How can children of illegal immigrant parents in New York be involved in education despite the language barrier?
Illegal immigrants in the United States go through many difficulties. As outlined, they find it hard to secure any formal jobs and, in some cases, informal jobs as well. In many cases, the parent works from hand to mouth and lacks any money to save. One of the biggest challenges they face is securing formal employment from the government, which makes it hard for them to feed their families. The main reason why said families fled from their countries is to look for greener pastures in the form of employment. Securing legal residency in the United States is tedious and tiresome for everybody. Apart from looking for pastures, some people migrate to the United States because of political instability in their countries. This means they migrate to the United States looking for peace, and using legal ways, which would take a long period, could mean death, making the illegal way the only option. New York, which is one of the states in the United States, has illegal immigrants from other countries. The challenges illegal immigrants face in New York are no different from those in other states, including unemployment, racial discrimination, illegal documents, and threats from locals.
Children’s Education
The majority of New York residents speak English, Spanish, and Chinese, among other languages. It simply means that if a parent speaks any other language, they will experience a difficult time communicating. It’s no different with their children. An illegal immigrant who does not know how to communicate in English, Spanish, or Chinese finds it hard to stay and get an education in New York, as the three languages are among the most widely spoken languages there. Some of the reasons which make it difficult for illegal immigrant children to access education include:
Lack of Funding
The fact that the said students don’t speak their native language makes it hard for the students to get funding for their education. It means the local people only fund pupils who speak their language, making life difficult for illegal immigrants. The little funding they get is from the United Nations and other charitable organizations, which help them to access education, although in a small percentage. Funding is an issue as the children’s parents are poor and cannot afford to pay for their children’s school fees without external help. Their parents lack formal jobs and are in another country illegally. However, from recent research, locals are now supportive of helping illegal immigrants by funding their education. Look at the following trend, which represents the trend from 2002 to 2012 (Kim, 2014).
In the above research graph, it is evident that long ago local people and donors were not willing to help people from other countries in matters of education. However, the trend has changed recently. Some illegal immigrants are being helped to achieve their dreams by locals.
Having No or Untrained Teachers
Language barriers force illegal immigrants to open their schools where their children can attend. It is because their children cannot attend the common schools which teach in different languages. The unemployment factor prevents them from hiring trained teachers. In some areas, these schools lack trained teachers, and in severe cases, the schools lack teachers altogether. The schools opened by those illegal immigrants cannot be supplied with teachers as they are in the country illegally, which means the only option they have is to hire their teachers. This is where the unemployment factor comes in, as they lack the resources required to hire their teachers. This problem could have been dealt with if those immigrants spoke the native language and there were no cases of a language barrier between them and the locals. They would have attended the same schools as the other students, but their inability to speak the required languages forces them to face these challenges.
Distance From Home
Some of the children of illegal immigrant parents have access to education, though they are forced to walk very long distances to access it. It is because the schools close to them teach in languages different from theirs. For instance, an illegal immigrant from Spain can access a Spanish class ten kilometers away from their home. Most of the nearby schools teach in English, making it very hard for the said kid to understand what is being taught. To access the educational right, the student will have to walk for kilometers to access Spanish classes offered in the area. A language barrier is causing the students to walk long distances as they cannot access education close to them. To make matters worse, their parents are in the country illegally, meaning the government cannot intervene. The parents also do not want the government to know, to avoid deportation and, in some cases, detention of the parents. The parents have tried to solve this problem by buying their children motorcycles or bicycles.
Lack of Learning Materials
This can be explained in two ways. One is that the parent cannot afford to buy learning materials for their children. It is because the parent is in the country illegally and cannot secure any formal job, meaning they lack the required money. The fact that the parent is not employed means that they cannot buy the materials. The second reason is that the difference in language between them and the locals makes it hard for them to buy the required materials. In New York, it is hard for indigenous people who do not speak the native language to purchase learning materials.
No Classroom
The fact that the parents are in New York illegally makes it hard for their children to have a classroom for learning. They cannot get help from the government to build classes due to their illegal status. However, they cannot attend other classes due to their language. The immigrants speak different languages from the locals, making it hard for them to attend the already established classes. In the area, the government sponsors native-speaking people, making it hard for the immigrants, who cannot complain due to their illegal status in the country. The only option they have is to attend classes under the trees.
What Program Can Help These Parents, Focusing on Spanish-Speaking Women in Harlem, New York City?
Illegal immigrants, mostly of Spanish origin, can focus on many things to help themselves in a foreign country. The most basic and important thing to do is to register in the United States and become a legal migrant. The process can be made legal by obtaining the required documents from the government. Once they obtain legal citizenship, they are recognized by the central government, meaning they are eligible for formal jobs. It will change their lives in the long run. The money obtained will be used to educate their children and provide medical assistance when the need arises. Also, it will enable them to live a decent and preferred life, unlike when they are in the country illegally. Also, women can engage in the following programs to help themselves.
Starting a Business
In the current business world, businesses are performing very well. Starting a business will also help those women at any given time. The program of starting a personal business would work very well for the said women. The business would help them support their families by staying in a decent house and paying for their children’s education in the best schools in New York. Apart from English, Spanish is the second most spoken language. This means that in New York, there are a good number of people of Spanish origin who will act as customers for the start of the business. The most important shareholders in the business are the customers, and in this case, they are provided by people from Spain.
Education
Women can be involved in education programs where they can be taught how to manage their own businesses and also how to live in a foreign country. The research reveals that educating women is like educating the whole society. Simply, an empowered woman will help her family to act and behave accordingly. In simple terms, it is very hard for women to abandon their families, unlike males who do so in many cases. Empowering women with education will help them to focus more on society (Krogstad et al., 2015).
In conclusion, people in foreign countries experience challenging lives, and it worsens when they are illegally in foreign countries. To avoid those challenges, they are forced to acquire the required documents and become legal citizens of that country. Naming a few, some of the challenges that affect illegal immigrants are unemployment, discrimination, lack of education, and, in severe cases, deportation to their countries.
References
Kim, I. (2014). New urban immigrants: the Korean community in New York. Princeton University Press.
Krogstad, J. M., Passel, J. S., & Cohn, D. (2015). 5 Facts about Illegal Immigration in the US. Pew Research Center, 19.
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