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¡A La Huelga! Secondary Students, School Strikes, and the Power of Educational Activism in 1970s Nicaragua

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 October 2020

Claudia Rueda
Claudia Rueda*
Affiliation:
Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi, Corpus Christi, [email protected]
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Abstract

The year 1976 was a violent one in Nicaragua. In an effort to quash the Sandinista guerrillas, the dictator Anastasio Somoza Debayle had declared a state of siege, suspending constitutional guarantees, muzzling the press, and unleashing the Guardia Nacional. Despite the dangers of dissent, thousands of students across the country walked off their secondary school campuses that year to protest poor funding, inept teachers, and oppressive administrators. This article examines this series of strikes to uncover the ways in which teenagers managed to organize their schools and communities in spite of the repression that marked the final years of the Somoza regime. Analyzing student documents, Ministry of Education records, and newspaper reports, this article argues that in the context of a decades-long dictatorship, student demands for more democratic schools opened a relatively safe pathway for cross-generational activism that forced concessions from the Somoza regime. By the 1970s, secondary schools had come to reflect the state's authoritarianism and mismanagement, and widespread educational deficiencies brought students and parents together in a joint project to demand better schools. Battles over the quality of education, thus, showcased the power of an organized citizenry and laid the groundwork for the revolutionary mobilizations that were to come.

Keywords

student protestNicaraguasecondary schoolseducation activismdictatorship
Type
Article
Information
The Americas , Volume 77 , Issue 4 , October 2020 , pp. 601 - 631
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Academy of American Franciscan History

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Footnotes

I would like to thank Tanalís Padilla, Robert Sierakowski, Juandrea Bates, Eimeel Castillo, Colin Snider, Heather Vrana, Dawson Barrett, Beth Robinson, and the anonymous reviewers assigned by The Americas for their comments and suggestions on this article.

References

1. Comité de Estudiantes de la ENAC, Communique: Fuera Virgilio y el Profe. Rosales de la ENAC, August 31, 1976, Archivo General de la Nación, Nicaragua [hereafter AGN], Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de la Huelga en Granada 1976; Memorandum to Carlos Huelva Prieto from José Luis Ramírez V. and Ridel Barahona Requenes, Asunto: Informe de la Supervisión Realizada a la Escuela Nacional de Comercio de la Ciudad de Granada el día 3 de Sept de 1976, September 7, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de la Huelga en Granada 1976; Edgard Montenegro, “Huelga en Escuela de Comercio en Granada,” La Prensa [Managua], September 6, 1976.

2. Students who finished primary school could attend secondary schools that offered three years of basic education and then two or three years of a more specialized program. Most secondary students were between the ages of 13 and 18. On Nicaraguan secondary schools under Somoza, see Arríen, Juan B. and Kauffmann, Rafael, Nicaragua en la educación: una aproximación a la realidad (Managua: Ediciones Universidad Centroamericana, 1977), 87–88Google Scholar, 92, 207; de Castilla Urbina, Miguel, “La educación en Nicaragua: un caso de educación para el desarrollo del subdesarrollo,” in Educación y dependencia: El Caso de Nicaragua, Bravo, Miguel Obando et al. , eds. (Managua: Institución de Promoción Humana, 1977), 318Google Scholar.

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6. Reviewing a random sample of 640 fallen combatants, Carlos Vilas found that almost one third were students. See Vilas, Carlos, The Sandinista Revolution: National Liberation and Social Transformation in Central America, Butler, Judy, trans. (New York: Monthly Review Press; Berkeley: Center for the Studies of the Americas, 1986), 112–117Google Scholar.

7. On the violence of the era, see Amnesty International, “República de Nicaragua: Informe de Amnistía Internacional,” (London: Amnesty International Publications, 1978); Zimmermann, Matilde, Sandinista: Carlos Fonseca and the Nicaraguan Revolution (Durham: Duke University Press, 2000), 188–189CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Robert J. Sierakowski, “In the Footsteps of Sandino: Geographies of Revolution and Political Violence in Northern Nicaragua, 1956–1979” (PhD diss.: University of California-Los Angeles, 2012), 163–169.

8. Zimmermann, Sandinista, 173; Booth, John A., The End and the Beginning: The Nicaraguan Revolution (Boulder and London: Westview Press, 1985), 77–82Google Scholar, 93; Walter LaFeber, Inevitable Revolutions (New York: W. W. Norton, 1993), 227.

