As major immigration arrest campaigns took place across the country this year, schools reported increased fear, anxiety, and student absences.
A study earlier this year focusing on districts in California’s Central Valley found notable jumps in absences as immigration raids swept through the region. Educators in Memphis, Tenn., also reported some absences tied to federal law enforcement presence in October.
Most recently, as the U.S. Department of Homeland Security enacts its “Operation Charlotte’s Web” immigration raids in North Carolina, officials with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district say there have been thousands of absences over the course of a week.
Educators say the fear and anxiety driving these absences is also affecting student performance. But national survey results also highlight how much more proactive work schools can do to get ahead of or assuage these concerns, experts said.
From Sept. 24 to Nov. 3, the EdWeek Research Center surveyed a nationally representative sample of 693 educators. Eighty-six percent of the survey respondents said they have current students from immigrant families in which the children or at least one parent were born outside the United States.
Of these educators working with immigrant families, half said their students have expressed fear or anxiety this school year because of federal immigration enforcement efforts.
Twenty-four percent reported reduced student attendance, and an equal share said their students were experiencing distraction or a lack of engagement in class. While 35% reported no effects, 15% cited declines in enrollment.
Of those that cited fear and anxiety, 75% said it is interfering with student learning “some” or “a lot.”
Yet 42% of educators surveyed who work with immigrant families said their school or district has taken no action in regard to federal immigration enforcement efforts.
“If you are an educator who believes that all children have an inherent opportunity to succeed, and you’re committed to teaching them so that they can learn and grow, then you have to acknowledge how immigration enforcement is impacting your children in front of you,” said Alejandra Vazquez Baur, a fellow at the Century Foundation and co-founder of the National Newcomer Network, a coalition of educators and immigrant advocates. “No response is not an option for those students.”
Teachers see anxiety play out in the classroom
Ellen Harvey is the curriculum specialist for arts, languages, English learners, and physical education for the Charlotte County school district in Florida.
Harvey, who participated in the EdWeek Research Center survey, said while her district hasn’t seen as much immigration enforcement activity as others across the state, she can still sense the anxiety among her immigrant students.
“This is a group of students who also grew up through the pandemic, and so they already have anxiety and fear to begin with. They are also a group of students who have grown up in the electronic age, so they don’t have as much interaction with humans. And now we put this on top of it,” Harvey said. “Maybe you’re already coming from a war-torn country with incredible anxiety there, and then we’re going to add this to your plate.”
Surveyed educators who work with immigrant families in urban and suburban areas were more likely than colleagues in rural areas to report students expressing fear or anxiety because of immigration enforcement (66% and 54% respectively, versus 38%).
Educators working with immigrant families in large (10,000 or more students) and midsize districts (2,500-9,999 students) were also more likely to report student fear or anxiety (60% and 57% respectively, compared to only 39% of those working in smaller districts of less than 2,500 students).
And fear or anxiety is interfering most in large districts of 10,000 or more students, where 87% of educators citing this concern said fear or anxiety is interfering with student learning “some” or “a lot.”
Toria Randle, an English-as-a-second-language teacher at Whitehaven Elementary STEM School in Memphis, Tenn., said she experienced some absences earlier this year as students reported their parents’ fear over leaving home to go to work or school.
Randle, who participated in the EdWeek Research Center survey, said her students have even shared that they no longer hang out at a nearby park after school for fear of possibly getting detained.
“These are people, just like everybody else. Yes, they’re new to our country. They might not speak the language, but they deserve to be treated like human beings, too,” Randle said.
Community partners can help districts address anxiety
At her elementary school in Memphis, Randle said a family engagement specialist has helped with outreach for immigrant families too afraid to send their children to school. Randle herself has helped gather school supplies for families in need as parents lose jobs or are too afraid to go to work.
In response to federal immigration efforts, 27% of educators surveyed who work with immigrant families said their school or district shared information about immigrant students’ rights.
Twenty-six percent of such educators said their school or district provided additional counseling or mental health support to students who have expressed fear or anxiety. Twenty-three percent said their school or district provided access to food donations, school supplies, and other expenses that families cannot afford because parents are out of work.
Sharing information about students’ rights, often referred to as Know Your Rights workshops or pamphlets, is one of the easiest things schools can do to support families and students amid increasing federal immigration raids, said Vazquez Baur.
In places where districts may be concerned about directly sharing such information with families, Vazquez Baur has seen partnerships with local organizations fill in the gaps. School leaders can direct families to their community partners, and such partnerships can also help with providing supplies to families in need.
“We saw the incredible ways that schools stepped in to support students who didn’t have access to food, needed additional mental health support, [or] required, potentially, home visits to make sure students were safe [during the pandemic],” Vazquez Baur said. “This is another opportunity to consider this immigration enforcement as the significant disruptive factor that it is.”
Data analysis for this article was provided by the EdWeek Research Center. Learn more about the center’s work.
