Protest U

The group of young, Hispanic protesters brandishing homemade signs cluster together, intently participating in an act remarkably atypical of protesters: listening.  For the most-part, they are the children of undocumented workers, brought to the United States in their youth and raised, for all intents and purposes, as American.  Due to their lack of citizenship they lack access to significant sources of university funding, including in-state tuition (in some states), and can’t get jobs to help fund higher education. 

The group is participating in the first ever “Dream University,” a project of the United We Dream Network, which is a coalition of 27 immigrant youth groups from across the country.  Dream University is bringing students to Washington to teach, learn, and support a piece of legislation called The Dream Act.  The act would allow a conditional path to citizenship, dependent on completion of University or two years of military service, to the 50,000-65,000 undocumented students who graduate from high school each year. 

There are “65,000 undocumented students graduating every year, and they have nowhere to go but here.  This is their one opportunity, and it shouldn’t be.  They should have all doors open to them for higher education,” says Maricella Aguilar, one of the group’s organizers.

In addition to raising awareness about their political agenda, Dream University’s protesters, hailing from Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Florida, Missouri, and Kansas, have come first and foremost to learn.  The four-day program brings in volunteer professors to give classes, providing a glimpse of the higher education the would-be students seek.

Among the goals of the movement is to bolster the participants’ civic education.  The organizers focus on all-American ideals of civic participation such as protest, petition-signing, self-education, and lobbying, poignantly accentuates the American-ness of the students.  “These students were brought in by their parents when they were younger, and it’s no fault of their own.  They’re American, and you can’t tell them otherwise, but they’re not full citizens,” says Aguilar.  

“We’re trying to make a positive change,” says Elizabeth Floris-Bustomante, a psychologist who travelled 13 hours by van from Wisconsin to support the cause.  “I love volunteering, and if this is what I can do for them, this is what I will do.”

In the nearly 100 degree heat, a few students sit in the shade, coloring bubble letters onto poster boards as they listen to their teacher’s lesson on immigration and electoral politics.  

“I think us just being here is protest on its own,” says Aguilar.

-Niv Elis