Get News & Views Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
Published on Monday, October 26, 2009 by New America Media
Nightmare of a Dream Student
TUCSON, Ariz. -- I’ll refer to her as Leticia X.
She is undocumented, but has been in this country since the age of three and is a top student at her high school. Yet, unless the law changes soon, she will be unable to continue with her studies. She tells my students at the University of Arizona that it is wrong that she will not be able to attend college next year: “I consider myself a U.S. citizen. It’s the only country I’ve ever known.”
Her symbolic mother is Leticia A -- a student who set the legal precedent in 1982 in Plyler v. Doe in Texas, permitting undocumented students to be able to attend public K-12 schools, without having to pay exorbitant out-of-state tuition.
Today, Leticia X struggles to change this policy to include K-16 students. If out-of-state fees are exorbitant for out of state K-12 students, the rates are stratospheric for out-of-state college students, generally costing tens of thousands of dollars yearly.
Leticia X is part of a nationwide movement – nearly a decade old – to pass legislation that would permit students such as her, to be able to attend college at in-state rates. It’s called the DREAM Act. A majority of members of Congress support it, but since 2001, they’ve never been able to garner the 60 votes necessary in the Senate to bring it to a full vote (cloture). It even has a controversial provision that was injected into it that would permit students to also qualify for U.S. residency by first going into the military for two years. A terrible compromise, but even that has not worked.
It pains me that I cannot publicly identify Leticia X. The irony is that she, like many other DREAM students do identify themselves in public. Apparently, they are more trusting of government than I am.
You have to understand, she was making her plea before my students in Arizona – the New South. It’s also the Old South.
Last week, I took my students to witness Operation Streamline, a Homeland Security program that targets undocumented migrants in specific zones with immediate prosecution and deportation. Nothing I told them could prepare them for what they saw. Several left early, crying, unable to continue to witness what passes for a judicial proceeding.
Here, at Tucson’s Federal Court, there are daily tax-payer-funded show trials in which 70 to 80 defendants, undocumented migrants all, are convicted in one hour. It’s the racial element and the shackles around the ankles, waist and hands that shock the conscience.
In one hour, they are tried, convicted and deported or sent to a private prison (Corrections Corporation of America). It is the breakneck speed that profoundly damages the human spirit and the integrity of the courtroom. As one of my students commented: “They’re like cattle being led to the slaughter.”
But back to Leticia X. Her story is gut wrenching. She is bright and articulate, and hard-working to a fault. She studies even when she’s sick because she believes she has earned the right to go to college. She is, figuratively, a dream student.
If the law does not change by December, she will not be attending a U.S. college next year.
It is difficult to imagine why anyone would be opposed to seeing her go off to college. She knows no other home and barely speaks Spanish.
The larger tragedy is that her story is repeated 65,000 times every year nationwide. There would be many more, but many drop out, not seeing the point of continuing to attend high school. What I really want to do is call the National Hispanic Scholarship Foundation and ask them why they are opposed to creating a special fund to help the Leticia Xes of this nation. Nothing in the law prevents them from doing so.
However, Leticia X is undaunted and courageous. She tells me she has no problem with me using her true name. I dare not expose her to the Joe Arpaios and Lou Dobbs of the world.
President Barack Obama promised a humane solution to the immigration crisis. Humane? Yes. Leticia X is a full human being.
She is undocumented, but has been in this country since the age of three and is a top student at her high school. Yet, unless the law changes soon, she will be unable to continue with her studies. She tells my students at the University of Arizona that it is wrong that she will not be able to attend college next year: “I consider myself a U.S. citizen. It’s the only country I’ve ever known.”
Her symbolic mother is Leticia A -- a student who set the legal precedent in 1982 in Plyler v. Doe in Texas, permitting undocumented students to be able to attend public K-12 schools, without having to pay exorbitant out-of-state tuition.
Today, Leticia X struggles to change this policy to include K-16 students. If out-of-state fees are exorbitant for out of state K-12 students, the rates are stratospheric for out-of-state college students, generally costing tens of thousands of dollars yearly.
