102: How to Advocate for Undocumented Students

Ethan Sawyer  0:09  
Hey, it's Ethan Sawyer, College Essay Guy here, and my goal is to bring more ease, joy and purpose to the college application process. Welcome to the podcast. This is where I interview some of the most brilliant minds in the college admissions world try and break down and dissect what it is they do into actionable steps that you can take or that you can help someone else take if you're helping someone else through this process. One of my goals with the podcast and with my work just in general, is to find the resources out there that are the most efficient, most practical, most effective ways of doing things. Sometimes, though, when I google something, I don't find the resource that I'm looking for, and that was the case with this. So I found the absolute best person that I could find to co create a resource. You'll see what I mean in just a minute about why she's the best person for this. In this episode, which is part two of two, I speak with veteran counselor Dr Aliza Gilbert about how counselors and teachers can best advocate for undocumented youth. I learned so much in this conversation. I learned how even wonderful and caring teachers sometimes go wrong when it comes to undocumented students, how sometimes it's not just about how much you care. It's also about how much you know. We do a primer on terms to use and not use when working with undocumented students, what the DREAM Act is, and why not all students get this? Why not all students love the term dreamers. We talk about why this is such a big deal right now in our culture, in this political moment, what percentage of kids born right now are born to undocumented parents? The number might surprise you. Should students reveal their undocumented status and their personal statement? How teachers, mentors, counselors can really effectively help and advocate for undocumented youth? Be sure to also check out the resources that accompany this podcast. You've got some really good ones, including a one page PDF called 15 ways to advocate for undocumented youth, a list of undocumented student resources with apps that students can download, films. There's a PowerPoint that Dr Gilbert created for a presentation called dreamers and the college dream, helping undocumented students navigate the path to post secondary education, a list of recommended readings. Dr Gilbert and I also created a two part article. Part one is, Should I come out as undocumented in my personal statement? And part two is for students who do decide to reveal their status, how to come out as undocumented in your personal statement, which may be of interest if you're listening to this and you're wrestling with that question, or you're working with students who wrestle with that question. You'll also find a recording in Spanish of a resource called seis cosas que los estudiantes indocumentados necesitan saber sobre la universidad, which has translated six things undocumented students need to know about college. You'll find a link in the show notes to that article, which was published by the College Board, and my reading of it, in case you'd like to share that with parents who speak Spanish. That's a lot, I know, but I hope you'll find these resources useful, and I hope you'll enjoy this conversation. I learned a lot. I hope you do too. So without further ado, here is my interview with Dr Gilbert. My guest is Aliza Gilbert. She's been a college counselor for 19 years. Spent five years in admissions before that. She's currently a counselor at Highland Park High School in Illinois. She got her PhD in May 2016 and her dissertation examined how high schools influence an undocumented students college search in 2017 she was a counselors that changed lives recipient, and she also received the city of Highland Park Humanitarian Award. Aliza, welcome to the show. Thank you very much for having me. And will you say just a little bit about this counselors that change lives things, or just just a couple words on colleges that change lives? Because some of our listeners may not know what that is sure.


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  3:59  
So there's a coalition of schools called colleges that change lives, and it's small liberal arts colleges. It actually originally started as a book written by a long time admissions professional who sought out institutions that he thought were doing things that were really innovative and really kind of changing the experience of college. And so over time, this book grew to an organization, and now it's affectionately known as ctcl, colleges that change lives, and they're wonderful schools all over the country, and each year they designate a small number of counselors that they identify as counselors that change lives, and I was fortunate enough to be recognized in 2017 which I appreciate, especially just because this organization is one that I so have such respect for. I think they do such great work, and I think the colleges that they represent are wonderful educational institutions for my students. Well


Ethan Sawyer  4:58  
put and succinctly. But Lisa, that was awesome. And it's an organization that I love too, you know, it's they do such great work, and have done such great work for, you know, for students, for getting them thinking about other colleges and other options. And it's a well deserved award. I was so Elisa and I met at NACAC, which is the National Association of College admissions counselors, conference two years ago, and I heard her speak. She gave a presentation on undocumented students, and I was just amazed by her depth of knowledge, just the way that, the way that you care about students. And it was just awesome. So I'm really grateful and really honored that you're here. So give us before we get into the real meat of the things, I want to hear a little bit about this dissertation, because I think it's relevant to our conversation. But what did you get a PhD in?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  5:45  
Sure, so my PhD is in higher ed. My dissertation was definitely a labor of love. It was a qualitative case study on a suburban high school similar to mine, but definitely not mine. And what I looked at was how a high school and the high school agent so teachers, counselors, staff, how they influence the college search of an undocumented student. And I went into it knowing that influence could mean positively or negatively, and I was hopeful that I was going to find that it was positively, and I think in some cases it is. But I think what I really learned was that we still have a lot of work to do.


Ethan Sawyer  6:25  
Yeah? Help us out, situate us with some of the terminology. Because I know that there are a lot of terms used in this field, undocumented, unauthorized, these kinds of things. Will you just kind of walk us through what some of these different terms are so people have context?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  6:40  
Yeah? Sure. So there's definitely terms that we use, and then one term in particular that we don't use. So you'll hear the terms undocumented and unauthorized interchanged and used interchangeably. They really, for our purposes of access to higher ed, mean the same thing. But technically, a student who's undocumented is a student who is here without documentation, so literally, doesn't exist. A student who is unauthorized is a student who was probably here at some time with something, whether that was a visa, either a Travel Visa or work visa, but has since fallen out of status and didn't leave. So now they're unauthorized to be here. You'll sometimes also hear the term dreamers, and that's a really popular term, and it really comes from kind of the original DREAM Act, which was legislation that was proposed in 2000 that would have created a path towards citizenship, but it never passed. And interestingly enough, though, there's some undocumented young adults who don't really love the term dreamers, because they feel that it doesn't really include everybody who's here, because there are some students who wouldn't qualified under the DREAM Act. And so they feel that it really kind of highlights a very specific population, which are the kids who have been here a really long time. And then we also hear the phrase documented, which is a take on undocumented, and that's for students who have received DACA status, which is Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which was an executive memo that President Obama signed. That is a big topic of conversation right now. And then the term, I think, that we really try very hard to stay away from is the term illegals. It is dehumanizing. It is not a kind term. It's definitely a label. People are not illegal. And interestingly enough, I learned recently from a friend who's an immigration lawyer, that actually the term illegal immigrant in immigration law actually doesn't exist. There's no, there's nothing that really talks about illegal immigrants. They're students who may be out of status, but nowhere in the law does it talk about an illegal immigrant? Which is really interesting, because it's a term that we all use often, and we hear a lot, definitely, in the media, definitely,


Ethan Sawyer  8:57  
yeah, you hear that in the news a bunch. It's one of those misconceptions that it's just become a part of our culture in this sort of new, you know, era where it's sort of like, well, what? What do we believe and what do we hear in the news? What are, what are some other misconceptions that are out there?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  9:16  
I think a lot of people don't necessarily understand who our undocumented students are, you know, they really they run the gamut. We have students who have come recently, who came with their parents. They may have come on like a travel visa, as I said earlier, or even for a work visa for their parents. Or they may have come for their parents to go to school. And something happened. In some cases, it was a mistake by a lawyer that caused them to get out of status. And so that's a population that I think people don't necessarily realize, that not everybody intended to be here without status. In some cases, it just happened. Definitely, there are some young people who are here alone that. Many of our students have come to actually reunite with their parents, and that's also something that we're hearing about on the news right now are identifications of students who are young children who are being picked up at the border, who are trying to reunite with parents. And really, how that happened was that before the border got tighter, a lot of parents came and went. So they went back and forth to work, and when the border became tighter, many of them got stuck on this side. And so you had children living in other countries and parents living here. And so knowing that things were going to get tighter, there was this push to reunite families and to bring students here. So that's one group, and a lot of those recent immigrants are kids that we see in our ELL classes. And then we have this population, which is the population that's definitely the most visible, which are our young people who came here at very early ages. It may have been at 23456, some cases, one month, who no longer even remember the country of their birth. They consider the US to be home, and these are students for whom the legislation of the Dream Act, or deferred action was definitely intended for


Ethan Sawyer  11:15  
why is this such a big deal right now? Why are we talking about this? It's


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  11:20  
a great question. We're talking about it because politically, our administration is talking about it. For many of us who work with students, it's always been a big deal. I think right now it's become a really big deal because there's a lot of focus on our undocumented youth, and I think they're very fearful. It's also a big issue, because we know that we have about a million undocumented students under the age of 18 in the US right now, and we also know that fewer than 10% of undocumented students who graduate high school will go on to pursue college right out of high school, and many of them will enroll in a community college because of cost, but most of them won't go to college, and many of them who go to college won't make it to a four year degree. And we know that a four year degree, you know, to quote an expression that the Illinois Student Assistance Commission uses, college changes everything. And I'm a huge believer in that, and so I do believe that we have to continue to push for all of our young people to have access to college. And then the other piece of it, which I think is really relevant long term, is that 8% of all kids born right now are born to an undocumented parent, and parent levels of education are have a huge impact on college attainment. So if we restrict our young adults from getting college just from going to college, getting a college degree just because they're undocumented, we then create a likelihood that their children, who are US citizens, will be at risk for not going to college. So now we create a whole other generation of young people who are going to be marginalized because they don't have a college education. And that has a significant impact, I believe, on who we are as a country, who we are as a nation. I believe it has an economic impact. I think it's a huge issue.


