Migrant students still pursue American dream

TEMPE — Diego Medina found himself studying for one of the toughest semesters in nursing school yet.

“I knew it would be hard, but never thought the stress would be like a shot of adrenaline,” Medina says.

Medina, a nursing junior at ASU, was raised in Phoenix since the age of 8, when his parents brought him with them from Mexico. He went through the Arizona K-12 educational system and graduated high school with a 3.5 grade point average.

Medina was admitted into Arizona State University before he graduated from high school and was awarded a full ride scholarship to ASU along with a $500 scholarship from the Phoenix Union High School District.

But after November 2006, undocumented students like Medina were denied financial aid. That’s when voters passed Proposition 300, which restricts access to all public monies for undocumented aliens to continue their college education.

At Arizona State University alone, more than 200 students who were unable to show documentation proving legal residency in Arizona dropped out without the assistance of financial aid.

Prior to the passage of Prop. 300, undocumented students in the state of Arizona did not have access to federal financial aid. Prop. 300 further restricted accesses to state monies, such as merit-based scholarships and discounted in-state tuition.

Medina’s immigration status had never been thought of as more than an inconvenience on his daily life.

“Your immigration status wasn’t something that just came up during lunch hour,” he jokes.

Students like Medina were left without funds substantial enough to cover the $12,000 tuition difference between in-state to out-of-state status.

“I thought to myself,  ‘my salary is nowhere close to enough to pay for tuition as a full-time student,’ so I just decided I would have no choice but to take once class per semester,” Medina says.

His dreams of becoming a dentist and making his parents proud soon became blurred in the light of the controversial referendum.

“I didn’t think the law would actually pass,” Medina says. “I thought this was only going to be a scare to the state for more rigid regulations in the system, but I never really thought it would go through until it did.”

In 2007, after the law was enacted activists who opposed the law created a program to help those students now illegible for scholarships they previously held. The new scholarship for undocumented students was called the Sunburst Scholarship.

The Sunburst Scholarship helped the approximately 215 students through private donations. Nevertheless, ASU began receiving negative publicity due to the fact that some of the private donors were university staff.

Hispanic Research Center director Gary Keller has long committed to advance the opportunities for Hispanic students with scholarship search engines and projects like Project 1000, geared to help underrepresented students into graduate programs. Keller says he was left unable to assist undocumented students due to the state funding received for such programs.

Karen Van Hooft, spokesperson for National Organization of Women says, “Students who have succeeded academically and qualify to attend an institution of higher education should be assisted in this endeavor, not punished for their immigration status.”

Van Hooft, who is also the editor-in-chief at the Bilingual Review Press at ASU, was deeply troubled by the law’s affects. She had trouble finding the words to describe her feelings of what it was like to refuse a student the chance to work for the Hispanic Research Center as a result of his immigration status.

ASU discontinued the scholarship because of numerous complaints and opposition of the new Sunburst Scholarship.

Chicanos Por La Causa, a nonprofit geared toward helping Latinos developed a fund for the students.

It the American Dream Fund shortly after ASU shut down the Sunburst Scholarship.

The goal was to raise $7.5 million in scholarship funds to support the American Dream Fund students over the next two years.

Students supported by the American Dream Fund went out to their communities and spread the word in hopes of garnering donations. Medina and other students participated in radio-thons and talk-a-thons across various media outlets in search of businesses and corporations willing to donate.

The American Dream Fund has been helping about 215 undocumented students at ASU continue with their education since fall of 2007.

The Victoria Foundation oversees the application process for the American Dream Fund. Maurina Moxham, assistant to the foundation presidents, says she hopes the foundation is able to keep helping these ASU students with the costs needed to better themselves and become well-respected members of society.

Although the current relief for these undocumented students is present, the law is not going away any time soon and new laws are needed to address the gaps left for future undocumented students who are approaching the college age.

And there are many of them. About 65,000 undocumented children who have lived in the United States or five years or longer graduate from high school each year, according to a report from The Urban Institute.

Advocates of laws to solve the ongoing issue of immigrant children in the United States are anticipating the return of the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act into the floor of Congress.

The DREAM Act would provide 360,000 undocumented high-school graduates with a legal means to work. To qualify under the DREAM Act, a student must have been brought into the U.S. more than five years ago when he or she was 15 years old or younger and must be able to demonstrate good moral character.

Support for the DREAM Act has increased since its introduction in 2001. In 2007, the DREAM Act was included in the comprehensive immigration legislative in the U.S. Senate that failed to pass in the spring.

However, the DREAM Act continues to attract support and has a strong backing of the House and the Senate leadership. It is currently being revised and rewritten for consideration in Congress in 2009.

Meanwhile, community efforts to support undocumented students is growing. Various students and activist groups have created websites and community groups across the country but unless reforms for immigrants, such as the DREAM Act, are passed, scholarship money will keep decreasing in availability.

Medina says he can only hope and keep studying for his current classes because, like many of his newly found friends in situations like his, he may or may not have the means necessary to keep going another semester.

“I believe in Arizona,” Medina says. “And I just want people to inform themselves well in what they’re voting for because you never know who will be affected.”

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>>Email the editor at aklaw@zoniereport.com.