Do I Look Illegal? Part Three.

There's this huge hubbub about the DREAM act. Google it.

Basically, the DREAM act focuses on the young adults who are illegal by no fault of their own and helps provide them with a way to obtain citizenship without having to leave the only country that they have ever known as their own.

I worked for four years at a nonprofit organization that worked primarily with the local Hispanic population. In my work, I never asked a student or adult about their status, but I would estimate, through various conversations, that between 30-50% of the population that we served did not have legal status in the U.S. and in some cases, I would have no idea.

Source.

I had a student whom we shall call "B". B was a good student, a flirt, but he stayed out of trouble. He was in the program before I became the coordinator and B stayed in the program after I left. B even came to visit me recently at my new job. B recently graduated from high school with great grades and with circumstances that would cause other kids to drop out. He has one of the largest hearts that I have ever seen and I would trust him with my children if I needed a sitter. And, had conversation never led it, I would have never guessed B's legal status.

One day, I was asking B about a driver's license and when he would be getting one. He told me he couldn't. In my ignorance, I asked why not? I asked if he had gotten into some sort of trouble that caused him to have to wait until he was 18 to get a license. He laughed at me and said that he couldn't get a license because he didn't have papers.

When B graduated, I knew that he could attend college as an illegal immigrant, but that the road would be much harder. I pushed him to attend, but it just wasn't something he saw as a reality, until recently. Last time we spoke, B had applied and would be attending an online university to study computers. However, since he is undocumented, he is unable to obtain scholarships or grants to pay for his education. B will have to do it entirely on his own, with nothing more than loans as an option for him.

With the DREAM act, he would have a better chance of success. By gaining citizenship, he would be able to get grants and scholarships to allow him to get an education without fear of the debt that would fall on his shoulders when he finished.

Is it illegal to be undocumented? Yes. There's no debate there. I won't even argue that. But, sometimes, you need to look at the entire situation.

B came to the U.S. with both of his parents as a very young boy. They were illegal immigrants and consequently, he was illegal too. He grew up in Chicago, then here. While he is bilingual, his English is flawless, and he is in all obvious ways, a first-generation U.S. citizen...without citizenship. The way citizenship is set up now, he is required to leave the U.S. and the only home he's ever known and go to Mexico, where he is a foreigner in all sense of the word. He has no means to survive there and would have to adjust to an entirely new life as he goes through the process to request a permenant resident visa (other visa's would allow him to return, but not to file for citizenship) just to return to the states legally. Then, he has a possibility of becoming a citizen, but there is no guarantee.

Becoming a citizen, also known as naturalization, is a long process and is expensive. Visa's must be renewed, and citizenship testing costs money. The process can be gruelling. And, the test can be difficult. In my work, we had naturalization test classes and I barely knew the answers to the test. (Wanna test yourself to see if you could pass? Go here for a list of the questions.)

So, what do you think of the DREAM act?