9. Sierakowski, “In the Footsteps,” 57.

10. Sierakowski, “In the Footsteps,” 81–91.

11. On this period, see Booth, The End, 81–95, 141–143; Jeffrey Gould, To Lead As Equals: Rural Protest and Political Consciousness in Chinandega, Nicaragua, 1912–1979 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990), 271–291; Vilas, The Sandinista Revolution, 133; Richard Millett, Guardians of the Dynasty (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1977), 237–238; LaFeber, Inevitable Revolutions, 227; Eduardo Crawley, Dictators Never Die: Nicaragua and the Somoza Dynasty (New York: St. Martins Press, 1979), 148–151; and Sierakowski, “In the Footsteps,” 163–169.

12. Gould, To Lead, 270–277, 280–281. On the organizing efforts of teachers, see the interview with Bruno Gallardo and Alejandrino Perera in Mónica Baltodano, Memorias de la lucha sandinista, vol. 1, De la forja de la vanguardia a la montaña (Managua: Instituto de Historia de Nicaragua y Centroamérica-Universidad Centroamericana [hereafter IHNCA and UCA, respectively], 2010), 323–342.

13. Gould, To Lead, 277–280, 286–288.

14. See for example “Barrios de la Paz Centro, solicitan alumbrado público,” La Prensa, August 19, 1976; and “Barrio Santo, de Rivas, reclama alumbrado público,” La Prensa, August 12, 1976.

15. De Castilla Urbina, “La Educación,” 267–315.

16. “Somos capaces de vencer a todo que quiera despojarnos de lo nuestro,” Novedades, September 15, 1976; Socorro Bonilla Castellón, “Los propósitos de la ministra,” La Prensa, August 2, 1976.

17. De Castilla Urbina, “La Educación,” 313–334, 376–377, 429–434.

18. “Exponen a Ministra desinterés oficial por la educación,” La Prensa, June 11, 1976.

19. The conservative daily La Prensa regularly covered these inefficiencies. See for example “Faltan aulas para clases en Carazo,” La Prensa, May 30, 1976; “Casco: irregularidades en educación pública,” La Prensa, June 3, 1976; “Exponen a Ministra crisis de mobiliario,” La Prensa, September 1, 1976; “Sobregiro con becas,” La Prensa, June 7, 1976; “Siguen investigando fondos de Educación,” La Prensa, July 25, 1976; and “Falta material didáctico para la escuela acelerada de adultos de Jinotepe,” La Prensa, September 6, 1976.

20. In the late 1960s, teachers who were part of the Federación Sindical de Maestros de Nicaragua (FSMN) undertook a series of strikes for better pay and working conditions, but by 1972 regime repression had effectively destroyed the union. Mónica Baltodano notes, “Between 1972 and 1976, the teachers union’ experienced a period of decline and dislocation. It was not until 1976, under the leadership of the FSLN that the union organizing process was restarted.” On the history of the FSMN, see Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 1, 323–342. See also the interviews in Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 4, Rebeldía y insurrección en el Departmaento de Carazo (Managua: Popol Na, 2012), 154–166.

21. “Fuertes críticas de diputados a la Ministro de Educación Pública,” Novedades [Managua], September 8, 1976.

22. “Piden material para construir escuela,” Novedades, March 1, 1976.

23. “Crecen protestas contra centro escolar,” Novedades, April 1, 1976.

24. “Escuela necesita máquinas,” Novedades, July 20, 1976.

25. “Renuncia el Ministro de Educación Pública,” Novedades, May 21, 1976; “‘Es pesada la cruz que me entregaron,’ dice ministra,” La Prensa, June 4, 1976; Isabel Rodríguez Rosales, Historia de la educación en Nicaragua, vol. 3 (Managua: Hispamer, 2007), 243.

26. As Valeria Manzano has argued for the case of Argentina, educational authoritarianism politicized secondary students in the late 1950s. There, she found that students chafed at the school's emphasis on obedience, order, and encyclopedism. Her sources suggest that schools had come to mirror the military. Manzano, Age of Youth, 44–54.

27. On the expanded notions of democracy that fueled Cold War conflict, see Greg Grandin, The Last Colonial Massacre: Latin America in the Cold War (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004).

28. In the 1960s, the Revolutionary Student Front (FER) was active on several campuses, but many of their groups appear to have been quite small for much of this era.

