Colleges Should Enhance Resources for Undocumented Students, Report Urges. Here’s How Some Are Doing That.

Maria Ivonne Treviño-Rodriguez, a junior at the University of Houston, has worked four different jobs as a student, two of them for about 40 hours a week, she says. She’s worked as a counselor for low-income high-school students and as a campaign-finance director for a Democratic candidate for the U.S. Congress in her full-time positions, her résumé shows.

“I’m trying to make sure that I am able to survive financially and able to help my family,” she says.

Treviño-Rodriguez is also a beneficiary of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, an Obama-era program best known for temporarily sparing young undocumented immigrants from being deported. The policy, commonly known as DACA, also allows students who were brought to the United States illegally as children to obtain work permits and pay in-state tuition at some colleges and universities, among other things. But it does not make them eligible for federal financial aid or most private scholarships.

The Trump administration announced plans last year to end the program, but the courts have so far blocked that proposal. Still, Congress has not passed legislation that would turn DACA’s protections into law and thereby make them immune from a president’s executive actions. For many students like Treviño-Rodriguez, their ability to afford the rest of their education often hinges on the program’s survival.

A study conducted last spring by an organization that supports such students with scholarships found that 71 percent of DACA students work in some capacity while attending college and 29 percent work full time. Of the employed students, approximately 89 percent are also full-time students, according to a report on the study, which was released on Monday. By contrast, 43 percent of all undergraduates work in some capacity.

In the study, the organization, called TheDream.US, sent survey questions to 3,058 of the students it supports, and 1,413 responded — a response rate of 46 percent. The group takes its name from the undocumented students it seeks to help, who are commonly called Dreamers. Over all, TheDream.US awards funds to 2,866 students, who earned a 3.55 GPA in high school or a 3.56 in community college.

Based on the study’s findings, TheDream.US’s primary recommendation for colleges and universities is to establish resource centers with staff members who can provide professional, academic, and legal counseling specific to the needs of undocumented students, said Gaby Pacheco, program director for advocacy, development, and fund raising at TheDream.US. The group also recommended that campuses provide mental- and physical-health services to its immigrant students. Changes can be as simple as creating a spot for students to rest, like a couch, Pacheco said.

“One of the findings of this report is there is a vast majority of our scholars that are not just going to school full time, but are working full time. And so they are not necessarily sleeping,” she said. “Sometimes people don’t have the luxury to drive home between classes or drive through a restaurant to get something to eat. When students are driving or getting on buses, it takes one or two hours to get to school.”

What Colleges Are Doing

The University of California at Davis was the first to build a center for undocumented students, in 2014, said Emily Prieto-Tseregounis, assistant vice chancellor for its Division of Student Affairs and Campus Diversity. Among other things, it provides free legal services to students and their parents through a legal fellow from the university’s law school. This year the legal fellow has helped students submit DACA-renewal applications, she said.

To reapply for DACA costs $495, according to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services website. But Prieto-Tseregounis said the center at UC-Davis gives students a chance to have their fees covered through a $500 emergency grant. Students are guaranteed the grant if they show that they are covered by the 2011 California Dream Act, demonstrate need through a budget summary, and submit a cover letter, she said.

UC-Davis is a rare example of a university with a stand-alone center dedicated to undocumented students. But an independent facility isn’t always recommended as a resource center, Pacheco said.

“We have seen how colleges and universities have worked through what they already have on campus,” Pacheco said. “Even if it’s establishing a resource center or finding different things that institutions can do to expand services that are provided for other students but make sure that the immigrant students on campus know that those services are available for them as well.”

Metropolitan State University of Denver does not have a center dedicated to undocumented students, but its Immigrant Services Program also serves international students and refugees. About 70 to 90 percent of the 330 students registered with the program are DACA recipients, according to Gregor Mieder, the program’s director.

Metropolitan State also developed a special student-aid application, the Dreamer Application for Institutional Aid, for students from mixed-status families to use, Mieder said. The form does not ask for a Social Security number or parental information, enabling DACA recipients to demonstrate need for the scholarships the university and its foundation offer, he said.

External private scholarships offered to DACA recipients can cover full-tuition costs, but they are often limited in number and competitive. Palm Beach State College has a website with a list of 19 scholarship foundations and organizations outside the Florida institution to which undocumented students can apply for aid.

When it comes time for DACA students to apply for jobs after graduation, staff members at the University of California at Berkeley’s Undocumented Student Program sometimes attempt to reason with employers whose application requirements make Dreamers ineligible for employment, said Meng So, director of access and opportunity programs at Berkeley. But it’s rarely successful — just one case two years ago, he said.

“There was a medical internship that our student got at a prestigious East Coast university, and once they found out he didn’t have a Social Security number, they revoked his internship,” So said. “What we did was we contacted the head of the internship, explained the situation, and communicated that it was leaving out an incredible pool of students who were otherwise eligible outside of that small nine-digit number.”

After students and those with “philanthropic influence” called the internship coordinators — whom So declined to name for privacy reasons — the application was opened up to those without legal status.

Follow Andy Tsubasa Field on Twitter at @AndyTsubasaF, or email him at andy.field@chronicle.com.