In the first two weeks of the Trump administration, policy changes are already being felt in local schools, sparking fears of deportation in many places.
The Department of Homeland Security has stripped away previous protections that kept Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents from entering sensitive locations like places of worship, medical facilities and schools.
“There was something going around over the weekend that ICE was coming into schools Monday and picking kids up,” said Valencia Pizzini, a sixth grade teacher at Ellen Ochoa Middle School in Prince George’s County, Maryland.
According to Pizzini, the rumors were so widespread that the superintendent issued a countywide message, stating that no ICE agents had entered any schools in the district. But the policy change and growing fear had already taken hold in the community.
“On Monday, I had four classes, and in each classroom I had double-digit absences,” Pizzini said. “The No. 1 demographic at this school is Latino students.”
Managing the growing wave of absences has become a daily struggle for teachers, forcing some to alter their curriculum.
“I couldn’t even teach,” Pizzini said. “I couldn’t even give my lesson, because I was teaching something new. And it wouldn’t even make sense or be fair to teach a new lesson with half of the students missing.”
Brandon Dillard, another teacher at Ellen Ochoa, shared Pizzini’s frustration, saying that both teachers and students are feeling the anxiety.
“All they’re here to do is get a better opportunity for life, and the fact that they’re scared to come to school is heartbreaking as a teacher,” Dillard said. “Kids don’t understand the full grasp of things, so they’ll make jokes like, ‘I wonder if ICE is going to show up,’ but I think there’s a sense of fear behind those jokes.”
“I honestly am fearful that at any moment, my students that I’ve built these bonds with will no longer be there,” Dillard added, emphasizing the psychological toll these policies have had on the school community.
“The fact that they’re scared to come to school is heartbreaking as a teacher.”
— Middle-school teacher Brandon Dillard
But this experience is not exclusive to Ellen Ochoa. Students and teachers across the country are facing the same pressures under the Trump administration’s shifting immigration policies.
Anthony Parker Jr., an eighth grade student at Pinckneyville Middle School in Norcross, Georgia, said he also has heard conversations about ICE in schools and has witnessed jokes similar to those in the halls of Ellen Ochoa.
“One time in the classroom, one kid went up to another Latino kid and said he was surprised he was still here,” Parker said.
For those untouched by the latest immigration policies, it’s easy to debate them from a distance. But this policy is a reality for the students who now hesitate before stepping into a classroom, fearing that today might be their last at school and for the teachers who must carry the weight of uncertainty for their students.
Serenity Owens covers Prince George’s County for HUNewsService.com.