29. Letter from Carlos Fonseca to Compañeros Estudiantes, November 18, 1958, León, IHNCA, Colección CUUN, D17 G3, folder no. 5. Note: In 2012, the Colección CUUN and the Colección Movimientos Estudinatiles at the IHNCA were reorganized and the location data given here may no longer correspond with the new system.

30. Carlos Fonseca, “Mensaje del Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional, FSLN, a los estudiantes revolucionarios,” Obras, vol. 1 (Managua: Editorial Nueva Nicaragua, 1985), 129–148.

31. Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 1, 504.

32. Bayardo Arce to Mónica Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 1, 497–503.

33. Bayardo Arce to Mónica Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 1, 504. After the FSLN split into three tendencies, these student organizations also took sides, but not all embraced the same side. Some AES groups were affiliated with the Proletariats and others with the Guerra Prolongada Popular (GPP). See Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 1, 321. On the ideological differences between these tendencies, see Zimmermann, Sandinista, 162–184.

34. Mónica Baltodano writes that Irving Dávila, who was the president of the University Student Center at the Universidad Nacional and a Sandinista militant “advised the Movement of Secondary Students in Chinandega, Estelí and Matagalpa” in the mid-1970s. Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 1, 306. Víctor Hugo Tinoco was a Sandinista college student who also worked with the University Student Center and according to Baltodano “coordinated the work of the Association of Secondary Students at the national level.” Baltodano, vol. 2; Baltodano, El crisol de las insurrecciones: las Segovias, Managua y León (Managua: IHNCA-UCA, 2010), 105. José González recalled founding Matagalpa's branch of the AES with several other secondary students, some of whom were already Sandinista militants. José González in Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 2, 171.

35. Letter from “Germán” (Bayardo Arce) to “Marcela” (Mónica Baltodano), August 20, 1976. I am grateful to Robert Sierakowski for sharing with me his transcription of this letter, which is stored in the archives of the Centro de Historia Militar. He discusses this letter in Sierakowski, “In the Footsteps,” 244–245. On Bayardo Arce's long and varied work with the Sandinistas, see the interview with him in Baltodano, Memorias, Vol 1.

36. At Camoapa, students and their supporters complained that the director was sympathetic to the FER, allowing FER activists to give a talk on campus that was critical of the Somoza regime. Altas personalidades de esta ciudad to Leandro Marín Abaunza, February 12, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Exp. 1976 Folder Especial de Huelga, Corresp. Especial de Huelga de Camoapa; Communique from Alumnado INC, February 23, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Exp 1976, Folders Especial de Huelga, Corresp. Especial de Huelga de Camoapa.

37. Altas personalidades de esta ciudad, padres de familia y alumnada en general to Leandro Marín Abaunza, Ministro de Educación Pública, February 12, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Exp. 1976, Folder Especial de Huelga, Corresp. Especial de Huelga de Camoapa.

38. Undated flyer, “Lo que debe contestar Emilio Sobalvarro ante el estudiantado y la ciudadanía de Matagalpa”; Comunicado al pueblo de Matagalpa from padres de familia, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

39. Communique “Fuera Virgilio y el Prof. Rosales de la ENAC,” from the Comité de Estudiantes de la ENAC, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de Huelga en Granada 1976; Guillermo Rosales Herrera, director, Escuela de Ciencias de la Educación, to Carlos Huelva, deputy director of Educación Media, September 3, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de Huelga en Granada 1976.

40. Altas personalidades de esta ciudad, padres de familia y alumnada en general to Leandro Marín Abaunza, Ministro de Educación Pública, February 12, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. 1976, Folders Especial de Huelga, Corresp. Especial de Huelga de Camoapa.

41. “Por qué la huelga en el Eliseo Picado,” La Prensa, July 4, 1976.

42. “Por qué la huelga en el Eliseo Picado,” La Prensa, July 4, 1976.

43. Circular to directores de centros de educación, from Helia María Robles, undated (ca. 1977), AGN, exp. Huelga Matagalpa; “Sigue el lío del Instituto de Chinandega,” La Prensa, August 19, 1976.

44. Undated flyer, “Lo que debe contestar Emilio Sobalvarro ante el estudiantado y la ciudadanía de Matagalpa”; Comunicado al pueblo de Matagalpa from padres de familia, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

45. “Investigan Instituto de Chinandega,” La Prensa, August 11, 1976.

46. “Paro de estudiantes triunfa en Jinotega,” La Prensa, June 27, 1976.

47. Sierakowski notes an instance when a Somocista mayor undertaking careful audits uncovered malfeasance and was driven out of office by other more powerful regime loyalists. Sierawkowski, “In the Footsteps,” 82–83.

