According to Lynn Neault, vice-chancellor for Student Services at the San Diego Community College District (SDCCD), most of its undocumented students operate “in the shadows.” Because of the presidential administration’s often negative spotlight on undocumented citizens, the need to remove them from the shadows and bring them out into the open and provide them with support and resources has intensified, she says.

When the San Diego Community College District and three of its community colleges – San Diego City, Mesa and Miramar – was awarded a $336,000 grant from the California Campus Catalyst Fund, it enabled it to step up its efforts and reach out to more undocumented students and provide resources at its DREAMers Resource Centers.

With the money furnished by the grant, its goals were “to institutionalize these DREAMer Support Centers, establish its infrastructure, increase the number of undocumented students we serve, and conduct this training district-wide. Many undocumented students don’t even know they can go to college,” Neault says.

The community college district is multi-ethnic, including: Latinos forming the largest group with 39% and with 30% White students, 15% Asian and Filipino, 7% African American, and 6% multi-ethnic.

Asked if there’s been any backlash in assisting students that aren’t citizens based on the anti-immigrant political chatter, Neault deflects that point.  “We’re a community college. We help all students; we don’t check whether they’re undocumented or not. We provide education and training for our community, which includes undocumented students.  To us, they’re just students,” she exclaims.

By providing resources to these undocumented students, many of whom have lived in California their entire life, community colleges are helping and strengthening the community, Neault suggests.  “We’re providing education and training to help students get into the workforce and become tax-paying members of our community.  It’s the American Dream in many ways.  We’re giving people a chance,” she says.

But many of these undocumented students feel threatened by any governmental bureaucracy or intervention, explains Shakerra Carter, dean of Outreach and Student Affairs at the San Diego Community College District.  “One of our goals was to make our students feel safe.  They’re on our campus, and we don’t always know who they are,” she says.

Though the district doesn’t track or identify undocumented students, requests for AB540, a bill that enables students to pay reduced state fees and DREAMer applications, reveals their identity, Carter explains.

Spreading The Word

One of the first initiatives fueled by the grant involved early outreach to undocumented students in the district key feeder high schools. At many of the workshops in high schools, students attend financial aid workshops that assure them that undocumented students have access to student aid.

In fact, Carter says some students learn for the first time during the workshops that they are undocumented because some parents withhold that information from them.  “We have to dispel the fear that applying for college will ‘out’ them or put them at risk for deportation,” asserts Carter.

At the crux of helping these under-the-radar students are the DREAMer Resource Centers.  Carter says the district has built up the center’s infrastructure with the belief that “If we build it, they will come.”

And so far, it’s been working.  The district that once assisted about 600 undocumented students is now helping 800 of them.  And yet there’s more work to be done, because it estimates that there are 3,000 additional students.

The DREAMer Centers are staffed by academic counselors, mental health professionals and peer mentors.  It also offers Legal Resources or access to actual attorneys to assist students with legal issues such as renewing their DACA applications, which enables them to work, and apply for their green cards.  The Centers also help them apply to four-year colleges.

It also provides mental health resources since many undocumented students “deal with anxiety, depression, and not knowing what their future is,” Neault notes.  All of its mental health staff, financial aid staff and faculty are trained in cultural competency.

Despite all of its efforts, Carter explains that for some students the resistance and fear still run deep, and its goal remains reaching out to students and creating a safe environment for them to seek support.  “One thing we’ve learned is the need to reach out to parents and community members.  How do we share information with them and get them to feel comfortable is our goal,” she says.

Neault observes that every time political conversation is ramped up in a negative way about undocumented students, a certain percentage drop out, saying that they have to work to earn money to live on.  But that often masks their fear of being discovered and deported.

Carter sees the situation as a problem to be solved.  “Undocumented students face significant barriers and we have to figure out how to best serve them,” she says.

The $12 million grants (which now have risen to $14 million) launched in April of 2018 by the California Campus Catalyst Fund, drawn from private philanthropies, were awarded to about 30 campuses state-wide including San Diego’s community colleges, explains Victor Garcia, the director of the California Campus Catalyst Fund.

San Diego Community College District earned the grant based on its proposal to have a centralized administrator at the district level ensure that all of its goals were met.  It earned a three-year grant that must be renewed annually based on its progress and achievements.

Choosing that community college district made educational sense because “that’s where the majority of undocumented students are enrolled. It’s the option closest to home, and affordability is a factor.  Community colleges have felt like a place that is increasingly aware of their needs,” Garcia cites.

One of the primary goals of issuing the grants is “helping campuses refine how they reach students on and off campus.  It allows them also to reach students’ families,” Garcia notes.

Garcia describes the major needs of undocumented student as access to legal services, understanding financial aid resources, and allowing them to recognize that other students are in the same situation and they’re not alone or isolated.

“At the center of all the work we do is helping the college institutionalize better practices that will outlast the grant, and better position the college to help undocumented students achieve their long-term goals,” Garcia said.

The bottom-line goal of implementing this grant at San Diego’s community colleges is “creating a culture on campus where all students, regardless of circumstances, know they belong and they are welcome on campus.  They’re safe places, where students shouldn’t have to worry and have all these fears,” Neault states. •

Contact Gary Stern at garystern@aol.com