Thread: "(Illegal) Immigrant Geniuses?

This appeared in the editorial pages of the Philadelphia Inquirer today
in (dis)honor of the La Raza's annual conference, which is being held tomorrow through Tuesday at the Convention Center in Philadelphia.
I will send Ms. Murguia a note explaining that I have no particular affinity
for border jumping criminals.

La Raucus? La Roach? La Rat?


http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news ... tstory.jsp

Posted on Fri, Jul. 15, 2005

Undocumented immigrant geniuses

Janet Murguia is president and CEO of the National Council of La Raza
Contact Janet Murguia at http://www.nclr.org/section/about/

The next Albert Einstein might be in Philadelphia this week. Four young men who have garnered national attention for their remarkable story - Cristian Arcega, Luis Aranda, Lorenzo Santillan, and Oscar Vasquez - will be attending the Young Leaders (Lideres) Summit at the National Council of La Raza's annual conference, which is being held tomorrow through Tuesday at the Convention Center.

In 2004, these four students from Carl Hayden Community High School, in one of the poorest sections of Phoenix, entered the Marine Advanced Technology Education Center's Remotely Operated Vehicle Competition, a prestigious underwater robotics contest at the University of California at Santa Barbara sponsored by, among others, the Office of Naval Research and NASA. Up against college students from the likes of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the high school team astonished the competition, their teachers and themselves by taking first place in the contest.

But these future Einsteins might not have the opportunity to pursue the kinds of dreams that minds like theirs can achieve. They are brilliant, innovative, hardworking, resourceful, eager - and undocumented immigrants. Brought by their parents to the United States as young children, they have grown up in Phoenix and excelled in school, but as undocumented students they don't qualify for federal loans or even most private or merit scholarships.

As a result, paying for college on their own won't be an easy feat for these four despite being dubbed "among the smartest young underwater engineers in the country" by Wired magazine. Of the two who graduated from Carl Hayden, one is a file clerk and the other had been working construction hoping to earn enough to pay for college. Fortunately, they will be able to enroll in college in the fall with the generous donations of people who hated to see such talent go to waste. They consider themselves lucky since most kids in their situation do not have this kind of support.

But, even if Oscar Vasquez does earn that mechanical engineering degree, we will probably never reap the full potential of his brilliant mind because he will likely never be able to work legally. His only hope, and that of the other 65,000 students like him who graduate from high school each year, is passage of the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act, a bill introduced in the last Congress that would help these students, if they work hard enough, to go to college and would put them on a path to U.S. citizenship. This legislation, despite strong and widespread bipartisan support, is languishing in Congress, robbing us of some of our nation's best and brightest.

Opponents of the DREAM Act say that it would "reward" lawbreakers, yet these students did not make the decision to come to this country: their parents did. And ultimately, who gets shortchanged if these students cannot pursue higher education and instead must take the kind of jobs - noble and hard work but unlikely to change the course of the world - that are available to high school graduates? Is it just the students and their families? Or is it all of us who may be deprived of the inspired genius of the next Einstein?

It is hard for me to believe that in the 21st century we cannot reconcile our history as a nation of laws with our proud and rich tradition as a nation of immigrants. And I cannot believe that we are better off as a nation or that we won't pay a greater price in the future by denying opportunities to the Cristians, Lorenzos, Oscars and Luises of the world.

We should be better than that. We are better than that.


Contact Janet Murguia at http://www.nclr.org/section/about/.

They'll do great things for Mexico upon deportation.

I'm glad these kids have done so well for themselves but that doesn't change the fact that 42% of High School dropouts are Hispanic even though they represent only 17% percent of the young population.

And what's so tragic about them having to work to put themselves through college like so many Americans do?

Their home countries could use their brilliant minds. Deport them and their families.

Personally, I feel that we have 'lowered' acedemic standards to the point where all students can be labeled geniuses. We have allowed this idiotic 'No Child Left Behind' act to get way out of control. Now, even stupid kids can get a high school diploma.
Look what is happening around us. Kids can't 'compete' and win, unless EVERYBODY wins. It just wouldn't be Politically Correct and Acceptable!
So LaRaza can come up with all these sob stories, and Big Businesses will contribute money toward scholarships for hispanic children, and no one else.

They'll do great things for Mexico upon deportation.

My sentiments EXACTLY!

By the way, welcome nhantimassredrebel

Janet Murguia...I don't know much about you. I've seen you a couple of times on television. I know you just stepped into the shoes of someone who is now a professor at Arizona State University and a member of the committee forming the recommendation for the Council of Foreign Relations to dissolve our nation through the Security and Prosperity Partnership Pact with Canada and Mexico. I know National Council of La Raza; I know your predecessor; but I do not know you.

HOW DARE YOU suggest that "We should be better than that. We are better than that."?

HOW DARE YOU make a mockery of these 4 students who earned every bit of recogniztion they deserved at the Science Fair Competition and USE THEM as tools of your organization's agenda?

HOW DARE YOU use your 501 C 3 "public charity" to attempt to influence public policy and impact legislation in the United States in violation of our federal laws?

HOW DARE YOU suggest that if Americans abide by their laws that were passed to protect all Americans that this is something that "we should be better" than?

HOW DARE YOU as a leader of an Hispanic Organization INSULT Hispanic Americans who believe the same as every other and any other AMERICAN CITIZEN that our immigration laws are necessary; that they are vital to the national security of this Nation; that they are essential to our standard of living which allows us to maintain our Republic and sustain our lives as a Free People?

HOW DARE YOU suggest that Traitorous Agendas like the ones of National Council of La Raza are more important or superior than the LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES?

HOW DARE YOU......

No American would use these 4 young men as Poster Boys for an agenda that is not in the best interest of the United States or the American People.

No American would ever suggest that compliance with laws essential to our survival as a Free Nation is somehow immoral or something we should be better than.

No American would have anything to do with you or your organization.

AND I dare say, No American does.