Thousands of Newark students leave school in protest, block major intersection
NEWARK — Around noon on Friday, 18-year-old Quinnetta Owens-Culver normally would have attended her Spanish class at Malcolm X Shabazz High School in Newark.
But at the start of the Memorial Day weekend, Owens-Culver and thousands of other Newark students walked out of their schools at that time, marched on city streets and shut down a major intersection in protest of the school district's policies.
"Most people walk around this world, thinking that they can't get nowhere...but us, as a young people, we have a voice. We need to speak for ourselves," Owens-Culver said.
"The message is for saving our schools in Newark," she added.
In what organizers claimed would be the largest student protest in the city's history, students from various high schools marched down Broad Street and assembled outside City Hall. The walkout was organized by the Newark Students Union and NJ Communities United, an advocacy group.
Waving signs with messages like "Save Our Schools" and "We Have Rights," the students cheered from the steps of City Hall as 17-year-old Jose Leonardo called on them to "make some noise."
"Our future should not be played with," Leonardo, a junior at Arts High School, shouted to the crowd.
The students then marched down Broad Street and protested in the plaza outside the Peter W. Rodino Federal Office Building. Soon after, they continued down Broad Street, made a left on South Street and then a right on McCarter Highway.
The protesters then blocked the intersection at McCarter Highway and Miller Street.
"We did not come here...to play a game," 18-year-old Kristin Towkaniuk, a senior at Science Park High School and president of the Newark Students Union, told the crowd at the intersection. "We're done playing games with our education."
As the students locked arms, Towkaniuk led the crowd in a chant of "We have a duty to fight. We have a duty to win. We must love and protect one another. We have nothing to lose but our chains."
Grace Tyler, a junior at Malcolm X Shabazz High School, addresses the crowd off Newark high students who converge on City Hall after walking out of their schools in protest of the designation of nine public schools as "turnaround" schools. They then marched to the Federal building before ending their protest march with a sit-in on McCarter Highway. Newark, NJ 5/22/15 (Robert Sciarrino | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com) Motorists waited in their cars at the intersection for about 20 minutes before the students dispersed shortly before 2 p.m., but a couple of them said they were not upset about the traffic delay.
"I think they're a voice for the community," said Asbury Park resident Francisco Duprey as he sat in his car. "They've got a duty so they're doing it...I just caught in the middle of it."
Another motorist, Newark resident Cassandra Gold, also said she didn't mind waiting in her car because of the protest.
"I'm not mad. I think it's great," said Gold, whose daughter graduated from University High School. "Democracy is great."
Besides the traffic delays, the protest did not appear to cause many other disruptions in Thousands of Newark students leave school in protest, block major intersection | NJ.com: