Wednesday, April 15, 2009

What is the Priority? Immigration Reform? Economic Reform? Education Reform?


The Obama administration seems to want to take on everything from education reform to immigration reform. However, many believe that President Obama should be focusing on the current economic crisis. Of course, education reform would make the United States more competitive in the global market in the long run, and therefore it would make sense to address the education issues.  However, there are many people that think that other reforms that the President is pursuing should be placed on the back burner until the United States recovers from the economic crisis.



One such reform deals with immigration. At the beginning of the month, Obama announced that he would be addressing immigration reform this year. In a NYTimes article, it  says that Obama plans to address the public in May on the issue and then work with a group to begin discussing possible legislation. As I said before, the economy is a bigger priority for many politicans and they will focusing on stimulating the economy, and restructuring many public services before they will address immigration reform.  However, some believe that immigration reform is vital to stimulating the economy.


For instance, the National Immigration Law Center (NILC) released a publication titled “Why Enactment of the DREAM Act Would Aid the Ailing Economy and Generate Tax Revenues" outlines how the DREAM Act would impact the economy. Not only would legalized immigrants increase tax revenues, they would also contribute to the Social Security system. Additionally, it would stimulate the economy by increasing productivity in the educated workforce. The publication also makes the point that many of these students have been educated from K-12 through the United States public school system. Their elementary and secondary education has been invested in through both federal and local taxpayers’ money. However, since these students are not allowed to attend public universities, the return on the investment is not seen. The NILC has another brief called the “Basic Facts about In-State Tuition for Undocumented Immigrant Students.” According to this brief, states that have already passed legislation similar to the DREAM Act have not experienced a substantial cost in its implementation. School revenues have increased because students that would not otherwise be there are now attending.


Additionally, Simon Rosenberg of the Democratic think-tank NDN says that legalizing immigrants would help to end unfair competition for low-wage American workers. At the moment, illegal immigrants are not protected by the same minimum wage rights that citizens are. Therefore, employers will hire undocumented immigrant, pay them under the minimum wage and not report it. This leaves the rest of low-wage American workers without jobs.


According to NPR, Simon also made the same point that NILC made about tax revenues. As more and more illegal immigrants become citizens, they will pay more to federal and state taxes. Furthermore, Rosenberg states:




It means they can start an entry level job, but they can't really make the step to improve their education, get to the next level," he says. "And so you're essentially holding a whole contingent of people back from contributing even more to the economy than they do.



While there are counterpoints to the argument (some of which are in the NPR article), I believe that it is time to address the immigration issue with a reform that will benefit everyone. With the growing numbers of illegal immigrants entering the United States there needs to be more structure around what will happen to them, especially in regards to education.
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Monday, April 6, 2009

More Data Collection

Secretary Duncan requested better data collection from states as part of the stimulus package. As an education researcher, I completely understand the need for more complete and accessible data from the schools, districts and states in regards to education. And while making it a requirement for more funds seems reasonable, I wonder if states have the capacity to report this data. Are all states even collecting the data that Secretary Duncan is requesting? It seems to me that funds to build the infrastructure for data collection and reporting would be needed.

In addition, it would be great if states were using compatible systems so that data sharing between states would be possible. This would be useful in tracking students that move from state to state. As of right now, if a child moves from one state to another that does not have a compatible data system, a lot of information is lost. This even happens within states, when students move from district to district.  Perhaps an effort to have compatible data analysis systems across districts, states and between K-12 and higher education, so data collection is continuous.

Having this data would inform important policy decisions, such as curriculum, and teaching.To learn more about what Secretary Duncan is requesting, please look at the NYTimes article.
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Thursday, April 2, 2009

Higher Education for Illegal Immigrants

(I have to admit that I'm in the middle of writing a paper about this for one of my classes, so a lot of this is from one of the drafts. But since I have been coming across a few articles about the education of illegal immigrants and the funding of it, I thought it was appropriate to say something.)


The United States is a nation of immigrants who have settled in the country looking for better opportunities. Many immigrate in search of the “American Dream,” which refers to the freedom to pursue their goals through hard work. In other words, many people immigrate to the United States in the pursuit of bettering their economic conditions. One way of improving your economic status is through attaining an education. In most cases, the higher level of education you have achieved the more money you will make. Nevertheless, there have been several political debates on the basic rights and privileges of illegal immigrants; one of which is on the access to education of illegal immigrants and the children of illegal immigrants.


Currently there are several state legislatures in the United States are debating whether to allow illegal immigrant students to get in-state rates at state universities and colleges. Since the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act is stuck in Congress, a number of states have decided to try to deal with the in-state tuition issue themselves. States including Connecticut and New Jersey would allow any students who graduated from high schools in the state, whether or not they were legal residents, to qualify for lower tuition, while Missouri and Kansas are explicitly banning the practice. The absence of definitive legislation at the federal level regarding the education of illegal immigrants in higher education and the consequences that holds on the state and local levels. California is a great example of a state having to deal with the vagueness of federal legislation with Proposition 187.


This past Wednesday, Colorado has passed a bill that will allow illegal immigrants to pay in-state college tuition. The bill violates a federal law that bars states from offering illegal immigrants any benefits that are not offered to citizens from other states. However, ten states, including Texas and Utah, have already passed similar laws. Although several states have moved toward granting in-state tuition to illegal immigrants, many states still do not even allow illegal immigrants to matriculate at their public universities. These states do not even allow illegal immigrants to pay the out-of-state tuition for the public universities.


In a time where many universities are losing money and many students are unable to pay for college because of the lack of financial aid available, it would make sense to allow anyone who can be accepted, to attend, regardless of immigrant status.  The News and Observer released an article on the 20th of March which stated that "it's cheaper to admit illegal immigrants than to keep them out." Revenue would increase not only because of illegal immigrants paying out-of-state tuition, but also because schools would spend less money on verifying immigrant status.


While an increase in revenue for colleges would be great in this economy, I am concerned with the lack of interest in providing higher education to illegal immigrants. In the past, laws that restricted the access to education to illegal immigrants and/or their children have been found to be unlawful.  For example, in 1982, in Plyler v Doe, the Supreme Court decided that illegal immigrants and their children, although not citizens of the United States, are protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. The law that the Supreme Court overturned in this case had disadvantaged the children of illegal immigrants by denying them the right to an education.


Isn't the unequal access to higher education also a violation of the fourteenth amendment? I am interested in seeing what happens with the DREAM Act. Last week, the DREAM Act was reintroduced to House and Senate.  I hope that when they are voting for or against the act, they consider all sides of the issue and figure out how illegal immigrants will be able to gain access to higher education within the United States if the DREAM Act is not passed.


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