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Sylvia Mendez and the Mendez v Westminster Court Case (redirected from Mendez v Westminster)

Page history last edited by Robert W. Maloy 1 year, 6 months ago

external image mendez.stamp__0.jpg?itok=vQLKqe4E

U.S. Postal Stamp (2007)

 

 

 

 

“The equal protection of the laws’ pertaining to the public school system in California is not provided by furnishing in separate schools the same technical facilities, textbooks and courses of instruction to children of Mexican ancestry that are available to the other public school children regardless of their ancestry. A paramount requisite in the American system of public education is social equality. It must be open to all children by unified school association regardless of lineage.”

Judge Paul J. McCormick

 

Mendez v. Westminster, 1947

 

    • Case Summary from Civics Resources for Students & Teachers from State Bar of Texas

 

      • The case declared the educational segregation of children of Mexican ancestry violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment  

 

 

 

      •  This resource differentiates learning for students because it presents the Mendez v. Westminster case and outlines a plan for teachers that will help them teach about this case.

 

      • There is an “about” page that teachers can use with their students to provide them with background information about the case so that they understand the basics of it before participating in the activity provided by the website, which is a re-enactment of the case.

 

      • There is a script to use to re-enact the Mendez v. Westminster case, which differentiates learning because acting out the case can help some students get a deeper understanding of how court proceedings work in America and the details of what went on in this case. In addition to those benefits, acting out the case will likely help students remember it better than if they only read about it.

 

      • There are opportunities for all the students in the class to participate (using the script they’ve laid out, up to 28 students can participate) and not every student has to be comfortable with public speaking to participate. For example, there are certain parts of the script where the “audience” speaks, so students uncomfortable with speaking in front of everyone by themselves could be a part of the crowd.

 

      • Students can be “picture holders” that hold up pictures of the people involved in the case while the students playing those people are delivering their lines, which ensures that all students will get to participate in the re-enactment in some way.

 

 

Case was decided in the federal courts in California and preceded Brown v. Board of Education by about eight years. 

 

Thurgood Marshall represented Sylvia Mendez and Linda Brown. 

 

Marshall used some of the same arguments from Mendez to win Brown v. Board of Education.

 

Answer Questions about the Text of the Court Decision, from Teaching Tolerance 

 

 

 

  Sylvia Mendez 2018 National Hispanic Hero Award

 

  • Ms. Mendez story in her own words along with historic pictures and video 

 

 

Desegregating California's Schools

 

Separate is Never Equal. Duncan Tonatiuh, 2014

 

  • Picture book telling of the story of Mendez v Westminster lets youngsters access the story through illustrations and text 

 

  • This book differentiates learning about the Mendez v. Westminstercase for young children because it tells the tale of the court case like a story and makes it easy to follow, as well as giving the student insight into how Sylvia felt during the court case by making her the main character of the story.

 

  • The story has pictures throughout to help the student visualize what’s happening, but also has a page of photos of Sylvia and her family at the end to help the student understand that the story they read was something that happened in real life.

 

  • In addition, the book has a glossary of terms, which is useful in giving students who are confused about the meanings of certain words a convenient way to look them up so that their reading experience isn’t interrupted.

 

 

Educator's Guide to Separate Is Never Equal

 

 

Brown vs. Board of Education (1956)

 

 

Separate is Not Equal:  Brown v. Board of Education, National Museum of American History

 

 

Learning Resources

 

iCivics “We the Jury” game (https://www.icivics.org/games/we-the-jury)

 

  • While this game doesn’t specifically focus on the Mendez v. Westminster  case, it does show the basics of how a court case works: a defendant and plaintiff both present arguments backed by evidence and then deliberation takes place.

 

  • This resource could be used in tandem with a resource that gets into the specifics of the Mendez v. Westminster case in order to teach about the case. Doing so would differentiate learning because playing the game and going through the process of a case from the point of view of a jury member gives the students a better understanding of how the US court system works in general, which will help them understand the case.

 

  • In addition to this, students will be engaged because this game is fun (I ended up playing the game all the way through while researching it for this assignment) and shows students just how difficult the deliberation process can be, which is an important part of the Mendez v. Westminster case, as it took almost a year for a verdict to be reached for that case (and over a year for a verdict to be reached for the appellate case that came after). 

 

 

 

Material about differentiated learning on this page provided by Sara Shea (March 2020)

 

 

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