Courtesy of American Immigration Council
Any student in the United States who wishes to obtain a public education is free to do so, according to the Constitution. This is the reason why so many immigrants immigrate to the United States; to provide a better future for their children by allowing them to acquire a free, quality education. However, that may not be the case for long. Some states are trying to ban undocumented children from attending public schools.
Receiving an education is the best way to succeed as a citizen of the United States. Denying a child of an education is more than just taking away their chance to learn their ABC's and multiplication tables. It is taking away their ability to contribute to our society's progress in the future.
In 1975, the Texas legislature entitled its school districts to deny any foreign-born children an education in the public schools if they were not "legally admitted" into the United States. In order to enroll, the children had to provide documentation that showed they were lawfully present in the country, or they would be denied. When several foreign-born children had no way of proving that they were "legally admitted," they filed a lawsuit called Plyler v. Doe that was eventually taken to the Supreme Court in 1989. The Court ruled that the states had no reason to deny undocumented children of a public education based on their immigration status due to the fact that it would only harm the children and our society as a whole.
The Plyler ruling meant that if public schools were providing a free education for U.S. citizens and "legally admitted" foreign-born children, they had to provide the same, free education for undocumented children, as well. However, since the Supreme Court ruling, several states have tried to deny undocumented children an education in spite of Plyler. In 1994, Proposition 187 was passed in California, which prohibited schools from enrolling any student who was not lawfully present in the United States and required them to report the situation to authorities if it came up. In 2006, an Illinois school district refused to enroll a student who had overstayed his tourist visa. In 2011, the Alabama legislature issued a measure that obliged schools districts to specify the immigration status of newly enrolled students. All of these actions violate Plyler and could be considered unconstitutional. If schools continue to circumvent Plyler, all of the students, both undocumented children and U.S. citizens, will be affected. Trust issues between students and school staff members, racial profiling, bullying, and high rates of absences have already emerged and will continued to increase. Is that what is in our country's future in education?
In The Distance Between Us, Papi expected all three of his children to do their very best in school without any excuses. Reyna, who especially wanted to make her father proud, worked very hard and it paid off. After coming in second, or even third, when it came to school achievements in the family due to her youth, she felt that she really needed to go far in order to make her father as proud as he was for his other children. She said, "she felt she owed him something, as if there was a debt that needed to be repaid" (Grande 173). Reyna became the first person in her entire family to finish college and her persistence and ability to overcome diversity helped her become a wonderful, award-winning author.
Imagine if Reyna, Mago, and Carlos weren't able to receive the education they did. Certainly, they wouldn't have been near as successful as they were, especially Reyna. Would they have stayed in the United States at all if they weren't able to? It really goes to show that educating immigrants, documented or not, will only be of use to our society. After all, they're already in the United States and desperately want to stay here, so we might as well make the best of it and create hard-working students that will strive in the future. Look at Reyna Grande. If she were denied an education when she first came to the United States, our country would have one less inspiring author.
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