Ethan Sawyer  13:23  
What are some of the challenges that are unique to undocumented students? We've, you know, I just interviewed two students who have talked about difficulties with travel, and they've mentioned, you know, difficulties in trying to figure out how to pay for college. But as from where you said, and feel free to expand on either of those, what are some of the challenges that undocumented students are facing?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  13:45  
Yeah, so it's interesting. You know, in my job as college counselor, I meet with students every day, students and parents, and we talk about the college search, and one of the things that we always say is it really starts with self assessment. You have to think about who you are and what you want. And we talk about things like class size and learning environment, and we talk about social life. Do you want a fraternity or a sorority? How do you feel about club sports? And all of those things are not things that we talk about with an undocumented student. We talk about things like friendly and unfriendly states, where is it not good for you to be, and where is a place that is safe for you to be? So certain states like Arizona, historically, we don't talk about in terms of sending students to South Carolina, Georgia, those are states that have known to have some pretty restrictive policies. We do talk, and you mentioned this, we talked significantly about, how are you going to get there? Our young students, our young people who have DACA do have, in most cases, the ability to get a driver's license, which allows them to travel. If a student doesn't have DACA, though, then they don't have a driver's license and they can't fly. And then, for many students, if their travel. And far, how are their parents going to get them there without putting their parents at risk for driving? And met with a student last year who had DACA and had a wonderful scholarship offer from a school in Connecticut, and in the end, she chose to stay in Illinois because she said, I want my parents to be able to come visit me at college. I want them to see what I'm experiencing, and I know that if I go to school in Connecticut, they'll never be able to do that. So that's a very real thing. Definitely campus climate, knowledgeable staff, student affairs. You know, do residence halls directors understand what being undocumented means. Do financial aid offices understand the difficulties because an undocumented student's not eligible for federal or, in most cases, state aid? Does the Career Development Office know that if a student doesn't have DACA, they're going to have a hard time doing a paid internship? Does a Career Development Office know that if a student does have DACA, they can go to medical school or become a lawyer? You know definitely, cost is critical again, because of the restrictions on federal and state aid and also a number of scholarships, a lot of scholarships will restrict eligibility to students who are citizens or permanent residents. And then I think the other piece, which is really hard for students, is how much do they share in their application? You know, we tell them that you're putting it all out there and you should be your authentic self, but to put out that your status is undocumented is a really scary thing for a student, because you don't know who's on the other side reading that application, and so it's not my job to tell a student they should or shouldn't disclose, but I try to help walk them through it. The Common Application added a question a couple years ago about what's a background story that's central to your identity, and that question just shouts for an undocumented student you know to talk about their experiences, and for many of them, you know, their lives are very, very different than a US citizen or a permanent resident, and the essay is really the only opportunity that they have to share that And to give some insight into their world. I want to


Ethan Sawyer  17:22  
say a little bit I want to hear you say a little bit more about that, because the two students that I've spoken with, they both, when I asked them, what's your advice to students, they said, you know, share it. Be proud of it. You know, step up. But what are some of the considerations when you're walking a student through and they're trying to make this decision, whether or not they're going to reveal their status in their essay. What are some of the things that that you would encourage them to think about? Sure,


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  17:46  
I think, you know, I've been working with undocumented students since the mid 90s. I met my first undocumented student when I was an admissions counselor, and definitely it's changed a lot since then. You know, in the 90s, nobody was talking about this at all, and then in the early 2000s people talked about it, but students weren't really out. And then the undocumented and unafraid campaign started. And then everything changed. And very much, as your students that you interviewed mentioned, they became empowered by being able to share. But not everybody has that has had that experience. I worked with a student at my high school once who told no one throughout all of her years at high school that she was undocumented. When I did my interview for my dissertation, I interviewed a student who had no idea that there were other undocumented students at her high school, she was a graduating senior, and had gone through all four years thinking that she was the only one, and so not everybody is comfortable putting it out there. I would say many of our Latino students are much more comfortable. They have really kind of become the visible pieces of this, whereas many of our undocumented Asian students are much more private about it and much more reticent, some of it just depends on what kinds of experiences they've had, you know, getting to the point of applying because they had good experiences in their high school. Have they had people that they have felt supported them? And so I wish I could say that all of our students definitely feel comfortable putting it out there, but, you know, definitely, definitely not. And I understand that, and I have to say that, especially going knowing what's going on right now, it's scary. It's scary to put down on a piece of paper, not knowing who's going to see it that you are an undocumented immigrant.


