Schools brace for clash with immigration officials ahead of Trump term

K-12 schools across the U.S. are gearing up for potential efforts to shield their students as the incoming Trump administration sets its sights on deporting millions of people.

Administrators and teachers' unions are looking to build relationships and provide resources for students and families without legal status as President-elect Trump has pledged the largest mass deportation in history, floating the end of policies barring immigration raids at schools and places of worship.

School officials and advocates are ensuring staff understand the rights to privacy that immigrant students have and how to tackle other issues that may arise such as slipping attendance as undocumented families fear the worst.

Trump's incoming "border czar" has said he plans to revive family detention centers, and that halfway homes may be necessary for U.S. citizen children with non-citizen parents.

“I don't know what [Trump's] true agenda is going to be until he gets in, but I can tell you this, he's scaring the living hell out of a lot of kids who are just here trying to make it,” said Todd Quarnberg, principal of Utah's Herriman High School, which has had an influx of migrant students over the past few years.

Hundreds of thousands of undocumented students attend public schools across the U.S., and many more are U.S. citizens with undocumented parents who could find themselves lacking a guardian or in legal limbo if Trump follows through with his promises.

While Trump reportedly is looking to allow Immigration Custom and Enforcement (ICE) raids in schools, even if the agency enters a facility undocumented immigrants have the same protections to their information as other students.

School administrators and staff would not be allowed to share the immigration status of any student.

“Many times, schools are the first people that a student will disclose an undocumented status to, and that's because of trust,” said Patrick Greene, principal at Greene Central High School in North Carolina, who has seen undocumented students ask their school for help for a license, finding a job or applying for college.

“One of the first things we've trained all our staff, student counselors and teachers together on is to maintain that trust” and “how to be an ally and a support and just to understand the barriers of these students and their families face,” he added.

Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Alberto Carvalho has also announced staff is in training to prepare for immigration officials.

Much of Trump’s plan will require local and state cooperation, which in some locations will not come easy.

ICE is unlikely to get much help from sanctuary cities or state such as California, where the governor convened a special session to anticipate incoming Trump administration moves.

“I think being in California, there's enough state protections right now that we would be able to not let [ICE] onto campus to talk to students, and I feel like we feel fairly confident about that,” said Mark Anderson, executive director of high schools in the Hacienda La Puente Unified School District.

When reached for comment, Karoline Leavitt, the spokesperson for Trump’s transition team, said the incoming president “was given a mandate by the American people to stop the invasion of illegal immigrants, secure the border, and deport dangerous criminals and terrorists that make our communities less safe. He will deliver.”

Republican states are much more likely to cooperate with Trump’s immigration policies, with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) calling a special session to do just that.

But federal protections on students’ privacy transcend the state and ensure immigration status at school cannot be shared without a legal warrant or parent permission.

“If an immigration agent comes into a school, it doesn't matter where it is, by law, under FERPA, under the protections that students have under privacy, a school district cannot disclose, voluntarily disclose students' information,” said Viridiana Carrizales, co-founder and CEO of ImmSchools, a group that focuses on the intersection between immigration and education.

But when immigration checks and raids tick up, so can the rates of absenteeism of undocumented students.

“We've seen students not come to school following a deportation or even a raid in their community, so we've seen schools struggle with absenteeism and the lack of engagement and involvement from both students and families because they are afraid,” Carrizales said.

The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) provides resources for schools that informs educators of the rights of immigrant students and plans schools can put in place to protect and help undocumented families.

In light of the “increased anxiety + fear” the group is seeing, President Randi Weingarten said on social media, AFT is “updating our resources on immigration — and the AFT will fight to protect working families who love this country and want an opportunity to pursue the American dream.”

Greene, the North Carolina principal, recalled years ago when a school open house happened at the same time the police set up a license check a few miles down the road.

“The perception among the Latino community was that that was done on purpose to bring them out and then get checked. And so, it took us a long time of rebuilding trust and understanding and all that to kind of earn that back,” he said.

Those types of checks and other efforts the Trump administration may deploy leaves anxiety for undocumented students who fear coming home from school one day without their guardian present.

"In the past, we have seen how following a raid that often happens at a workspace, usually the next day, hundreds of kids miss school because their own parents were detained, and now they don't have a parent to take care of them," said Carrizales.

"Even if deportations are not specifically being targeted ... or schools aren't being targeted for these mass deportation, we know that regardless of where they happen, the impact is going to be felt the most in our schools," she added.

A drop in attendance would come as chronic absenteeism has been pervasive in schools since the pandemic. The drop in attendance is accompanied by low academic scores, with research from NWEA last summer showing eighth grade students a year behind in reading and math.

"Attendance ever since COVID, it's just a big issue making sure, especially at the secondary level, that students are engaged and they're attending,” said Anderson.

“We can't ignore the federal politics, because they play such a big role in what we do but we can't get ourselves so caught up in them that we're no longer capable of providing those services to kids,” he added.

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