It’s 1968 and 18-year-old Pemon Rami, a recent graduate of Wendell Phillips Academy High School, stands in front of the Umoja Black Student Center in Bronzeville. He stares off into the distance, quiet, determined. Behind him, a poster with an illustration of Malcolm X preaches unstinting devotion to radical change, challenging viewers: “He was ready! Are you?”

The past five years have seen a wellspring of student activism in Chicago and beyond, actions that hearken back to the unrest that transformed society 50 years ago. In Chicago, it was Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s proposed closing of more than 200 schools in 2012—intended to save $43 million annually—that first sparked resistance among teachers, parents, and students, an energy that carried forward into the Chicago Teachers Union’s successful 2013 strike. In the end, 50 schools, not 200, were closed. (A 2018 study at the University of Chicago found that the closures had had no educational benefits, and CPS has not commented about whether the move did, indeed, save the district money.) In the last year, Englewood students have protested the proposed closure of four neighborhood high schools.

“They thought for a long time that we had adults telling us what to do, but we didn’t,” Matthews says. “This is what we came up with in our group, because we saw an injustice and wanted to fix it. ”

In spite of their young age, many of the students involved in these protests faced violence and intimidation. Matthews’s younger sister, after being identified as her highly visible older sibling’s relation, was thrown down the stairs by a police officer at Harrison High School (she suffered no serious injuries, only minor bruising). On November 4, efforts to stage further sit-ins within several school cafeterias resulted in 26 arrests. Thanks to those arrests, the growing pressure of outside groups on the student-led movement, and the students’ success at bringing the school board to the table, the Black Monday protests finally came to an end.

“I think that your legacy is defined by what you do, not by what someone does to contradict it,” Rami says. “What you hope is that some young people will believe that the struggling, being a community organizer, being dedicated to improving the quality community, is their responsibility.”

Screening of 63 Boycott and discussion. Fri 10/5, 7-9 PM, Uri Eichen Gallery, 2101 S. Halsted, 312-852-7717, uri-eichen.com.  F