Leticia X is part of a nationwide movement – nearly a decade old – to pass legislation that would permit students such as her, to be able to attend college at in-state rates. It’s called the DREAM Act. A majority of members of Congress support it, but since 2001, they’ve never been able to garner the 60 votes necessary in the Senate to bring it to a full vote (cloture). It even has a controversial provision that was injected into it that would permit students to also qualify for U.S. residency by first going into the military for two years. A terrible compromise, but even that has not worked.
It pains me that I cannot publicly identify Leticia X. The irony is that she, like many other DREAM students do identify themselves in public. Apparently, they are more trusting of government than I am.
You have to understand, she was making her plea before my students in Arizona – the New South. It’s also the Old South.
Last week, I took my students to witness Operation Streamline, a Homeland Security program that targets undocumented migrants in specific zones with immediate prosecution and deportation. Nothing I told them could prepare them for what they saw. Several left early, crying, unable to continue to witness what passes for a judicial proceeding.
Here, at Tucson’s Federal Court, there are daily tax-payer-funded show trials in which 70 to 80 defendants, undocumented migrants all, are convicted in one hour. It’s the racial element and the shackles around the ankles, waist and hands that shock the conscience.
In one hour, they are tried, convicted and deported or sent to a private prison (Corrections Corporation of America). It is the breakneck speed that profoundly damages the human spirit and the integrity of the courtroom. As one of my students commented: “They’re like cattle being led to the slaughter.”
But back to Leticia X. Her story is gut wrenching. She is bright and articulate, and hard-working to a fault. She studies even when she’s sick because she believes she has earned the right to go to college. She is, figuratively, a dream student.
If the law does not change by December, she will not be attending a U.S. college next year.
It is difficult to imagine why anyone would be opposed to seeing her go off to college. She knows no other home and barely speaks Spanish.
The larger tragedy is that her story is repeated 65,000 times every year nationwide. There would be many more, but many drop out, not seeing the point of continuing to attend high school. What I really want to do is call the National Hispanic Scholarship Foundation and ask them why they are opposed to creating a special fund to help the Leticia Xes of this nation. Nothing in the law prevents them from doing so.
However, Leticia X is undaunted and courageous. She tells me she has no problem with me using her true name. I dare not expose her to the Joe Arpaios and Lou Dobbs of the world.
President Barack Obama promised a humane solution to the immigration crisis. Humane? Yes. Leticia X is a full human being.
Copyright © Pacific News Service
- Posted in
Comments are closed
Comments
Note: Disqus 2012 is best viewed on an up to date browser. Click here for information. Instructions for how to sign up to comment can be viewed here. Our Comment Policy can be viewed here. Please follow the guidelines. Note to Readers: Spam Filter May Capture Legitimate Comments...
26 Comments so far
Show AllWhat goes around comes around?Slavery from the beginings of this nation and the "disposal" of same.We cant sneak in aliens now that things are not going as they should and we must get rid of the ones we have they ask for to much.These court setups;"with liberty and justice for all" and it does not say americans only allowed.Well should the students cry for one does not know who is next and there will be a next.Tony
Boo hoo! Cry me a river. You're not a resident of the state, you pay out of state tuition. Get over it. Why should state residents subsidize your tuition?
In the long run it's to our advantage for these kids to be educated and productive.
Its to our advantage to educate our own children, not to educate foreign citizens instead. Its to our advantage to have our own kids employed instead of educating and employing foreigners at lower wages and no benefits.
Thank you for proving every negative stereotype about the 'Ugly American' true.
You are a credit to your fellow knuckle-dragging gun-toting ditto-head teabaggers.
How so? Because he advocates following the law? Because he feels that if an Amerrican citizen has to pay out of state tuition an illegal alien that is a citizen of another countery should certainly have to pay the same as she or he steals education from an American kid?
The only stereotype proved here is the big business tune of "cheap labor" and exploitation and those that favor it.
My post might seem insensitive but there's a lot of US citizens that pay out of state tuition. I bet all the foreign students studyingin the US also pay out of state tuition, even tho i might be wrong on this one.
Not sure why should be different for the student mentioned in the article.
Would she not be eligible for a scholarship at a private school? Some of them have lots of money to throw around to students like this. It just doesn't seem right to penalize the children for the sins of the parents.