Ethan Sawyer  19:44  
So Eliza, what are some ways that counselors and teachers can advocate for undocumented youth?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  19:51  
So I think there's a bunch of different things they can do, some of which they can do for their students in high schools and some of which they can do with colleges. So. Do the students in high schools first, I think, first and foremost, we need as counselors and as schools to normalize the conversation around undocumented students in college access, and we need to do that as early as freshman year. And what I mean by that is we need to put it out there in everything that we say and do. And so when we give presentations to our freshman advisories, we talk about financial aid, we talk about who can go to college. You don't have to necessarily have the best grades. We love students to do the best that they can do. But we're fortunate, and we have all different ranges of colleges. And so one of the things that I really advocate for is having counselors talk about, you know if you have financial aid, if you're not, you know if you're if you are an undocumented immigrant, if you are the first in your family to go to college. And just put the language out there along with everything else, so that the students who are undocumented, who maybe haven't told anybody, pick up on that phrase and know that there's someone in this building who knows that they exist and who definitely can give them access to good information. I've been pushing that for a really long time, and last year, I had a counselor who called me so excited because she said that she was doing her program with her incoming freshman, and she said, I did that. I just included the words undocumented in my little college spiel. And she said, a couple days later, she had this little freshman boy who stood in her office and said she wanted to talk to her, or he said he wanted to talk to her. And she said, Sure, you know what about and he said, Well, about that thing you said the other day about being undocumented but being able to go to college, he said, That's me, and I always thought I couldn't. So I think we need to not assume that kids are going to tell us that they're undocumented and then we're going to tell them that they can go to college. That might happen, but we know that students often don't self disclose until they need something from us, so they're filling out an application that asks about citizenship, and they don't know what to do, or they're applying to get their driver's license. That is a huge time when kids surface when they're taking Driver's Ed through school, and they run into road blocks because of getting their permit and things like that, and that's often when students will share, and usually that sophomore or junior year. And if we could get them to have access to that information earlier, that's critical, because the earlier, the better. So I think normalizing the conversation, I think is really important. I think the other thing that's really important is that we have to make sure that information and resources are accessible to all students, even if they don't self disclose. I think we think that students are going to come and tell us that they're undocumented, and then we're going to tell them what their options are. And the truth is, is that many students won't and many students don't self disclose until they actually need something from a counselor, so they need help with an application, or they're struggling because they've hit a roadblock with getting their driver's permit. And so one of the things that I really encourage, and I learned a lot about this from interviewing students when I did my dissertation, is where do we have the information about undocumented students? So most of us have a college planning handbook that we give to families. We have information about testing and essays and athletics just to include a section about undocumented students, many high schools will say, Well, I'm not so sure we have any. And I would argue that almost every high school in the country has at least one undocumented student, whether they know it or not, and and it just having that information there, if I'm an undocumented student, and I'm getting this college planning handbook, and I'm flipping through it, and I see students with, you know, special needs, I see athletes, and then I see undocumented students, I know, again, that that's information that pertains to me, and that also is incredibly empowering for a student to be able to get information on their own and not constantly have to ask someone for it. So you know, we now have information in our handbook, which is on live binders. We have information on our website. We have information on our financial aid. Night, I asked our financial aid director, who does the program, to include some information about undocumented students. So again, I think we really need to make sure that the information is out there for students to access, even if they don't self disclose. I think the other thing is, knowing that cost is such an issue, I think we really need to look at how, how do we have, how do we advertise, and how is our information collected about local scholarships. You know, we all have scholarships that are relevant, just for our students or our community or. Our high schools, and many of them have citizenship requirements, but that's just because the person who started the scholarship often just thinks they have to do that, right? So they'll say, like, oh well, we're a not for profit, or we need it for tax purposes. And the reality is, is that they don't as a private agency or private person, they can give their money to whomever they choose, and so they don't have to ask for a social security number. They don't have to make citizenship a requirement on the application. And so a couple summers ago, we went through all of our local scholarships, and we called every single person who gave a local scholarship and asked them if they would consider opening it up to an undocumented student, and almost all of them said yes. When you tell them the impact that their scholarship could have, you know, for some students, $1,000 can make or break whether or not they go to school. And so if you tell someone who wants to give a scholarship that has value and has purpose. That's a really powerful thing. So I think that's something that's important to do. I think also we need to look at what kinds of outlets do we have for our undocumented students to have a voice. Many high schools now are starting undocumented student and Ally clubs, and I think we need to be careful. We don't just want to say, Hey, this is a group of undocumented students, but we have a lot of a lot of allies in our school, a lot of students who are citizens, who have undocumented parents, who maybe come from mixed status families. And then we have students who are just interested and want to be supportive, and then we have undocumented students, and so by creating opportunities for these students to get together, students don't have to disclose their status to be a part of this group, but it has given our students a voice and a presence in the high school. And one of the things that we did with this group a couple years ago was through the United We Dream organization. They have national educators Coming Out Day, and we put signs in the faculty mail room that a teacher could take and put on their door, which says, I'm an educator and I support undocumented students through our group, we also hosted a screening of the movie ask Angie. We did it as a fundraiser and sold popcorn. And then we had a couple students, none of whom shared their status and no one knew who was documented and who wasn't documented talk about what it's like to be an undocumented student. And so those are, I think, really important ways to empower students and to help them find their voice and get it and establish kind of, I don't know, a sense of being in a sense of self within our school community.


