Sunday
May 04, 2008
In this guest blog post, Greg Michie, a Golden Apple Fellow, invites us to consider our role as educators in the national debate on immigration.
During my years teaching 7th and 8th graders in the Back of the Yards neighborhood on Chicago’s south side, I avoided decorating my classroom with motivational posters.
“Success is 99% hard work.”
“Education is the key to every door.”
“When I let myself dream, anything is possible.”
Common as such platitudes are on school walls, I figured they’d ring hollow to my students’ ears. Many of the kids I taught had seen poverty and hardship up close. They knew the world was more complicated than feel-good slogans could convey.
Still, I did my best to make my classroom a place of hope. I tried to help my students see college as a real possibility down the road. And I tried to impress upon them that, clichéd or not, working hard and doing well academically would give them more options after high school.
Turns out that I lied.
You see, most of my former students are from Mexican immigrant families, and some—more than I realized at the time—are undocumented. So even if they remain focused, stay out of trouble, study, and graduate from high school with exceptional grades, going to college is still a long shot at best. For many, it’s simply not possible.
That’s because current U.S. law dictates that the estimated 65,000 undocumented students who graduate from U.S. high schools each year are not eligible for federal work study programs or loans to help fund their collegiate studies. Their immigration status also precludes them from receiving many private scholarships, and they cannot work legally to support themselves through school.
But legislation known as the DREAM Act would change that. The DREAM Act would allow undocumented students who entered the U.S. before the age of 16, have lived here for at least 5 years, and demonstrate “good moral character” to become legal residents on a conditional basis when they are accepted to a 2- or 4-year college or university. The conditional status would allow students to get work study jobs, receive federal loans (but not Pell grants), and seek legal employment. In short, it would make college a real possibility.
Unfortunately, the DREAM Act failed again last year to become law, a casualty of the contentious broader debate over comprehensive immigration reform. But the struggle for its passage continues, and teachers and educators should be a major voice in the conversation.
Write your senators and representatives. Educate your colleagues. Let them know that we need to take action to support undocumented youth who’ve been in this country much of their lives doing the right things.
These are kids who have worked hard. They’ve grabbed hold of their educations. And despite evidence around them that sometimes mocks their devotion, they’ve continued to believe in the promise of America.
Question is, how much do we believe in them?
Our answer will speak volumes about whether the dreams we propagate in schools are the stuff of reality for undocumented students, or simply fodder for a poster on a classroom wall.
Gregory Michie teaches in the College of Education at Illinois State University. He is co-editor of City Kids, City Schools: More Reports from the Front Row, to be published this summer by The New Press. He is also the author of Holler if You Hear Me: The Education of a Teacher and His Students and the co-author of See You When We Get There: Teaching for Change in Urban Schools.
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Greg is absolutely correct.
As teachers, it’s in our nature to be inclusive and accepting as we embrace and celebrate the diversity in our classrooms. Sadly, politics sometimes interferes. But rather than walk away, each of us can take a stand and show we truly believe in diversity by supporting the DREAM Act.
Take inspiration in this song by Dylan.
The Times They are A-Changin’
Come gather ‘round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You’ll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you
Is worth savin’
Then you better start swimmin’
Or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’.
Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won’t come again
And don’t speak too soon
For the wheel’s still in spin
And there’s no tellin’ who
That it’s namin’.
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin’.
Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway
Don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
There’s a battle outside
And it is ragin’.
It’ll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin’.
Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don’t criticize
What you can’t understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your old road is
Rapidly agin’.
Please get out of the new one
If you can’t lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin’.
The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin’.
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin’.
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Please do what you can to be part of the change.
Believe…
DREAM.
When I was three years old I was brought to this country by my parents who sought a new life here in the U.S. Like so many immigrants they wanted to provide their children the educational and financial opportunities that the American dream promised to those who would work hard to attain it. My story is a successful one in that my parents assimilated rather quickly to their new home and by the time I was in third grade, we were legal residents of the U.S. and shortly after my 18th birthday I became a naturalized citizen.
Had that not been the case I would have found myself like the many Latino youth who are intelligent, deserving and certainly capable of attending college but cannot because of their illegal status; just nine little numbers preventing them from filling out the application for a college or university. Those nine little numbers being a lack of a valid social security number; a sure red-flag sign that someone does not reside here legally.
Mentioning the number nine reminds me about about the Little Rock Nine; those brave nine teens who attended high school protected by military guards sent by the president himself marking the beginning of the desegregation of schools.
That was 51 years ago. Our public schools are now wonderfully diverse, at least the schools where I have worked for as a teacher. No one is turned away from receiving a primary or secondary level education regardless of their lack of legal status in this country. But the immigrant community who live silently on the outskirts of this society need us to be their resounding voice calling for legislation such as the DREAM ACT to pass.
Where are the rallies with hundreds of thousands of Latino, European and Asian immigrants of the last couple of years gone? They have been overcast and downplayed by the recent presidential election campaigns. A topic too prickly for any presidential contender to touch.
