blog #5 A Young Immigrant Struggles for a College Education

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This article is written by Mimi Schiffman. A lot of high school students think about senior prom, graduation, soaking up the summer sun with old childhood buddies before heading off to college. “For one teenager from Queens, that joy was clouded by growing anxiety as he attempted to save enough money to pay for his first semester of college. I followed Frisly Soberanis, and illegal immigrant from Guatemala, through his final weeks of high school and the run up to what he hoped would be his first semester at Brooklyn College.” (Schiffman, “Immigrant”). He is worried that he won’t find a summer job because he said, “You don’t know if you’re going to get a job next week or if you’re going to get paid for the job you just finished because maybe they’re just going to be like ‘I’m not going pay you.’” (Shiffman, “Immigrant”). “More than four million illegal immigrants under the age of 25 are thought to be living in the United States according to 2009 census figures, yet statistics indicate that only around 65,000 graduate from high school each year. The reason for the huge disparity between population and attrition rates comes down to opportunity. There are many obstacles for those who aspire to higher education, and in the schools that do accept illegal immigrants, students do not have access to federal financial aid. Without the opportunity to hold down steady, legal jobs, young illegal immigrants often do not make it to college at all.” (Shiffman, “Immigrant”).  Classes at Brooklyn College on August 27, but he is not sure how the future is going to look for him. Frisly was brought into the US when he was 7 and because he overstayed his tourist visa, he can’t become a citizen without first going back to Guatemala for 10 years, then reapplying for the US visa again. “At that point there is no guarantee that the United States would welcome him back.”(Schiffman, “Immigrant”).

            This article makes me straight up mad honestly. What people don’t realize is that at one point, we were all immigrants. My ancestors came from the Netherlands, so I am part Dutch. I mean, immigrants want to come the US just for a better life. Why can’t we just let them? Instead we force all of these ridiculous rules and regulations on them in order for them to be legal residents, but to deny a high school student’s education from him? That is just plain wrong. Where he comes from the education rates are pretty bad. http://www.nationmaster.com/country/gt-guatemala/edu-education. After look at those shocking statistics its no wonder he wants to continue his education in the US. What the US government should do is issue him a 4-year visa, and after that visa is done with, he goes back to Guatemala.

http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/25/an-undocumented-youths-struggle-for-higher-education/

Blog #2 A College Lifts a Hurdle for Illegal Immigrants

Many illegal immigrants bring their children to the United States and are raised as Americans. There are many people especially Republicans that have set forth to pass legislature making the border patrol more strict in an attempt to stop illegal immigrants and their children from coming across the border. Not only have they passed those types of laws they have also refused to pass laws that help the illegal immigrants children go to school affordably.

The article is about the Metropolitan State University of Denver implementing a new policy lowering the tuition for the children of illegal immigrants that meet their requirements. The president of the college stated that the reason behind this policy change at the University is because the legislation didn’t pass a similar law. He feels that the students deserve an equal opportunity to go to college so that they can get a degree and then contribute to the society in Colorado. In order for the children to receive the discount they have to have gone to a Colorado High School for at least 3 years and they have to earn their diploma or their GED. After meeting those requirements their tuition is lowered from about $11,000 to about $7,157.04 per year which is significantly lower than out-of-state students. There is currently a lot of controversy over this new university policy especially from the Republican Party. They feel like the University overstepped their boundaries because they had a similar law that wasn’t passed in the legislator. They are even going as far as to sue the school because they believe that the university tried to undermine the government and the decision that they made.

In the end I believe that the policy to lower the tuition was a smart idea because the children of illegal immigrants are really victims. They had no choice when it came to coming across the border and because they are considered to be in the lower class they are trying to hold them back from becoming something great one day. This ties in with class inequality because when immigrants and their children get over here they are considered to be lower class people and the people with the power don’t want illegal immigrants nor their children to have any opportunities in this country. As one of the girls in the article stated because that one university changed their policy and prices she is able to focus on school more instead of how she is going to pay for school. Yes they might be immigrants but they deserve an equal chance just as everybody else.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/18/us/denver-college-policy-aids-illegal-immigrants.html?ref=education