She is here illegally so its doubtful she can get the things you mention. But its her Parents that have penalized her, not American citizens.....and she is a not an American citizen. We have no responsibility for her.
I have some sympathy for her, but not much. She might 'consider' herself a US citizen, but she and her parents have evidently done nothing to actually regularise their situation, since they'd either be citizens by now or be living where they actually *are* citizens.
I'd love to go back to the other country where I do actually have citizenship. But it would be unfair: I've been too long away and wouldn't be bringing anything unique and desirable with me. All I'd be doing is exploiting my citizenship to enjoy the better life that that country offers, which my conscience is a bit too active to permit.
Nor could I go to Russia or Germany and get a job, even though I speak both languages and have demonstrated skill in 4 professions. Other countries reserve their jobs, uni placements, etc to actual citizens. Nor could my kids decide now to take German citizenship, though having been born there and their births registered at the Standesamt they were entitled to do it when they reached adulthood.
What unique and desirable qualities can this young woman offer that entitles her to take the place that by rights and worldwide convention belongs to an actual US citizen?
We need to do away with all borders and all nation-states. But to do it only to the US would be faux-liberal madness.
The provision in the Constitution that says anyone born here is a citizen is the most racist possible law imaginable: babies born to women who'd just stepped off the boat are immediately citizens, but the aboriginal people whose families had been living here since time out of mind didn't get their citizenship til 1920 and are still treated as trash in their own land.
"What unique and desirable qualities can this young woman offer that entitles her to take the place that by rights and worldwide convention belongs to an actual US citizen?"
Your points are well made, especially this one.
It's called LIFE. It's just the way things are in this day and age. I have the opposite problem - my father joined the US military and served in the ETO, but was sent to the US after the end of the war there (after requesting discharge), leaving my mother alone in a devastated country that had been occupied and pillaged by the Nazis. After all, the US had another war still going on - in the Pacific, and my father was 'regular army' rather than a draftee and thus considered a valuable commodity. So the US offered my mother (and tons of other war-wives) free passage to the US - my mother was a college graduate with a good job and came from a relatively wealthy family. But I ended up with American citizenship - even though few in my family even spoke any english, and both of my parents learned English from a book (my grandparents, of course, did NOT speak english, although my mother spoke British and had taught ESL as well as translating during the war.) Now I'm trapped in a fascist country, just as my mother once was. I sure don't feel 'American' - but there is nowhere else for me to go now. (Yes, I tried repeatedly to get out - but the world doesn't like Americans - not since Ike.)
This girl - if she is really that eager and bright - can do it the hard way, like so many Americans have to do it: work hard for a couple years at serf wages to save up enough to go to school SOMEHWERE. She might try Cuba - they have a global reputation for aiding education. Check out European scholarships - yes, there was such a thing, because I checked it out myself. I can't imagine who - in their right mind - would want to stay in this country, although I can't see why this girl (or her peers & compatriots) would want to emigrate to Mexico either.
America is a failed state - with an ignorant regressive society. Why would anyone who is really 'bright' want to stay here - at any price? So it's one step up above Mexico - big deal. There are lots of other places. And just because she never learned a few other 'foreign' languages - well whose fault is that? Doesn't she have a library card? A used-book store in her town? Neighbors who speak other languages? Give me a break - this is a 'cry story' - nothing more.
I do believe in a free education for all people - citizens or not - including college or university. But this country is too regressive to even consider national healthcare, let alone a decent education. Americans are actually PROUD of being ignorant savages. They should be reading Dewey and Bernays instead of feeding their addiction to the idiot box. (Also Zinn's history books and maybe Joseph Campbell)
"I dare not expose her to the Joe Arpaios and Lou Dobbs of the world."
This author means people that abide by our laws and expect others to abide by them as well.
Her contention that this has anything to do with racism is expected from her type. The real racists are the first to asttribute racis motives to the slightest thing. The manacles she alludes to are standard procedure for anyone at ruisjk of flight. Its not different simply because these criminals happen to be generally from Latin America in this part of the country.
Her accusations are not only less than helpful, harken back to the cheap labor siongs of a few years ago sung by the big business shills but is contemptable for its lack of clarity.
