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Synopsis: MAKING THE IMPOSSIBLE POSSIBLE tells the dramatic story of a group of students who led the struggle to win Puerto Rican Studies at Brooklyn College, CUNY in the late 1960’s. The documentary is a mosaic of voices, film footage and photographs taken by student activists and features the music by Grammy Award winners Arturo O’Farrill and Oscar Hernández. This important intergenerational story highlights how students seized the moment to build upon an already existing alliance between Puerto Rican, African American and other progressive students forged in their communities and the civil rights movement. Together they changed the face of higher education, transforming the curriculum and expanding who gets educated. The film sheds light on the 50-year history of struggle that started with the founding of one of the first Puerto Rican Studies departments in the nation, and documents the continued movement to maintain their gains.

Language

English with Spanish sub-titles

Run Time

33 minutes

Directed by

Tami Gold
Pam Sporn

Produced by

Gisely Colón López
Tami Gold
Pam Sporn

Director's Statement

The stories within the film awaken a new sense of self while inviting us to recognize our own collective strengths. Our history contributes to transformational and equitable changes within many sectors of society.

Gisely Colón López
Co-Producer

Director's Bio

Gisely Colón López , Producer, was born in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, and raised in New York City. Gisely fuses her lived experiences to collaborate and contribute to student and community driven initiatives disrupting the marginalization and minoritization of communities of color. She is an educator and has taught for the New York City Board of Education, and the City University of New York teaching courses in bilingual education and Latino/a Studies. Gisely holds a Master of Arts from UConn-Storrs in International Studies and previously graduated from Brooklyn College-CUNY with distinct honors as the college’s Salutatorian and a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellow. She is an alumna of the Puerto Rican and Latino Studies Department at Brooklyn College. Gisely is on the board of the Alliance for Puerto Rican Education and Empowerment where she contributes to culturally relevant events preserving and celebrating Puerto Rican history.

Tami Gold – Producer, Director, Camera, is an award-winning filmmaker and a professor at Hunter College/CUNY. Her films have consistently been at the forefront of social justice, focusing on issues of race, class, Islamophobia, gender, sexual identity and criminal justice. They have reached audiences near and far, airing on PBS, HBO, Lifetime TV. Some of her films include: Every Mother’s Son; Juggling Gender: Politics, Sex And Identity; Out At Work: Lesbian And Gay Men On The Job; Another Brother; Passionate Politics: The Life and Work of Charlotte Bunch; RFK In The Land of Apartheid. Her work has screened at the MOMA, the Whitney, The Chicago Arts Institute, The Kennedy Center, the American and British Film Institutes, Sundance, Tribeca and The New York Film Festival, and in over 200 film festivals. She is a recipient of Guggenheim, Rockefeller and Fulbright fellowships.

Pam Sporn – Producer, Director, Editor, is a Bronx based documentary filmmaker, educator, and activist. She loves listening to people tell stories about standing up to injustice in their own unique, subtle, and not so subtle, ways. A pioneer in bringing social issue documentary making into NYC high schools in the 1980s and 1990s, Pam substantively contributed to the growth of the youth media movement. Pam’s work includes Detroit 48202: Conversations Along A Postal Route, Cuban Roots/Bronx Stories, With A Stroke Of The Chaveta, Remembering The Mamoncillo Tree, and Disobeying Orders: Gi Resistance To The Vietnam War. Pam has received grants and awards including: JustFilms/Ford Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, the Puffin Foundation, Latino Public Broadcasting, CUNY Caribbean Exchange, and the Bronx Council on the Arts.

Production Year

2021

Official Website

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