I think the other thing that is really important is that everybody needs to make sure that teachers are aware that undocumented students exist in our schools and that they can go to college. When I when I did my interviews, I interviewed a bunch of teachers who were wonderful and caring and loving, and when I asked the question of, What do you think is an undocumented students options for college, almost all of them said, Oh, I don't think they have any here in Illinois. And and it broke my heart, because Illinois is actually a state that has tuition equity legislation, and so an undocumented student will pay in state rates if they graduate from one of our high schools. And so that was really surprising to me that teachers are completely unaware of that, and so I think we really need to accept responsibility to educate our faculty and staff community. They don't need to know the ins and the outs, that's our job as counselors, but they do need to know that undocumented students have options, and they need to be careful about what their language is, because sometimes they say things without realizing who their audience is, and those words are felt by students. One of the things that is really visible in the literature is that many undocumented students will talk about discrimination or prejudice by a teacher, and that impacts their their high school experiences, and many cases, impacts college. But the students who get to college and get through college, almost all of them, will point to someone in the high school or someone in the college who helped them get there and help them stay there. And so we don't do it right often enough, but when we do it right, we do it really right. And so I think that's what's so important about this podcast, and I'm so grateful to you for doing this, because we need to make sure that everybody who comes in contact with young people knows that undocumented students have options. And I guess the last thing that I'll say on that is they also need to recognize how fearful our young people are right now, and they are more fearful than ever. They are fearful about potential deportation of themselves, and they are fearful of potential potential deportation of family members, and then over kind of an overarching theme for all of them is just this uncertainty, like, what will happen tomorrow? Will I come home and not find my parents here? Will I be walking to the grocery store and get picked up? And so when we talk about college, it's kind of like Maslow's hierarchy of needs, right? If you're not sure that you're going to be here tomorrow, it's hard to really think about college and and we need to understand that, and we need to respect that, I would say, and some would disagree, while gently encouraging, pushing, supporting and advocating college.


Ethan Sawyer  31:04  
So I want to play the role of unknowing English teacher or unknowing counselor. Say I'm listening to this podcast, and I love my kids, and I advocate for them in so many ways, but when it comes to undocumented students, I'm just, you know, I don't know what to do, so help me out, save me some time googling. Because I could certainly, you know, Google how to support undocumented students, but like, what? What should a, you know, a teacher, a counselor who wants to support, what should they do?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  31:32  
So one of the things that will happen sometimes is students, teachers will ask students about college, like, Oh, where are you going? Where are you applying? And some students haven't begun to think about it, and sometimes it's because of status and some students, some teachers, will sometimes make assumptions, like I had a teacher once say to a student, the student said she was going to our local community college, and the teacher said, Well, you're so smart, why would you go there? And the student was choosing to go to community college because she was undocumented and because it was financially her best option at that moment. And so I think the first thing I want teachers to to know is to think about what they're saying before they say it, because those are those comments. You know, students really respect their teachers, and they look up to their teachers, and when they hear a teacher say something like that, it makes them feel horrible because they think there's something wrong with their decision. So I think that's one I think the other thing is, you know, if students, if teachers, have students in their classes, who they think aren't necessarily moving along, like, for example, a student who they know is academically capable but just isn't cutting the mustard. In some cases, that's because an undocumented student thinks they have no options. You know, if you ask most of my my high achieving students why they take seven AP classes? They'll all tell you it's to go to college. None of them say it's the love of the learning. And so if you are an undocumented student and you think that college isn't an option, then what is the purpose of high school? And so instead of assuming that that student is lazy, or instead of assuming that that student doesn't care about college, I would reach out to a counselor and say, I have this student in my class. I think he or she is incredibly capable. He or she is not working up to potential, and I just want to put them on your radar. You know, teachers are the ones who see students day in and day out, and some of our counselors have case loads of upwards of 500 students. And many of us don't know our students as well as teachers do, so they are really kind of that first line of defense. I would encourage a teacher to put up a sign in their classroom that says, I'm in I'm an educator in support of undocumented students. There's also the dreamers butterfly, which says dreamers welcome, which was developed by favianna Rodriguez, who is an artist in California. And there are stickers and magnets, and you can download a JPEG, but just having that in your classroom, even if it's on a bulletin board in the corner, says to a student who's sitting in your room, you know I'm here and you care about me, and I think those efforts will go a really long way.