Please support these kids as well as your own because their parents are criminals. Thats her real cry. She is truly a knuckledragger. Extend the abuse and exploitation is her real result.....not the pandering, pretensious moralism she is preaching.
She and every one like her are the ones that stop girls like this from becoming US citizens....no one else.
By God, people like this are either simple minded or being paid to shill.
"By God, people like this are either simple minded or being paid to shill." -
Henry, exactly my thoughts. About you.
Sioux Rose
HENRY: Apart from my disagreeing with your "letter of the law" application, could you consider using the preview comment button? As a former English teacher, I can't help noticing that your post has at least 4 major mistakes that I think you could easily correct. Or shall I point them out to you?
The student is not extracting trillions of dollars - she is in a predicament not of her making and making a stunning go of it. Were US tax payers not being sucked dry, abused for militarism, abused by financial bubble blowing, abused by poisoning of the environment, abused by criminalization of the poverty the system has created, there would be no question of the merit in desiring to contribute to the society one knows and actively participates in, instead the best qualities of civility and humanity under duress are regarded as "abuse".
It is interesting to read an interpretation of an article that refers to identification of a situation as "knuckle dragging". What a sad hall of mirrors that interpretation illustrates.
The thing that bothers me about this is, like you said, is that this situation is not of her making. I am no expert on immigration to the U.S. but I did some looking around on government web sites today and I really don't see how she can even become "legal" or a citizen even though she has been here most of her life.
It seems to me there should be some way for young people who are brought into this country like this girl was, to have some path to becoming a legal alien, then be able to become a citizen. She was brought here at age three. What other laws do we have that treat three year old has adults, or what law is out there that holds children libel for their parents illegal actions?
This really does not seem right to me at all.
There is much ugliness in this thread. I think a fundamental problem lies in the arguing about the importance of US citizenship over belonging to the human citizenry.
Becoming caught up in that kind of argument plays directly into the hands of the ruling elites. They have you right where they want you - clear as day.
You hit the nail squarely on the head !!! But it's not just an 'American' problem...
I'm surprised that no one has suggested she join the armed forces.
I'm sure they'd take her, and even the benighted nativists would surely be pleased that Amerika is willing to make an honest woman of her.
· Yr Obd't Servant
The suggestion that this young lady should join the armed forces to 1) either dirty her hands with innocent blood for the benefit of the corrupt, though (thankfully) failing, US empire, or 2) be killed or injured herself is insulting. Is she worth no more than cannon fodder to you? Moreover, even if she should survive without being injured, she would return a changed person. I have known many people that entered the military. Aside from there being no honor in being part of the "big stick" that the US brings down to enforce its will, the indoctrination and brain-washing that is part of US military training produces nothing but monsters or zombies (depending on their level of denial after leaving the military). Well maybe not all ex-military (the veteran war-protesters are a notable exception), but the vast majority that I have met.
Many of the comments here revolve around the attitude that no-one should receive a free ride, or more specifically, that "an illegal" should not receive a free ride. Yet there is no attempt to understand her situation. Do you know that there is no way for her to achieve citizenship other than to join the military or to marry an American citizen? If she marries, the odds that she will ever complete her degree much less fashion any kind of career are greatly diminished.
But the broader question is one of priorities. I believe that a free education (including college, grad school, PhD, whatever) should be attainable by all. It is not available because the elites who rule this country do not want an educated populace. Better to keep the majority ignorant and corse. Better to push ugly gangster rap music and grotesque or sadistic movies. Fans of those genres will feel more likely to identify with the US as "Terminator" and clap happily at videos of Iraqis being blown to bits by US weaponry. Plus, of course, after the sacking of the economy that we have just witnessed, there really are not enough jobs for the upcoming college graduates.
I also seem to keep hearing the response : "oh well, those of us who are here legally sometimes have to make sacrifices to get through college too." First of all, for this young lady it is not just a question of a few sacrifices; it is a question of whether or not she can go to college at all. Secondly, who is a more worth-while individual, this young lady or one of the many Wall Street scumbags: someone who is responsible for the sacking of this nation; someone who lives, breathes, and eats greed? Why is there such a vehement denial of a future for the undocumented in the US while the outrage in response to Wall Street looting the US's future is so muted? The truth is that most USans hate the poor and most USans are basically racist: "Never mind the 23 trillion to clean up Wall Streets mess - what really pisses me off is the $10,000 in yearly tuition this girl wants to suck out of us!"
Lastly, many studies have conclusively proven that undocumented immigrants contribute far more to the US than they receive (factoring in taxes and government assistance). It's just that the Federal Government receives the benefits while the state goverments bear the costs.
I agree with your post 100%, but I think that Obedient Servant was being sarcastic.
Anyway, joining the military is not an option for those kids either. The DREAM Act with the provision that would enable them to do it, is yet to be passed, and I agree that it would be a terrible price to pay.
Bea, you're quite right; I was indeed being sarcastic, or at least ironic; I was pointing out that "good for nothing 'illegals'" are perfectly acceptable to US authorities as cannon fodder. Actually, I find the prospect obscene and reprehensible.
Comments to articles addressing immigration issues feature a regular cadre of hardliners who buy into a philosophy that may as well be called the War on "Illegals", which absolutely defines non-documented aliens as parasites.
This perspective is exactly as if one took our old friend the War on Drugs at face value.
That is, only the most clueless, fanatic, or intellectually deficient proponent of the War on Drugs would insist that it's a simple, cut-and-dried issue: drugs are illegal, people trafficking in illegal drugs are lawbreakers, and enforcing the law is the only "responsible" solution. No ifs, ands, or buts!
In fact, one DOESN'T find War on Drugs advocates taking that position on comments boards because it's patently idiotic. Everyone knows that it's not only way more complicated than that, but that it's a bogus "war" that will never be "won".
However, foes of "illegals" proudly argue just that sort of impossibly simplistic and myopic perspective. They foolishly believe that illegal immigration is a cancer that can be "cured", or at least "controlled", by constant overwhelming "zero-tolerance" law enforcement-- in other words, brute force.
Given this twisted, primitive viewpoint, I assume that reactionaries would approve of recruiting "illegals" into the armed forces-- it's not as good as banishing or imprisoning them, but at least they're not being "parasites".
· Yr Obd't Servant
I also seem to keep hearing the response : "oh well, those of us who are here legally sometimes have to make sacrifices to get through college too." First of all, for this young lady it is not just a question of a few sacrifices; it is a question of whether or not she can go to college at all.
--------------------------------------
You overstate the case, I believe.
If I understand her situation correctly, the only issue is money. I had that issue, too. I finally got my Bachelors in night school in my 30s, working full time through the day to support my three teenagers. That's life in the USA. Based on my tests through school, in Europe or the UK I'd have had a full ride provided me. But in the US I got nothing beyond a 1-year non-renewable scholarship that at 17 I was too emotionally disabled to use.
I repeat: that's life in the USA. It should be changed---but it's crazy to try to do it for one person at a time! There are hundreds of thousands of kids in similar strapped circumstances, many no doubt at least as deserving as she is, whom we will never hear about. The only way they'll get what they need is if we Change The System. All our energy should be going into Changing The System. And I *don't* mean the non-citizens-pay-out-of-state-tuition system.
I believe that there should be a change to the immigration law that fast-tracks citizenship for people like Leticia X. _She_ did not make the choice to come here when her parent(s) brought her. The military service requirement in order to gain citizenship that some people advocate is a _punishment_ against children who really did nothing wrong themselves.
Maybe the law should allow that anyone brought here at such a young age, before they are old enough to make a conscious decision, and don't have the choice of alternatives, who goes to school from K-12 AND GRADUATES, should be given citizenship as a reward for staying in school.
That feels like the right direction to go, but the speed doesn't seem right.
I'd suggest instead that someone like her who does well in school, graduates, and behaves pro-socially gets to pay in-state tuition at uni, and if she graduates there with a strong degree in a wanted field, THEN she gets a green card and tracked for citizenship.
That would keep her off the cannon-fodder track while not handing citizenship to her on a plate (full disclosure: I'm strongly in favor, too, of repealing that deeply racist Constitutional provision for citizenship-by-birth that was put in for no other reason than to maintain a White power structure in the new USA)