Colton, CA—The cheers of hundreds of students echoed through Colton High’s Whitmer Auditorium on May 5, as they got to hear the voice of award-winning and best selling author Luis J. Rodriguez as their guest speaker.
The majority of students at Colton High first heard of Rodriguez this school year when the English department decided on a new book for the Freshman to read: “Always Running: La Vida Loca, Gang Days in L.A.,” Rodriguez’s 1993 memoir.
The change in novels was because Freshman teachers noticed the disengagement students experienced with the typical novels being taught. Through a class on multicultural education, English Teacher Andrew Vidal learned about how students have a harder time engaging in work that doesn’t reflect their own experience.
“We were trying to find a book that [students] could try to relate to,” he said. “So we were looking for something because we have a large Chicano population on this campus and people of color, so we started looking for a text that would, you know, speak to that.”
The novel “Always Running” shares the story of Rodriguez’s youth, as he went from being locked up and in a gang to freeing himself and sharing his story.
Although students at Colton High don’t face exactly the same challenges as Rodriguez did as a teenager in Los Angeles, the statistics point to its relatability. According to the data collected by Location, Inc. for NeighborhoodScout, in 2023 Colton was only 5% safer than all other cities in the U.S. And across the county, cases of aggravated assault and homicide were on the rise between 2017 and 2021, as reported by San Bernardino County.
While those numbers seem alarming, it may play a part in the interest CHS students are taking in the Rodriguez book. Vidal said, “I noticed that students who normally would not admit that they liked reading a book, were actually saying, ‘Yeah, I actually like this.’ You know it was kind of cool to see that.”
That’s when Vidal learned he could reach out to Rodriguez to speak at Colton High. After calls, set dates, and a postponement of the event, Rodriguez finally hit the Whitmer Auditorium stage on May 5.
At the event Rodriguez was introduced by Vidal and fellow English teacher Leticia Gomez. Once on stage, he impressed students with stories of his life, in which he discussed gang life, police interactions, drug addiction, and how writing saved his life. The presentation culminated with a recitation of a new poem from an upcoming collection called “Piece by Piece.”
Junior Tommy Lopez said, “I really liked Rodriguez’s discussion on becoming a better person. He went from a life of ruthlessness to one with more peace and love, so I think that’s really powerful.”
After his presentation, in a sitdown interview, Rodriguez shared about the importance of telling his stories. One of his major focal points is speaking his truth. “That’s it. Speaking my truth. I think the truth is kind of not there in the world. So the most important thing I can do is tell my truth, but also tell the truth of my community in the world that we’re in.”
Telling the truth did not initially make Rodriguez popular with family and friends. He wasn’t one to ask for permission when telling his stories, angering those closest to him for revealing his truth, but he said, “In the long run they all, they’re okay with it. I never asked permission, and they were just upset because I was putting the dirty laundry out there. You know how that goes.”
Some truths, however, are harder to tell. Rodriguez shared a story from “Hearts and Hands: Creating Community in Violent Times,” his second work of nonfiction, and the importance of truth within that story. “In my second memoir, I mentioned that my dad molested my sisters, and I didn’t talk about it, not in ‘Always Running,’ but in [“Hearts and Hands”] I did, because it’s an important part of the story that destroyed my whole family.”
He continued, “My youngest sister was the one. She was homeless at the time, she didn’t want help, but she did say, ‘Don’t let anybody stop you from talking about my dad.’ So I did it for her. I had to tell her story, because it’s something that I didn’t really know happened when I was growing up. So again, those are truths. Those are painful, but I do it to help and heal, not to hurt.”
Rodriguez’s impact on Colton High was immense for students, after his speech students came up thanking him, relating to him, and asking for advice, and as his poem Piece by Piece says:
“Here you have a way. Here you can sing victory. Here you are not a conquered race. Perpetual victim—the sullen face in a thunderstorm.”