Ethan Sawyer  34:38  
And Alisa, how, how can a school know, if it has a climate that is undocumented, or, you know, AB 540 friendly AB five maybe you can explain what AB 540 is. But what are some markers of a school that's got a climate that's supportive, and what are some markers of a school that's maybe not as supportive as it could be?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  34:56  
That's a good question. So I think so let's talk about it in a broader context. So. Let's talk about states that are supportive, right? So there are states that restrict access to higher education by college students, by undocumented students, sorry, and then there's states that are supportive of access. So California, for example, you mentioned AB 540 that is the California legislation which enables an undocumented student who goes to a high school for three years, graduates and lives with their parents, to enroll in a California state institution at in state rates and in California, it also gives them access to California state aid. I don't know the nuances of AB 540 but that is the title of the legislation as the bill was passed, and so that's kind of what it's become, affectionately known as other states have similar legislation. Illinois, for example, is one of them. It's one of many states. If anybody was curious, I think the first thing you need to know is, what is the policy of your state? Does your state have legislation that supports restricts, or are you one of the states that has no legislation either way, in which case, then an undocumented student would have to pay out of state tuition in your states. And then looking at it more on a micro level, I think you need to look around your building, right? And I kind of equate it with when I started counseling in the 90s, one of the things that we all felt was really important was we all wanted to make sure that our LGBT kids knew that our offices were safe places for them. And so we had like a rainbow sticker or a triangle as kind of a way to say, this is a safe space. And so I think there are lots of different symbols that work and speak to undocumented students. Definitely, the butterfly is a really big one. It's always been a very it's always been tied to kind of migration. And so I think you can look around your building and see, are there places and ways that you can let undocumented students know that you exist. Educators for fair consideration out of California used to have these wonderful posters which just said undocumented students can go to college. I think they were like, $10 I bought 10 of them, and I put them all over our building the USA Today, a couple years ago, actually had a really nice article about undocumented students and their path to college, and so I printed a bunch of color copies, and I put them in different places. And so again, I think it's just really kind of heightening other people's awareness of the fact that we need to make sure that students see themselves on a bigger scale. If you really want to go for it, one of the things that we have done is we now have some of our English classes will incorporate literature that addresses undocumented students. So for example, one of our classes reads reads the Devil's Highway. And we know that for students to see themselves in the curriculum is incredibly important, and so adding books like that to your reading lists is incredibly powerful. I realize that in some cases, that's a bigger issue than perhaps a counselor can tackle, but again, I think sometimes it's also just starting to have those conversations with people who you think might be good allies.


Ethan Sawyer  38:39  
When you spoke earlier about undocumented students sometimes feeling like their options are limited. I mean, this really resonates with the undocumented students I've worked with, you know, at as a charter school that I used to work with. Tell me what advice would you give to undocumented students who are listening to this going through this process? You know, what do you what would you tell them?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  39:03  
It's a really good question, and some of what I would say has changed over the years. I think what I would say right now is first and foremost, which is what I say to my students, which is, if you want to go to college, I will help you get to college. You will go to college. Do not lose faith. I think that the reality is that many undocumented students will start in community college because of cost. But I want all of my students to not default to community college without doing a good search, because for many students, a four year option is financially viable. Many schools that fund 100% of a student's need will fund undocumented students, maybe not all of them, but some of them, many of those colleges that change lives will fund undocumented students and. And they need to know that a community college might be an option, but it's not the only option. And so what I say to my students is our Community College is a wonderful resource, and we know it's an academic and a financial safety. And so for right now, we're going to take it and we're going to put that option on a shelf, and we're going to do a four year search and see if we can find a school that works and is a good fit for you, academically, socially, as well as financially. And if that doesn't happen, then we know we have Plan B. But let's see if we can make plan a work. And everybody always asks me, like, where are the schools that fund and the truth is, is that it varies by year and it varies by student. I have a school this year that has never funded any of my undocumented students, I think actually has never fully funded any undocumented students, and this year is funding three so it varies yearly, but I think we also have to help students. I also want students to realize that it's a four year investment. And so sometimes students, and this was actually an admissions colleague who kind of helped me think about this. But you know, many scholarships that are open to freshmen are not open to transfer students. And so you need to look at what that four year cost is not necessarily just what that first year cost is, because there are some schools where that scholarship that you're being offered as a freshman isn't going to be offered as a transfer student. And so even if you go to community college for two years, your next two years might be significantly more expensive than they would have been if you had started at a four year school for all four years. So I think it's really looking at all of those options.


Ethan Sawyer  41:53  
So I want to segue into the show and tell portion, because I have some sense I think of where you what you're going to show and tell. But this is just the part of the show where we, each, you know, share something, a resource or something that's been useful to us. So Eliza, what have you brought for show and tell? What


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  42:09  
if I brought for show and tell? So I have brought for show and tell a website. So you mentioned NACAC early on, the National Association for College Admission Counseling and all of the states and areas have their own ACAC, and in Illinois, it's called IAC. AC. And IACC has a committee called the committee for inclusion, access and success. And one of the things that we have been involved with for many years is creating a College Advising Guide for undocumented students, and on this website, it started actually as a PDF, and now it's a website undocumented students, parents, teachers, counselors, educators, Community Based, organizers, anybody can access a lot of information about undocumented students and about the college search. So it's, it's undergoing a little bit of an overhaul, and so over the course of the next couple months, you're going to see some changes on the website. But basically, it has information about legislation. It has some college information. It has information about financial aid and scholarships, and it also has a phenomenal resources section, and it's really kind of a one stop shop go to, where undocumented students and their advocates and supporters can access information to help them as they move through the college search.