48. “Educadora denuncia campaña infamante en su contra,” La Prensa, September 14, 1976; “Masaya necesita biblioteca pública,” La Prensa, August 12, 1976; “Investigan Instituto de Chinandega,” La Prensa, August 11, 1976.

49. Communique from Alumnado de este centro, February 23, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. 1976, Folders Especial de Huelga, Corresp. Especial de Huelga de Camoapa.

50. Communique, September 3, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de Huelga en Granada 1976.

51. Undated flyer, “Lo que debe contestar Emilio Sobalvarro ante el estudiantado y la ciudadanía de Matagalpa,” AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

52. Demands quoted in “Tres colegios tomados por estudiantes del MES,” La Prensa, July 11, 1976.

53. Communique, September 3, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial el Huelga en Granada 1976.

54. See for example Zolov, Refried Elvis, 106–115. For a nuanced examination of the class dimensions of 1960s sartorial conflict, see Manzano, Age of Youth, 88–93.

55. Undated and incomplete document, “Cronología de una huelga,” Instituto Histórico de Nicaragua y Centroamérica, Colección Movimiento Estudiantil [hereafter IHNCA CME] D9 G4, exp. 6; Sergio Torres, presidente del Comité Estudiantil and Norman Chavarria, presidente de la Directiva Central, to Helia María Robles, Ministra de Educación Pública, June 23, 1976, AGN.

56. “Sanción a estudiantes del INO, suavizada,” La Prensa, June 2, 1976.

57. “Amargo homenaje a la patria en Masatepe,” La Prensa, September 21, 1976.

58. The activist Jonathan Matthew Smucker, building on the findings of the sociologist George Mead, has argued that social movements “hold up a mirror” to society in order to reveal “parts of itself that had escaped its conscious gaze, and thereby, society reimagines itself.” Smucker, Hegemony How-to: A Roadmap for Radicals (Chico, CA: AK Press, 2017), 62–63.

59. Domingo Ramírez G., “Editorial: Graves en los institutos del país,” La Voz de Occidente, clipping attached to a letter to Helia María Robles from the parents of students from the Instituto Nacional Joaquín Sanson Escoto, August 31,1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Años 1976, Huelga en Chinandega.

60. Freire, Paulo, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, (New York: Bloomsbury, 2013), 154Google Scholar. Freire discusses the way in which the banking model of education, in which teachers “deposit” knowledge in the minds of passive pupils, prepares students to take on the role of unquestioning citizens in an oppressive society. See Freire, Pedagogy, 74–78.

61. See Manzano, Age of Youth, 46–54.

62. “Pagan por fin a los becados,” La Prensa, July 20, 1976.

63. Theoharis, Jeanne, “W-A-L-K-O-U-T!”: High School Students and the Development of Black Power in Los Angeles,” in Neighborhood Rebels, Joseph, Peniel E., ed. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), 107–129CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Calvo-Quirós, William A., “Thank you, Maestro: The Walkouts as Praxis of ‘Epistemic Resistance,’” Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies 39:2 (2014): 155–165Google Scholar.

64. On this history, see the interview with Marcos Largaespada and Isabel Castillo in Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 2, 154–156, and the interview with José Gonzáles and Sandra López in Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 2, 171.

65. Undated and incomplete document, “Cronología de una huelga,” IHNCA CME D9 G4, exp. 6.

66. Memorandum to Carlos Huelva Prieto from José Luis Ramírez and Ridel Barahona Requenes, Asunto: Informe de la supervisión realizada a la Escuela Nacional de Comercio de la Ciudad de Granada el día 3 de sept. de 1976, September 7, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de Huelga en Granada 1976.

67. “Esperan pruebas sobre irregularidades del Instituto de León, La Prensa, July 5, 1976; Edgard Montenegro, “Huelga en Escuela de Comercio en Granada,” La Prensa, September 6, 1976.

68. Communique from the Comité Central del Instituto Nacional Eliseo Picado, ca. June 4, 1976. AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

69. See Cowan, Securing Sex.

70. Communique from the Comité Central del Instituto Nacional Eliseo Picado, ca. June 4, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

71. Undated and incomplete document, “Cronología de una huelga,” IHNCA CME D9 G4 exp. 6.

72. Parents of Matagalpa, Telex to Anastasio Somoza, June 16, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Años 1976, Huelga en Chinandega.

