The morning after Election Day last year, Melanie Claros, a civics teacher and ESL coordinator at a South Florida school where half the students are Latino, found herself having to go above and beyond the call of duty. I noticed that.
She recently told NBC News that by the end of the day, more than 20 students had contacted her separately about immigration changes ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.
“‘Are they going to deport us all now?’ ‘Who’s going to be deported first?’ she recalled students asking in class.
Claros said her concerns have not subsided since then, noting that she knows of at least one student who has already stopped coming to school for immigration-related reasons. “I very much suspect that we’re going to see (more) kids who become shut-ins or stop coming to school,” she says.
Claros is one of several educators in six states who told NBC News they were in the uncomfortable position of answering questions about the possibility of mass deportations under the Trump administration. Many teachers and administrators are aware of the various scenarios that could soon begin to unfold. A child leaves school for the day, only to find out that his parents have been detained and there is no one at home to take care of him. Students stopped coming to class because they were worried about being deported. Educators and advocates say they feel the need to prepare for such a situation, but are also keenly aware of the risk of backlash that comes with talking about such political issues publicly.
This dilemma leaves teachers like Claros in disbelief.
She said she became a teacher knowing she would have to talk about civics, but “never in a million years did I think they (students) would ask me questions and have concerns about immigration.” . Increased immigration enforcement is needed to reduce the incidence of immigrant crime and stop record numbers of individuals from crossing the border illegally. But critics say they are concerned about the potential for family separation and the spread of fear among certain communities.
Several educators told NBC they feel it is in the community’s best interest for children to have the opportunity to attend school, regardless of their legal status. Jasmine Baxter leads the communications office for the Hattiesburg, Mississippi school district, which has a large population of English learners. She said the district is committed to making sure all students feel supported.
“When you come to school, you should feel safe in school. Those are external factors that you shouldn’t be thinking about while you’re getting your education,” Baxter said.
But that doesn’t mean it’s been easy for the district to answer questions from families about immigration or talk about what it’s doing to prepare for a possible mass deportation.
“It’s definitely difficult for us to talk about this issue,” said one California school principal, who asked that his name not be used so he could speak freely about the issue. “Because even if you say, ‘This is how we support students,’ you’re going to get pushback from families and community members.”
Viridiana Carrizales, co-founder of the nonprofit ImSchools, said she has also seen schools reluctant to ask for information about immigration and what to do if they encounter federal agents. speak
“Many of them say that the moment we put our names out there, we become a target,” she says.
Nevertheless, in the days after the election, ImSchool received messages from 37 schools it had not previously worked with asking about training opportunities and information for staff, she said. Just before Christmas, the organization also held a virtual training session with 29 superintendents on how to prepare for immigration raids and deportations that could impact student populations.
“(Schools) are really scared and trying to figure out how to best support families through this,” she said.
Educators also expect students to start disappearing from classrooms altogether, as Claros has already seen happening in her schools. Parents may fear that they will be separated from their children if one of them is detained, or that their presence at school could alert authorities that they are in the country without permission. There is a possibility.
Karen Iglesias, an ESL teacher in Michigan, said she has had students ask if they will be deported and been told that parents are afraid to drive their children to school.
Cynthia Longoria, an elementary school teacher in North Texas, said she is doing her best to support parents who are worried about their own futures. Longoria is currently in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. The program provides temporary legal protection from deportation for some immigrants brought to the United States without documentation as children. A parent recently asked me to reassure him that his family will be okay under the new administration.
“I just told her I hoped so,” Longoria said. “Because I couldn’t say yes to her. That’s when I told her I was a DACA recipient. In that moment, the only thing I could say to her without being dishonest was… That was it.”
Federal law prohibits schools from denying students free public education based on their immigration status and restricts the disclosure of students’ personal information. In addition to Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures, these laws are intended to serve as a safeguard for undocumented families concerned about enrolling their children in schools, experts say. It is said that
“Taken together, these provide fairly strong protection against immigration enforcement actions against students in schools, especially if school districts are committed to protecting noncitizen students,” said Naina Gupta, policy director at the nonprofit American Immigration Council. “This is a great protection measure.”
Under current policy, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement generally avoids places where people receive public services, such as schools, hospitals, and churches. But under the Trump administration, the “sensitive areas” or “protected areas” policy is scheduled to be repealed, three people familiar with the repeal plan previously told NBC News.
Denver Public Schools in Colorado and Canutillo Independent School District in Texas both issued statements about potential policy changes, emphasizing the need for “uninterrupted learning.”
This is not the first time schools have been at the center of immigration issues. In 2019, during the first Trump administration, a series of ICE raids arrested approximately 700 workers at seven food processing plants in Mississippi. As a result, district officials told NBC News at the time, local organizations and schools needed to find safe places for children to go in their parents’ absences. A school district in Mississippi has announced that it has instructed bus drivers to always make sure a parent or guardian is present when dropping off a child. If not, they would take the child back to school and spend the night there. This history has shaped us. It’s the same way some advocacy groups and educators are currently preparing families.
In Tucson, Arizona, a coalition of nonprofit organizations is working to provide parents with important information in case they are detained or deported, including guardianship powers, emergency contacts, and how to talk to their children. We are helping families create emergency packets that include: Responsible when parents are not present.
A California assistant principal told NBC News that she and some of her colleagues even gave up their homes.
“We have discussed their situation with the families who have come forward and made it clear that if deportation is an option for the family, the child can still stay with one of us,” she said.