Ethan Sawyer  43:43  
Amazing. I'm meeting that with my own resource that we talked about actually two years ago at NACAC, but there's an organization called I'm first and they advocate for first generation and undocumented students. They've got a guide to college and by the way, I'll link to both of these in the show notes, so you can check these out once you've on the website and on the college essay guide website, and you can even get a sneak peek inside. But what you'll find inside this guide is, like, my favorite part of this is that there's just, like, lists of schools that have resources for first generation undocumented students, and it'll list what those resources are. In some cases, you know, scholarship opportunities, particular programs they've got. There's also for those of you who are interested, and this is jumping back a little bit of something that you said sometimes students are interested in, you know, which colleges will meet full need? And you can actually Google this, right? You can google colleges that meet full need, meaning, you know, they will pay for everything. But how does that apply to undocumented students? Eliza, that's


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  44:44  
a great question. It depends on the school. So what we're seeing more and more of, and what I'm hoping when we expand the College Information section on the guide, we get more of, what we're seeing more of, is more colleges actually now putting information. About undocumented students on their admission websites, which is a beautiful thing. And so they're becoming much more transparent about what their policies are. And so some schools will fund 100% for any undocumented student that they admit some but they won't admit all Some schools will fund for a small number of undocumented students. It really it depends, but definitely there are some schools that will fully fund undocumented students, and some schools also have now scholarships for undocumented students. So for example, Loyola in Chicago has the magis Scholarship, which was started for undocumented students. Okay,


Ethan Sawyer  45:44  
but is there, like, some big list, Elisa, like, could, is there something that I could just Google that would just give me the giant list that would have all the up to date information about, like, you know what each school's policy is? Or, like, how do I find out what each school's policy is on towards undocumented students? Like, if I'm a student, like, what do I do? Do I call them? Like, how does that work? How does that go?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  46:03  
Yeah, that's a great question. So I wish I could say there was a comprehensive list. Like, if you just googled it, it would be there, but that's not the case. I think there's a bunch of different places. Our goal, ultimately, with our College Advising Guide, is to make it as comprehensive as possible. But even then, there's also going to be some schools that will choose not to post because they don't necessarily want to be out there because of stakeholders. So usually, the best place for a student to start is to start with this list. I would say you can absolutely Google College, undocumented students, financial support, that's probably a great way. And then really and truly, most of the students will tell you that they code called, you know, I have a good for a good student of mine, who, when he graduated college, really wanted to go to medical school, and this was before DACA, and he wanted to make prosthetics. That was what his dream job was, and so he basically called every single medical school in the country until he found one that said that they would admit him. And it's an amazing story, because the medical school said we have no idea what we're going to do when you need to do your clinicals, but we'll figure that out. And so he packed up and he moved to Texas, and he studied. And then just as the time that he was supposed to do his clinicals, daca appeared, and now he is working, and he makes prosthetic limbs. So it's a it's important to not lose hope, because if he had lost hope, he wouldn't have done it, and at the time that DACA passed, then he would just be starting to go back to school. So I think you just have to be persistent. It's really easy for me to say resilient, which is totally an overused buzz word in education right now, but you really have to be persistent and just keep asking questions.


Ethan Sawyer  48:07  
Eliza, I'm committed to creating a two part guide that part one is has a set of questions that that students can ask you know for themselves, about whether they're going to, you know, reveal their status in their essay or not. And part two is going to be for students who have decided to reveal themselves in their essay. And it's sort of a how to guide on how to you know artfully, and in some cases, maybe you know carefully, but also probably plainly, come out and to you know, reveal themselves as undocumented. And I'm wondering if you'd be willing to help me. Be willing to help me


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  48:43  
write that. I would absolutely be willing to help you write that. And since you actually just said that, I'm going to backtrack for one minute for students who are reaching out to colleges to ask their information. On the College Advising Guide website, there actually is a link to questions students should ask colleges. It's divided out by questions about admissions as well as questions about financial aid.