In the meantime there is no way to know how many young people cannot fully participate in American society and its promise of a bright future for those who study hard to try and achieve it. Even mentioning that you are here illegally in this country is a very dangerous thing now a days.
I truly believe as Mr. Michie does that our undocumented students need us to believe in them enough to write to our legislators about their plight. I’m sure we all know of at least one student who has a bright future ahead of him or her but will undoubtedly hit a roadblock when trying to enter college because they are undocumented.
How many of us who have been undocumented at any time in our lives recall having doors close and disapproving looks from mainstream society shed upon us? Too many in my case. Even in the face of adversity, we made it to college, didn’t we? But we didn’t do it alone. Somewhere along side us was a parent or teacher or pastor or someone who told us that a higher education would be the key to our success.
Getting justice and an equal opportunity for a college education for our brightest students should not be denied someone just because of nine little numbers.
In searching for a valuable comment to make in response to Dr. Michie’s wonderfully true words radiating with motivation and hope, my thoughts brought to the recent (very recent) California Supreme Court Decision to legalize same-sex marriage.
There are many similarities between the same-sex marriage battle and education for undocumented citizens including, equal rights, human rights, acceptance of diversity and the American Ideal this country was built on. The point I would like to make is the difference in support.
A major reason this monumental decision was passed through the California Supreme Court was the amount of support this issue receives. When I read the article a few minutes ago, the reporter (Lisa Leff, AP) referred to this as “a monumental...victory for the gay rights movement”. What struck me was her use of the word movement.
Why isn’t there an education movement or more specifically an immigrant’s educational rights movement? Dr. Michie suggests that we write letters and I could not agree more. Often we only see ourselves as voters but in this battle that is not enough. We as educators need to make our voices heard. When students are denied education because of a requirement that is closed off to them, then we should act and defend. Let’s look at other social justice movements, take hints and use them. Band together, and we will make change.
Greg’s thoughts and comments regarding the Dream Act have really hit home now for me more than ever before. Last year I was truly blessed with a beautiful, motivated, and simply magnificant student and person. She always wanted to know more and pursue information that most sixth graders wouldn’t even glance at. She was just a teacher’s dream come true!
When we wrote letters to senators and representatives in support of Golden Apple funding, she researched what Golden Apple is and really wrote a heart-warming letter, in which she stated that if we continue funding Golden Apple, she and her peers can continue having a better education. Plus, she would like to be a teacher when she grows up and would love to be a Golden Apple teacher. Jim even read her letter to all of us, before we went to speak with the senators and representatives.
When I moved up to seventh grade this past year, I was again blessed to teach this wonderful child. Earlier in the school year, I received information about a leadership seminar in Washington D.C. and a nomination form for any students that I thought would be a good candidate. Naturally, this particular student came to mind and she and her parents wanted to pursue this, since a scholarship was offered to low-income families. When I was helping her fill out the application for the program and the scholarship, this student told me that she and her family are undocumented and she did not end up applying, in fear that they would be discovered. She also could not complete the part about citizenship or having a social security number.
That really broke my heart. Just because this child was not born in the U.S., but has lived here the majority of her life, she not only will not be able to go to college; she can’t even participate in a middle school leadership seminar. She works her tail off day in and day out and has not received less than an A in her middle school career. Time and time again, she works patiently with other students, motivating and encouraging them, while helping them understand what is being taught even better. Why should we eliminate a person so full of dignity and respect, who also demonstrates an immense desire to learn as much as she can to help change the world around her, the opportunity to grow as a leader and attain a higher education. Is her hard work and eagerness here in seventh grade meaningless? I can’t accept that as an option for my child.
Every summer I travel to Germany and travel to different countries in Europe and every year there are less and less borders. Just a few months ago, Germans and Czechs celebrated together while knocking down border crossing checkpoints between their countries, as did Austrians and Slovaks. Why is it that Europeans are joining hands, but we are building more secure walls with armed guards ready to attack people coming here to fulfill the “American Dream”? It’s just not right and it kills me that a child like my student can only dream of such things as participating in a leadership seminar, becoming a Golden Apple Scholar, or even going to college, when I know fully well that unless something is done, none of these dreams even have the potential to become a reality.
The comparison of undocumented students to the Little Rock Nine, although rare, is valid. People criticize those that find similarities between the struggle for civil rights by some groups of people and the struggle for legalization by undocumented people. They state that the civil rights participants were citizens, and therefore were entitled to fight for equality, whereas undocumented people do not deserve that right. Well, let’s think back further to a time where America more blatantly had second-class citizens. It was acceptable to deny them rights based on their legal status, but as time passed and they spoke out against the injustice that was being committed, they earned more and more rights. The modern-day second-class citizen is the undocumented person. They have fewer rights than a citizen, yet they provide our country with the same benefits that a citizen does. The fact that they are not citizens now does not mean that they do not deserve it. The argument against this comparison emerges from a divisive agenda-if we believe what they say (that this group is different than that group, and that one group deserves more than another) then they will succeed in separating us. If we were to see each other’s struggle as one struggle, then justice would come knocking; our voice would be louder and our opinion would have more power.
