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PROPOSED RESOLUTION
DECLARATION OF RUDY LOZANO DAY IN COOK COUNTY
WHEREAS, Rodolfo "Rudy" Lozano was born in Harlingen, Texas on July 17, 1951. He was one of six children born to Guadalupe and Anita Lozano; and
WHEREAS, Rudy Lozano and his family moved to Chicago in the early 1950's, and he spent his formative years in the Pilsen neighborhood on the near Southwest Side; and
WHEREAS, Rudy Lozano developed a sense of activism at an early age and as a child walked strike picket lines with his siblings alongside their metalworker and staunch union activist father; and
WHEREAS, Rudy Lozano's life was characterized by his passion for community activism and his unwavering dedication to humanity and the betterment of all working-class people; and
WHEREAS, Rudy Lozano's mission was to empower all workers and uplift the voices of immigrants and to organize the unorganized, and to strategically forge coalitions among Latino, Black, white progressive allies, and other historically underrepresented community groups; and
WHEREAS, in 1970, Rudy Lozano helped organize Black and Latino students at Carter Henry Harrison Technical High School (now Maria Saucedo Scholastic Academy) to stage a series of walkouts protesting the lack of representation in the curriculum and of bilingual education as well as substandard facilities-Harrison, located in South Lawndale, also served Pilsen and was overcrowded; and
WHEREAS, approximately 35,000 Chicago Public School (CPS) students were inspired by the Harrison action to walk out and within a decade, as a result of both the walkouts and continuing community pressure, the Board of Education built a new high school to serve Pilsen, Benito Juarez Community Academy; and
WHEREAS, Rudy Lozano was among the first wave of Mexican American students at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), and led struggles for student diversity and multicultural curriculum leading to the establishment of the Latin American Recruitment and Educati...
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