When Executive Orders Get Personal

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Yesterday as I drove home from work. NPR reported on the new executive orders expanding the groups prioritized for immigration enforcement– in effect, increasing the number of deportations of undocumented immigrants. But I didn’t hear much of the story. After all, there has been a big new story just about every day for the past several weeks. I didn’t really think about how this story was different. But it is different, because it will likely affect my students directly.

I teach junior high English Language Development. My students are still learning English. Although many of my students were born in the U.S., and even in Mesa, where I teach, many were not. Most are either from Mexico, or have families from Mexico. Most of my students enjoy joking that they voted for the current president, and just saying his name in funny ways, the same as other students in my school.

I don’t know the immigration status of my students, their parents, their grandparents, their cousins, their neighbors or their friends. I don’t need to know, and although I have a slight curiosity at times, I don’t think about it much. I am their teacher, and they are my students, and I try to show them as often as possible that I care about each and every one of them (yes, even you, Jose, although it would be nice if you would quit tapping on the desk).

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This morning on my drive to school, the story about expanded deportation efforts came on again. This time, I was listening. I wondered, should we discuss this in class? We have been watching the news and blogging about it over the past few weeks. It will probably come up on CNN 10 before the end of the week. But talking about deportation could open up floodgates of opinions, anecdotes, and mostly gossip and jokes… and we are in the middle of AZELLA testing*.

Also, tumbling in my mind were the questions that began to place boundaries around the potential conversation: Would I accidentally imply that the students are here illegally? Would they think they needed to tell me their immigration status? Would they think I might turn them in to ICE? Would they shrink from discussing the issue in case I was digging for information? Remember, I am dealing with a language barrier. Maybe they didn’t know about the new orders, and maybe my discussion would create new fears and anxieties that didn’t already exist. Perhaps parents would be upset that I had made the students worried about things that either may not apply to them, or are outside of their control. Would colleagues who heard about our conversations believe that I was making a political statement against the new policy by discussing the issue in class? (Mesa, Arizona, was ranked recently as the most conservative city in the nation, even to the right of Wichita, Kansas, so it is not a completely paranoid idea.)

Mostly, I didn’t want students disappearing without knowing that I cared about them. And if students were distracted by what might be happening in their families, I wanted them to feel supported.

I spoke to a colleague about my thoughts. She encouraged me to keep it simple, and so I did.

I told my students that I wanted to tell them something important. I summarized the new policies as simply as I could. I let them know that I was following the news, and that I hoped they followed the news. I told them that I knew it would not affect everyone, but that I was guessing that most of them might know someone who is affected, or know people who are worried about the changes. I told them that I care about all of them, that I care about their families, and that I care what happens to them and their families. Each period, a few students cracked quick jokes and others looked concerned. In one class, a student shared that Guadalupe Garcia de Rayos, the mother whose deportation made national news two weeks ago, used to sit in front of his family in church until she was deported. I hope we can talk later and I can hear more of my students’ thoughts.

For today, we had to continue preparing for the test.

*The test that determines how many extra hours of English Language Acquisition services they will need in their course schedules next year.

Amethyst Hinton Sainz

Amethyst Hinton Sainz is National Board Certified Teacher in Adolescent and Young Adult English Language Arts, and is constantly trying to live up to that standard! This year she will begin teaching at Westwood High School in Mesa, Arizona as an interventionist. She has taught junior high ELD and high school English in Arizona for 25 years. She has been a Stories from School blogger since 2012. Amethyst’s alma maters are Blue Ridge High School, the University of Arizona and the Bread Loaf School of English at Middlebury College. Her bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing and Philosophy led her toward the College of Education, and she soon realized that the creative challenges of teaching would fuel her throughout her career. Her love of language, literature, and culture led her to Bread Loaf for her master's in English Literature. She is a fellow with the Southern Arizona Writing Project, and that professional development along with, later, the National Board process, has been the most influential and transformative learning for her. As a board member of the Mesa NBCT Network, she works with other NBCT’s to promote this powerful process throughout the district. She supports candidates for National Board Certification, and loves seeing teachers realize and articulate their teaching and leadership power! She enjoys teaching students across the spectrum of academic abilities, and keeping up with new possibilities for technology in education. Last year she had the privilege of running our school garden, and will really miss that this year. She is currently learning more about social and racial justice and is striving to be an antiracist educator. She lives in Mesa, Arizona with her family. She enjoys time with them, as well as with her vegetable garden, backyard chickens, and the two dogs. She also enjoys reading, writing, cooking (but not doing dishes), kayaking, camping, and travel, among other things.