73. Memorandum to Helia María Robles from Carlos Huelva Prieto, June 8, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa; “Esperan pruebas sobre irregularidades del Instituto de León,” La Prensa, July 5, 1976; “Apoyan a Eliseo Picado,” La Prensa, June 24, 1976.

74. “Apoyan a Eliseo Picado,” La Prensa, June 24, 1976; “Paro de estudiantes triunfa en Jinotega,” La Prensa, June 27,1976; “Esperan pruebas sobre irregularidades del instituto de león,” La Prensa, July 5, 1976.

75. Undated and incomplete document, “Cronología de una huelga,” IHNCA CME D9 G4, exp. 6.

76. Memorandum to Helia María Robles from Carlos Huelva Prieto, June 8, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa; “Se agrava caso del Inst. Eliseo Picado,” La Prensa, June 9, 1976.

77. “Tres amparitos para estudiantes,” La Prensa, July 17, 1976.

78. Katherine Hoyt, who was living in Matagalpa at the time, recalled the incident in her memoir. She wrote that “Boys and girls slept in separate classrooms, with the girls being chaperoned by their mothers!” Katherine Hoyt, 30 years of Memories: Dictatorship, Revolution, and Nicaraguan Solidarity (Washington, DC: Nicaragua Network Education Fund, 1996), 24.

79. “Se agrava caso del inst. Eliseo Picado,” La Prensa, June 9, 1976.

80. “No hubo consenso en ‘arreglo’ del Picado,” La Prensa, June 12, 1976.

81. Telex to Anastasio Somoza D. from Comité de Padres de Familia, Matagalpa, June 16, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Años 1976, Huelga en Chinandega.

82. Undated and incomplete document, “Cronología de una huelga,” IHNCA CME, D9 G4, exp. 6.

83. Letter to Honorable autoridades minístrales from alumnos de la ENC, September 1, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de la Huelga en Granada 1976; Letter to Señores Investigadores de Educación Pública, September 1, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de la Huelga en Granada 1976.

84. Memorandum to Helia María Robles from Carlos Huelva Prieto, June 8, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

85. Letter to Alba Rivera de Vallejos from Pablo Espinoza Ugarte, July 27, 1977, AGN, exp. Huelga Matagalpa; Telegram to Jefe Director GN [Guardia Nacional, hereafter GN] et al. from Gregorio Pichardo, Coronel GN, Comandante Deptal., July 16, 1976, AGN, exp. 1976, Folder Especial de Huelga en Jinotega. Similar charges were leveled against Chicano protesters in Los Angeles. See Edward J. Escobar, “The Dialectics of Repression: The Los Angeles Police Department and the Chicano Movement, 1968–1971,” Journal of American History 79:4 (1993): 1496.

86. Telegram to Jefe Director GN et al. from Gregorio Pichardo, Coronel GN, Comandante Deptal., July 16, 1976, AGN, exp. 1976, Folder Especial de Huelga en Jinotega.

87. In Argentina, for example, the intransigence of university administrators and state bureaucrats who refused to recognize the problems students were protesting led to the escalation of violence in 1968. Manzano, Age of Youth, 164–165.

88. In her study of black student walkouts in Los Angeles, Jeanne Theoharis notes that sometimes the school board gave in to students’ demands in order to “ensure the maintenance of its own power.” Theoharis, “W-A-L-K-O-U-T!,” 120. The Somoza regime was just as savvy, and it is worth nothing that in both cases it was student protests that jeopardized the status quo.

89. Memorandum to Helia María Robles from Carlos Huelva Prieto, June 8, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

90. Memorandum to Carlos Huelva Prieto from Luis Ariel González, Asunto: Acusaciones contra el Prof. Adolfo Rosales de la Escuela Nacional de Comercio de Granada, September 10, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de Huelga en Granada 1976.

91. Sierakowski found that the regime's greatest tool for ensuring loyalty was its willingness to “selectively apply the law.” This meant, in practice, that the regime enforced laws when victims were powerful loyalists and disregarded the law for that group as well. See Sierakowski, “In the Footsteps,” 68–73, 85–91.

92. Letter to Carlos Huelva Prieto, Director de Educación Media, from Lic. Fermín Mendoza Estrada, August 9, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, Caja 358, exp. 1976 Huelga en León,.

93. Memorandum to Helia María Robles from Carlos Huelva Prieto, June 8, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

94. Letter to Carlos Huelva Prieto from Fermín Mendoza Estrada, August 9, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 358, Exp: 1976 Huelga en León.

