Lee Thomas
D Block
1/31/2019
When
starting this project, one of the big questions in my head was what happened to
children who were born into an illegal immigrant family, but on American soil.
They would be considered citizens but they’re family wouldn’t. This thought
eventually lead me to look into children that are brought over the border at a
very young age. Many might say that they weren’t born on American soil so
they’re illegal. Others make the argument that while they might be illegal,
they are still kids and it’s their parents that bring them over it’s not the
childrens decision. For children who are brought over at young ages there is a
process for them to become legal members of our society, and it starts with
DACA.
DACA stands for Deferred Action for Childhood
Arrivals, it allows kids who are young when brought over the border to have a
place as a citizen of the US. currently roughly 1.3 million out of 11 million
undocumented immigrants living in the US are eligible for DACA, but not just
anyone can be brought over and be accepted into the DACA program. There are
certain requirements that every applicant must have to receive approval for
DACA. All applicants had to be under the age of 31 at the time of June 15th
2012. The applicant had to come over the border before their 16th birthday, and
has to be currently studying, or have graduated highschool, or received an
honorable discharge from the coast guard or military, or if nothing else
completed technical or trade school.
Before an applicant’s DACA request can be reviewed, all applicants
got through a biographic and biometric background check. There are another
specific set of requirements that an applicant has to have before they can move
through this portion of their request. The applicant cannot be a convicted
felon, have a DUI or three or more misdemeanors, this could also mean less than
three depending on the severity of the misdemeanor. All of these are to ensure
the safety of our communities once we let the foreigners into our country. Once
they’ve passed this portion of the process their application can be reviewed
and possibly approved.
As of January of 2018, there were more than 682,000 immigrants who
were enrolled in DACA. 18% of DACA recipients between that ages of 15-32 go on
to attend college, which is impressive compared to the 20% of US adults in that
age range who attend. However, only about 4% of those recipients go on to
graduated compared to the 18% of US adults. Female DACA recipients have a 20%
to 15% ratio to male recipients on graduating college, but they are less likely
to be working with a 48% to 64% for males. Currently around 55% of DACA
recipients are employed which is equal to about 382,000 workers. While illegal
immigrants are likely to work in fields of manual labor such as construction, DACA
recipients were seen to have a higher chance of working in an office job.
While they might’ve been illegal at some point, majority of DACA
recipients are now contributors to our society. They have been seen to mostly
work in areas of hospitality, retail trade, construction, education, health,
and social services. All this to say that immigrants can be functioning members
of our society as it’s been shown with DACA and most of its recipients.
Sources:
This was a very interesting topic to learn about on Immigration. The essay is very well written and explains in great detail on DACA and illegal immigration with families with children.
ReplyDeleteThis topic is very intriguing and thought provoking because it gives a different perspective. A very good essay except for the fact that your thesis isnt very clear in your introduction.
ReplyDeleteReally good and informative
ReplyDelete