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Last update: May 25, 2005 at 7:03 PM
Mary Turck: Help immigrant students to keep the dream alive
Mary Turck
May 26, 2005 TURCK0526


On May 18, in a last-minute, behind-the-scenes maneuver, Gov. Tim Pawlenty shattered the dreams of Minnesota immigrant students. Threatening a veto of the entire Higher Education Omnibus bill, Pawlenty forced the withdrawal from the omnibus bill of the Minnesota Dream Act, also called the in-state tuition bill. This bill, which had strong bipartisan support and sponsorship in the House and Senate, would have extended in-state tuition rates to immigrant students who have grown up in Minnesota and graduated from Minnesota high schools.

To understand the impact of the governor's action, imagine that you are a high school junior in Minneapolis or Owatonna or Litchfield or Moorhead. You came to Minnesota with your parents more than 10 years ago. You've attended Minnesota schools since first grade. As you were a young child when you arrived, learning English was easy. Your parents and teachers are proud of how well you have done in school. Now you want to go to college, perhaps to become a teacher yourself.

If you were a Wisconsin resident, you could pay close to in-state tutition of about $8,000 per year at the University of Minnesota. If you were a New York or California resident, you could live here for one year, and then register at the University of Minnesota and pay in-state tuition.

But you do not have permanent legal resident status. So it does not matter that you have lived in Minnesota for more than 10 years. It does not matter that Minneapolis or Owatonna or Litchfield or Moorhead is the only hometown that you know. If you want to attend the University of Minnesota, you have to pay out-of-state tutition of about $20,000 per year.

Thousands of Minnesota students face this dilemma. Between 300 and 500 undocumented students a year graduate from Minnesota high schools. The Minnesota Dream Act would allow them to pay in-state tuition. No free ride -- just a fair shot at an education. Similar legislation has been enacted into law in other states, including Texas, California, Utah, New York, Washington, Illinois and Oklahoma.

Angela, a high school student from Faribault, said earlier this year: "Ever since I came from Mexico at 13, school has been hard but I've struggled to succeed. As I prepare to graduate from high school, I find that I don't qualify for in-state tuition rates. I can't afford to go to college and I fear the struggle was all for nothing. I dream that the governor will hear my story and make this law so that students like me don't get left behind."

Hundreds of young people -- citizens and immigrants -- from high schools around Minnesota participated in this year's legislative process. They wrote to their representatives and came to the Legislature. They testified at hearings and lobbied legislators. Many students returned over and over to watch the legislative process in action.

They cheered when committee members voted for the Dream Act and when the Senate included it in the Omnibus Higher Education bill. They thought they'd seen the legislative process in action, and they thought they'd seen it respond to their pleas for fairness. They were ready to go to the next level, beginning to work for the passage of the federal DREAM Act.

On the federal level, the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act was introduced with bipartisan support in the last session of Congress, and will be reintroduced this year. To be eligible under the federal DREAM Act, a student must have been brought to the United States more than five years ago at age 15 or younger. When the student graduates from high school, he or she could apply for conditional legal residence for up to six years while attending a college or serving in the military. If the student completes at least two years of college or military service during that six-year residence, he or she could apply for permanent legal residence.

The Minnesota Dream Act could not give our Minnesota students a route to legal residence or citizenship, but it could give them a chance to keep their dreams alive through college. Pawlenty's veto threat shattered those dreams. Sen. Sandy Pappas, DFL-St. Paul, and Rep. Ray Cox, R-Northfield, plan to re-introduce the Dream Act as stand-alone legislation in the special session. The Legislature, the governor and all of us have one more chance to keep immigrant students' dreams alive. Let your legislators and the governor know that you want to see the Minnesota Dream Act become law.

Mary Turck is editor of Connection to the Americas, a publication of the Resource Center of the Americas, and of www.americas.org.