"Lumina Nostra Ante Portas Aureas Libramus" (I Lift My Light Beside The Golden Door!) - Belle

That inspiring quote above has become our University's motto, the last line of the famous sonnet The New Colossus, written by Emma Lazarus in 1883, and is about the Statue of Liberty and how it welcomes immigrants from all over the world. To us, the students at Dream University - which is open to all who want the right to continue their education - it means we are lighting the pathway to our "golden door", the rights that have been denied to us, the right to an education and a bright future. In many ways, what we are building here shows our struggle, but also our happiness and good moments, and through all of that, we have become closer to each other and have learned many things which otherwise we would've never thought of before. From Political Science all the way to Street Theater and Public Relations classes, we have come together to hear about love, hardship, bonding, and what brings us all together to want to make this a better country. With so many incredible and intense things going on, it's no surprise we have attracted both local and national media. And I wanted to share with you the best of these experiences.

From the very first day our group has been working hard on something many organizations don't quite deem important enough; the ability to bond with one another, to get to know each one in a personal level, to build love within the movement, in order to do the best job we can. I am personally very glad this topic has come up with such ease to us, and we have since then made several activities that included one-on-ones, story telling, and the sharing of personal ideals and experiences. Our second day of classes was a particularly hard day for me, seeing as my sore throat/cold attacked with full force, and the intense heat didn't help. One of the activities we had was the splitting into groups to share our personal stories of why we came to D.C. to attend Dream University, and by the end of the class each group chose one person to go to the front of the class and share their particular reason. I felt weak and unmotivated thanks to my sickness, and ended up crying when asked to share my story within my group, and later, to my surprise, they asked me to share it to the rest of the class because they felt it had been the most emotional and powerful one. When asked, many of the other students agreed that public speaking, as hard as it is, is definitely easier when you don't have to speak about yourself. I cried for several minutes after my speech, and as a very closed off person when it comes to my personal stuff, it was something I didn't feel comfortable with. But the amount of understanding and love I received was something that touched me deeply, and several people walked up to me throughout the rest of the day to ask for a hug and to say they thought I did great. "You can't go wrong with something that comes from the heart", Milo, another student that came from Massachusetts, told me by the end of the day. It came to my understanding that the sharing of personal experiences within our movement is something not only amazing, but necessary to do. We realize we are not alone in our hard times, that there are many, many others who feel the same way we feel, who go through the same things, walk the same shoes. That makes us closer, stronger. That makes our movement stronger.

We learned more about this issue during our Public Relations class on our third day, taught by an amazing woman named Charlene Carruthers. She preached that public relationships should be based on Love, Justice, and Freedom, then went on to explain that those relationships are intentional, an exploration of shared values and purposes, an exchange of resources and skills, a shared commitment, all which end up in growth and learning over time. This was by far one of my favorite moments ever since I got here, and I made sure to take down plenty of notes from this particular class. Charlene did an amazing job in passing on the message that Love Ethic is important when building a movement like this, while teaching about good leadership at the same time, making me realize how deeply entangled those two are, and that they should always go hand in hand. She even went as far as to mention that, in all of the organizations and movements and meetings that she has ever participated in, the youth movement and meetings have been the only ones that she's seen talk about and put importance in love and bonding between our members. In a way, her class was a Leadership Training as well, giving value to the fact that building connections builds power, and that power should be relational instead of dominant; power WITH, not power OVER. Learning to be a leader is a healing process in itself. All of this helps in building our young people to be the leaders of tomorrow. And what absolutely amazing leaders we will be.

Yet another very interesting point to me was the amount of media coverage we got ever since we arrived at Lafayette Park, the spot in front of the White House where we have been holding our classes out in the open. Both The Washington Post, locally, and CNN, nationally, have taken pictures, videos, and interviews of us, and by the third day we already had an article written about us in The Associated Press, which can be found online. It was my first experience with the media, and I felt both excited and scared at the same time. I was asked to do a personal interview with The Washington Post, where I shared part of my situation, the fact that I am undocumented, my hopes and aspirations, and what had led me to come to D.C. to be a part of this big movement. Now, it should be understandable why somebody in a position such as mine would be somewhat afraid to share such things in a public interview which will be streamed online and available to essentially the whole nation. But these are risks that I believe every person who has come here, such as myself, have been aware of from the beginning. My train of thinking leans towards "If I don't do it, who will?". After all, this is an issue that is particular and dear to our hearts, and if each one of us is here today, it is because we could not stand to sit in the comfort of our homes - those of us who do have their own homes - waiting and wishing that something will be done for us. I know I could not stand it. This action was made with the intention of it being big enough to impact this nation as whole, in an incredible way, to be something never done before, to make people stop and look, struck by what's going on, by what we are showing, to make them feel deep within their hearts our struggle and our need for change. And for it to be as big as that, what we need the most is commitment and the will to believe. Without commitment, we get nowhere. In the presence of doubts, we fail. In order to get the Dream Act passed, we must believe with all our strength, hearts and souls that it WILL be passed. I know I believe. I deeply, deeply believe. Do you?

Comments

[Lai Wa]

Belle speaking from the heart! beautiful blog :)

[Howard Park]

Last Friday my 15 year old neice from Missouri was visiting Washington, DC and naturally she wanted to see the White House (tours are very, very hard to arrange these days). Anyway, we stumbled upon DREAM University in Lafayette Park. We spoke to a few of the young activists and signed a petition. Anyway, the experience was probably the most educational experience of the weekend for my neice and was as much or even more "American" than all of the marble monuments, fences and security barriers that are official Washington's face to the world. Dream On! Like those in the Civil Rights movement a generation or two ago it is tough and may get tougher but like Dr. King in 1963, keep your dream alive. I do believe it will pass but it could be a long, long time.

[ALICIA STANSBERRY]

BEAUTIFUL WAY TO EXPRESS WHAT COMES OUT OF YOUR HEART!. MY SOON WAS IN WASHINGTON D.C., TOO AND THEY ACCOMPANIED THE DREAM OF THOUSANDS OF STUDENTS WITH SIMILAR GOALS OF SUCCESS IN THIS COUNTRY.I CAN TELL YOU THAT I THINK THE SAME LIKE YOU:"I DEEPLY BELIEVE THAT THIS DREAM WILL PASS TODAY!!!!. KEEP THE DREAM ACT UP!!!!

[Dissertation]

I am personally very glad this topic has come up.Large numbers of people belong to media group come & coverage your protest,is the sign that you were right.Keep up & try your best.My pray is always for you.