Immigration, College, and Employment

[Omphfullas Zamboni]

Hello everybody,

I am posting this because the material led me to ponder my views on immigration, attending college, and seeking gainful employment. The segment is a piece from a radio program which I found interesting:



Act Four. Just One Thing Missing.

Reporter Douglas McGray interviews a college student in California with good grades, an excellent work ethic, but no possible way to get a legal job. She's lived in the U.S. since she was little, but her parents are undocumented; and she is, too. Most of her friends and teachers don't even know. Douglas McGray is a fellow at the New America Foundation.

What is frustrating is that the person featured in the story seems like the sort of individual whom I think would make a wonderful doctor--but she is prohibited from being on the payroll because of her lack of paperwork. On the one hand, I don't really support these "fast-track citizenship" type deals because they cheat the people who went through the full trouble of actual citizenship. Then again, being able to come here for schooling, then do nothing else seems more than a little frivolous.

Listen to the story, if any of you like, and tell me what you think. If you're looking for something a little more lighthearted, Act Three made me laugh out loud.

The link is here:
http://www.thislife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1235
(You can fast-forward to the pertinent segments, located further toward the program's end.)

Best regards,
Omphfullas Zamboni

[Omphfullas Zamboni]

Bump. A piece of legislation relevant to this topic is something called, "The Dream Act". I may be able to dig up the bill, shortly.

[Omphfullas Zamboni]

[Link to legislation (http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s110-2205&tab=summary)]

Basic summary:


Highlights from Project Vote Smart



The following is Project Vote Smart's highlights for this bill, generously made available by PVS:
# The following summary was for the Cloture Vote for this bill on 2007-10-24. The bill may have changed since then.
# -Allows the Secretary to cancel the removal of undocumented immigrants and adjust their status to lawfully admitted for permanent residence if they can prove that they have been present in the U.S. for no less than 5 years and were younger than 16 years old at initial entry, have been admitted to an institute of higher education or earned a high school diploma, have never been under a final judicial order of deportation, and have not yet reached the age of 30 years old (Sec. 3).
# -Allows an undocumented immigrant with an adjusted status to retain a conditional permanent resident status for up to 6 years (Sec. 4).
# -Allows someone with conditional permanent residence to become a permanent resident if they have “demonstrated good moral character,” have not been absent from the U.S. for over a total of 365 days during their conditional residence, have acquired a higher education degree, have served in the uniformed services for at least two years and have provided a list of secondary schools attended within the U.S. or with the absence of a higher education degree or military experience, can demonstrate compelling circumstances for the inability to complete a degree or military service or can demonstrate that removal from the U.S. would result in “exceptional and extremely unusual hardship” (Sec. 4).
# -Allows undocumented immigrants who are at least 12 years old and meet the requirements to obtain an adjusted status to qualify for a stay of removal if they are enrolled full time in a primary or secondary school (Sec. 7).
# -Allows undocumented immigrants with adjusted lawful permanent resident status to be eligible for student loans and federal work-study programs (Sec. 10).