Ethan Sawyer  49:12  
Okay, so something that just popped into my head is that just as in some cases, students don't want to reveal themselves for fear of being judged. What I heard you say a minute ago was that there are also on the other side of this, schools that don't want to, in some cases, put themselves out there as being friendly and undocumented students because they're fearful of being judged. Is that? Is that? Do I have that right? Yeah,


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  49:36  
you had that right, especially, yeah. And I can actually give you an example on that without naming the school. So this past winter, the president of Pomona issued a very bold statement in support of DACA, and immediately tons of presidents started signing on and and it was, it was like growing daily, and we were. Getting updates. It was 100 it was 150 it was 250 it was 300 and there was this statement to the new administration to not get rid of DACA and a school that has a number of undocumented students, many of my students, the President didn't sign on. And I was flabbergasted, and so I reached out to some colleagues who are graduates, and I tried to get them to, you know, utilize a little alum pressure to see if they could get the president to sign. And he kind of gave back a pretty generic answer about why he wasn't. And it was really kind of a bunch of baloney. And what I said to actually, my husband was, I said, I bet you he's courting a donor, and he's between a rock and a hard place. And as it turns out, that's actually exactly what it was. He had a big donor who was pledging a significant amount of money that was needed to finish up a capital campaign, and the donor was not on board, and he felt that he put this donation at risk. And it's really easy, I think, for us to say sometimes things are more important than money. However, you know, it took him some time. He actually was able, with the help of some other board members, to get this donor on board, and ultimately, he got the donation and he also signed so it's complicated. It's a little bit of a sticky situation in some cases.


Ethan Sawyer  51:38  
Yeah, Elisa, what are some cool and inspiring examples that you've seen of students advocating for other students in high schools?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  51:50  
That's a really good question. I think definitely through our undocumented student group, I do see students advocating for each other the whole when we showed ask Angie it was, it was an amazing experience. We just we we bought the movie, we put it out there, we advertised it. I had no idea who was going to show up. I thought maybe just teachers. I thought maybe no one. It was after school. And will you tell


Ethan Sawyer  52:17  
us just a little bit about for people who don't know what that movie is? Will you say just a couple of words about what?


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  52:22  
Thank you. About the movie is actually not called, ask Angie. I shouldn't say that the movie is called No. La digas nadie, don't tell anyone. And it's the story of Angie. I think it's Rivera, who is an undocumented was an undocumented student in New York who basically started an advice column for other undocumented students, and it was called Ask Angie, so it's kind of like Dear Abby for undocumented students. And they did a documentary about her and about her experiences as a high school student, her experiences as a college student, about her family. She talks a lot about coming out and feeling very empowered. It's a it's a great documentary, and I would recommend it to anybody. But when we showed it, I didn't know who was going to come, and what I saw was a mixture of students, some of whom I knew weren't documented. Some of whom I knew had family who weren't documented. Some of whom I knew probably had no idea who was documented in the school, or even that there were any. And then when they when some of our students got up to do this panel at the end, there were three students, two of whom were citizens, one of whom was not and they were so incredibly protective of each other. It was, it was very interesting to watch. They wanted to put themselves out there, but they also wanted to make sure, not even that they weren't going to get hurt, but that their friends weren't going to get hurt. And it was, it was really interesting dynamic to see. And so that's ways that we see kids look out for one another all the time, and then probably the bigger way, and I'm guessing this is why the students that you interviewed want to be part of this podcast, is that a lot of my students who have gone to college, who have made it through college, will come back, and we use them to motivate and to talk about their experiences and to show students, if these students have done it, so you can do it also. And that's also a very powerful tool, and is great for everybody.


Ethan Sawyer  54:38  
What's What's one thing that you'd like to leave folks with,


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  54:44  
it's really important that we create opportunities in our schools for students to self disclose. If they don't share their status, they often don't get access to good information, and so I really would love for every. To think about how welcoming is their high school environment to an undocumented student. What in that building, who in that building would an undocumented student look at, or where would they go and say it is safe for me here, this is a place where I can go and I can share my status and I will be positively received. And the positively received piece is really important, because when they share, they have no idea what that reception is going to be, and so it's a very scary thing for them.


Ethan Sawyer  55:38  
Aliza, I just want to thank you for all of your work in this, you know, in this regard, but also just it's, I can hear how much you love the kids you work with, and I'm just really grateful. Well,


Dr. Aliza Gilbert  55:48  
thank you. I really appreciate you giving me the opportunity to talk about this. As I said before we started, it is my most favorite thing to talk about, and I do believe that these students are so incredibly worthy. And what I will say to teachers and counselors is it just takes one student to touch your soul, and you will never look back and you will you will be on this journey with me when you realize how amazing these students are. This is not anything that I set out to do. Like I said, I met an undocumented student when I was in admissions, and it just kind of took off from there and and there are a couple undocumented students in particular who motivate me and guide me every day to continue to push this story and to push this effort, because they are so incredibly worthy.


Ethan Sawyer  56:47  
Amiza, thank you. Welcome. That's the episode. Thanks for listening. Please be sure to check out the resources in the show notes. There are many. If you've got a minute, I'd appreciate it if you left a review on iTunes, and if you've got feedback, I'd love to hear from you. Email me at info at college. Sa guy.com, as always, stay curious. You.


Transcribed by https://otter.ai