as an education for our children." She continued, "Education, we believe, is what protects children and prepares them for the future, especially now when they are inheriting the economy they are inheriting."
Some parents, like Mark Hart, expressed doubts whether the protest could accomplish its desired goal. He said, "I think it's a little drastic; is it really necessary. I don't think it is."
The protest is called "Mothers For Education Hunger Strike" and are asking the Miami-Dade County school board not to cut electives out of the curriculum, and to also give teachers promised pay raises.
"We don't give up, we can't give up. How can we give up? How can we teach our children to give up?" Viviana Salmon, who has only had bottled water since Monday, says there are other mothers who may join their cause. "Something very bad is happening, we are killing the future by not investing in education."
Salmon says the School Board may be ignoring them. School District officials say that's not the case, but that the parents are protesting to the wrong people.
The Miami-Dade County school spokesman John Schuster said the budget cuts come from Tallahassee. He understands the frustration many parents and children have already accommodating nearly $280 million in cuts and in the future, they may have to cut another $80 million from the decimated district.
"We need to take this to Tallahassee. It's not our School Board members; it's not our superintendent," said Miami-Dade PTA President Mindy Gould. She's planning a big rally outside the School Board headquarters during the budget meeting Wednesday.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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