The teachers and the “Mendozazo”

Abstract

This work was presented by Susana Vera at the Conference on stories, memories and experiences of the subordinate Mendoza: "50 years after the Mendozazo". We include it in this dossier, with the authorization of Susana, for its value as a testimonial source to learn at first-hand about the experience lived by a leading sector of those struggles: the teachers. Both authors, Susana Vera and Elsa Barifuza, were born in Mendoza in 1939. They studied to become teachers and began their working lives in primary schools in rural or semi-urban areas. They met in 1959 to share a boarding house in the department of Tupungato, where they began a friendship that would last a lifetime. At that time, they traveled together by motorcycle to Greater Mendoza on weekends. They worked in several primary schools and some secondary schools. Although they once held managerial positions as substitutes, they always preferred the classroom. In their union participation, they integrated the Education Commission of the Education Worker Union (SUTE) from which they toured all the province offering teacher improvement courses. Both retired in 1992. This testimony was written for SUTE in 2019. Elsa passed away at the end of 2021, the day of her 82th birthday. Susana keeps alive the memory of her friend and colleague and of all the teachers who forged the “Mendozazo”.