DREAMers face uncertain future when it comes to higher education

March 15, 2017, 6:45 a.m. ·

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Educators for Fair Consideration, an advocacy group for undocumented students, estimates 7,000 – 13,000 DREAMers enroll in college throughout the United States annually (Photo courtesy of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln).

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Nebraska researchers are turning their attention to 'DREAMers' or undocumented immigrant students. Specifically, they want to know about their college experiences. They're finding they face far different challenges than their peers. Neeta Kantamneni has spent her career studying the challenges minority students face. Lately she's focused her researched on this student body.


NET NEWS: The interviews you and your team have conducted have brought to light how very basic some of the roadblocks these students face are. Can you give a few examples?

NEETA KANTAMNENI: I think that was actually one of the most humbling aspects of doing this research. We did multiple case study research with a couple of undocumented students in Nebraska. Some of the roadblocks were really just basic. Things like transportation, something that most college students would take for granted. Think about trying to navigate how to get to classes, or not even just classes, but how to get to professional development opportunities. Even conferences. Things like that that can be really difficult. For renting books sometimes you need a state-issued ID. Navigating the college admissions process and scholarships, particularly private scholarships, which were the only ones accessible for the students were very difficult to do. So again, some of the things that other college students might take for granted were hurdles for these students.

NET NEWS: What about social stigma? Do these students feel like outsiders compared to the student body?

Neeta Kantamneni is an associate professor in educational and counseling psychology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. (Courtesy photo).


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NEETA KANTAMNENI: The students we interviewed talked about that. They talked a little bit about the fear of sometimes being in very public places. One of the interviewees talked about that for a while, 'I was really active in trying to be more active about undocumented students’ needs,' and then she had a really negative experience with a person in power at the institution she was at. Because of that experience, it really caused her to kind of take a step back and try to remain less visible as an undocumented student.

NET NEWS: What kind of information did they provide about the state of services available to them here in Nebraska?

NEETA KANTAMNENI: There was more emphasis on informal support and both of the students talked about how they received a lot to help them access and navigate the path to higher education. So going back to things like filling out specific paperwork or things like that. So very little support from structured offices or anything like that. More often than not, it would come from somebody who knew of somebody who could help undocumented students. One story involved how a private scholarship was falling through and this person was worried about funding. Obviously they didn’t have access to federal funding. They heard about a person who might be able to personally loan them money so they ended up going that route.

NET NEWS: President Donald Trump campaigned on tough immigration laws and he's already enacted tough orders affecting immigrants. Did you talk to any students who have DACA status who are concerned they'll be deported?

NEETA KANTAMNENI: So these interviews were conducted a few years ago, but they did express concern at the time about the future of DACA. One of them was how to be here under DACA and how they feel about the paperwork. It’s a pretty big investment, especially for a student. If you think about the monetary costs and sometimes you need, I think, several hundred dollars. One student said she had completed all of it and was worried about how at that time the DREAM Act had stalled. She was just worried about the future, especially with Obama's executive action that was overturned by the Supreme Court. I remember her saying, “It just feels like you don't know because the landscape is always changing. You don't know what you're doing and where you're going.” I imagine now it feels even more uncertain because it's even quicker right now.

NET NEWS: What do these students see for their futures? I would think it might be hard to be optimistic when there's so much uncertainty.

NEETA KANTAMNENI: Definitely. I think just clinically when I worked as a college counselor or university counselor we see that a lot with these undocumented students. What's going to happen? And even if the student is documented, they often have undocumented family members. Then there’s the uncertainty of what's going to happen to their family members. What's going to happen? Especially right now. You might be seeing more deportations or people taken a little bit more frequently. That uncertainty can really be debilitating at times and it can lead to a sense of hopelessness.