95. Memorandum to Carlos Huelva Prieto from Luis Ariel González, Asunto: Acusaciones contra el Prof. Adolfo Rosales de la Escuela Nacional de Comercio de Granada, September 10, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de Huelga en Granada 1976.

96. For example, see the memo dated February 24, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Exp 1976 Folder Especial de Huelga, Corresp. Especial de Huelga de Camoapa.

97. Memorandum to Helia María Robles Sobalvarro from Carlos Huelva Prieto, June 8, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educacion, Caja 394, exp. Caso de Matagalpa.

98. “Ultimátum en caso ‘Eliseo Picado,’” La Prensa, June 16, 1976.

99. “Paro de estudiantes triunfa en Jinotega,” La Prensa, June 27, 1976.

100. In 1975, Guardia soldiers invaded the campus of the Escuela Mercantil de Chinandega to arrest several student activists. “Más noticias de Chinandega y El Viejo: repression,” Jornada Heroíca de Pancasan, August 21, 1975, 4, IHNCA, Colección CUUN, F no. 79.

101. “Analizan causas de los conflictos estudiantiles,” La Prensa, June 15, 1976; Petition to Honorables autoridades ministeriales from Alumnos de la ENC, September 1, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, Caja 394, Folder Especial de Huelga en Granada 1976.

102. The student protests that year occurred around the same time that the Guardia Nacional was engaged in an intensive counterinsurgency campaign called Aguila Sexta in the mountainous northern area near Matagalpa. With military aid from other Central American countries and the United States, the regime sent 600 additional troops to the north in an effort to quash the guerrilla movement once and for all. This effort culminated in the assassination of Carlos Fonseca in November 1976. Zimmermann, Sandinista, 200–204.

103. Letter to Carlos Huelva Prieto from Fermín Mendoza Estrada, August 9, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 358, exp. 1976 Huelga en León; Memorandum to Carlos Huelva Prieto from José Luis Ramírez V. and Ridel Barahona Requenes, Asunto: Informe de la supervisión realizada a la Escuela Nacional de Comercio de la Ciudad de Granada el día 3 de Sept de 1976, September 7, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, Caja 394, Folder Especial de Huelga en Granada 1976.

104. Telegram to Jefe Director GN et al. from Gregorio Pichardo, Coronel GN, Comandante Deptal., July 16, 1976, AGN, exp. 1976, Folder Especial de Huelga en Jinotega.

105. “Nuevos cambios en educación pública,” Novedades, October 11, 1976.

106. Memorandum to Carlos Huelva Prieto from Luis Ariel González, Asunto: Acusaciones contra el Prof. Adolfo Rosales de la Escuela Nacional de Comercio de Granada, September 10, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Folder Especial de la Huelga en Granada 1976.

107. Letter to Carlos Huelva Prieto from Fermín Mendoza Estrada, August 9, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 358, exp. 1976 Huelga en León.

108. Document signed by parents, February 25, 1976, AGN, Fondo Educación, caja 394, Exp. 1976 Folders Especial de Huelga, Corresp. Especial de Huelga de Camoapa.

109. José González in Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 2, 171.

110. Quoted in Telechea, María Gravina, Que diga Quincho (Managua: Editorial Nueva Nicaragua, 1982), 114Google Scholar.

111. Quoted in Telechea, Que diga Quincho, 21–22.

112. This discussion of consciousness is directly inspired by Temma Kaplan's study of women's collective action in Barcelona in the early 1900s. Kaplan argues that “women's consciousness of broader political issues emerged in their defense of rights due them according to the division of labor.” Temma Kaplan, “Female Consciousness and Collective Action: The Case of Barcelona, 1910–1918,” Signs 7:3 (Spring 1982): 551.

113. Communique from AES to estudiantado y pueblo en general, June 25, 1978, IHNCA CME D9 G4, exp. 6; AES, La poesía está en la calle, March 1978, IHNCA CME D9 G4, exp. 6.

114. Victor Hugo Tinoco, in Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 2, 110; Humberto Román, author interview, June 17, 2011.

115. “En León: bombas y manifestaciones,” La Prensa, April 4, 1978; “Huelga estudiantil en Masaya,” La Prensa, April 5, 1978.

116. América Libertad Vidaurre, in Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 2, 258–259; Baltodano, Memorias, vol. 4, Rebelión e insurrección en el Departamento de Carazo (Managua: Marcenaro, 2012), 334.