In Fresno, California, social media rumors about impending immigration raids on the metropolis’s faculties left some mother and father panicking — regardless that the raids had been all hoaxes. In Denver, an actual immigration raid at an condominium complicated led to scores of scholars staying home from school, in response to a lawsuit. And in Alice, Texas, a college official incorrectly informed mother and father that Border Patrol brokers may board faculty buses to examine immigration papers.
President Donald Trump’s immigration insurance policies already are affecting faculties throughout the nation, as officers discover themselves responding to rising anxiousness amongst mother and father and their kids, together with those that are right here legally. Trump’s govt actions vastly expanded who is eligible for deportation and lifted a ban on immigration enforcement in schools.
Whereas many public and faculty officers have been working to encourage immigrants to ship their kids to high school, some have performed the other. In the meantime, Republicans in Oklahoma and Tennessee have put ahead proposals that may make it troublesome — and even unattainable — for kids within the nation illegally and U.S.-born kids of oldsters with out documentation to attend faculty in any respect.
As they weigh the dangers, many households have struggled with separating information from rumor.
Within the Alice Unbiased Faculty District in Texas, faculty officers informed mother and father that the district “obtained data” that U.S. Border Patrol brokers might ask college students about their citizenship standing throughout discipline journeys on faculty buses that cross by way of checkpoints about 60 miles from the Texas-Mexico border. The data ended up being false.
Angelib Hernandez of Aurora, Colorado, started holding her kids house from their schools just a few days per week after Trump’s inauguration. Now she doesn’t ship them in any respect.
She’s frightened immigration brokers will go to her kids’s faculties, detain them and separate her household.
“They’ve informed me, ‘Hopefully we received’t ever be detained by ourselves,’” she mentioned. “That will terrify them.”
Hernandez and her kids arrived a few yr in the past and utilized for asylum. She was working by way of the correct authorized channels to stay within the U.S., however modifications in immigration insurance policies have made her standing tenuous.
Up to now week, her fears have intensified. Now, she says, her notion is “everybody” — from Spanish-language media to social media to different college students and fogeys — is giving the impression that immigration brokers plan to enter Denver-area faculties. The college tells mother and father that youngsters are protected. “However we don’t belief it.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement brokers usually are not identified to have entered faculties anyplace. However the risk has alarmed households sufficient that some districts are pushing for a change within the coverage permitting brokers to function in faculties.
Denver Public Colleges final week sued the Division of Homeland Safety, accusing the Trump administration of interfering with the training of younger individuals in its care. Denver took in 43,000 migrants from the southern border final yr, together with kids who ended up within the metropolis’s public faculties. Attendance at faculties the place migrant youngsters are concentrated has fallen in latest weeks, the district mentioned within the lawsuit, saying the immigration raid at an area condominium complicated was an element.
The assist Denver faculties have given to college students and households to assist by way of the uncertainty entails “duties that distract and divert assets from DPS’s core and important instructional mission,” legal professionals for the district mentioned within the lawsuit.
Across the nation, conservatives have been questioning whether or not immigrants with out authorized standing ought to even have the right to a public education.
Oklahoma’s Republican state superintendent, Ryan Walters, pushed a rule that may have required mother and father to point out proof of citizenship — a beginning certificates or passport — to enroll their kids in class. The rule would have allowed mother and father to register their kids even when they might not present proof, however advocates say it could have strongly discouraged them from doing so. Even the state’s Republican governor, Kevin Stitt, thought the rule went too far — and vetoed it.
In Tennessee, Republican lawmakers have put ahead a invoice that may permit faculty districts to resolve whether or not to confess college students with out papers. They are saying they hope to ask authorized challenges, which might give them an opportunity to overturn a four-decade-old precedent defending the proper of each youngster within the nation to get an training
The implications of immigration coverage for U.S. faculties are huge. Fwd.us, a gaggle advocating for prison justice and immigration reform, estimated in 2021 that 600,000 Ok-12 college students within the U.S. lacked legal status. Practically 4 million college students — a lot of them born within the U.S. — have a dad or mum dwelling within the nation illegally.
Immigration raids have been proven to influence educational efficiency for college students — even those that are native-born. In North Carolina and California, researchers have discovered decrease attendance and a drop in enrollment amongst Hispanic college students when native police take part in a program that deputizes them to implement immigration legislation. One other research discovered test scores of Hispanic students dropped in faculties close to the websites of office raids.
In Fresno, attendance has dropped since Trump took workplace by anyplace from 700 to 1,000 college students a day. Officers within the central California district have obtained numerous panicked calls from mother and father about rumored immigration raids – together with about raids at faculties, mentioned Carlos Castillo, chief of variety, fairness and inclusion on the Fresno Unified Faculty District. The dreaded faculty raids have all been hoaxes.
“It goes past simply the scholars who … have citizenship standing or authorized standing,” Castillo mentioned. College students are afraid for his or her mother and father, relations and associates, they usually’re terrified that immigration brokers may raid their faculties or properties, he mentioned.
A faculty principal not too long ago known as Castillo in tears after a household reached out to say they had been too afraid to go purchase groceries. The principal went looking for the household and delivered $100 in groceries to their house — after which sat with the household and cried, Castillo mentioned.
The district has been working with households to tell them of their rights and advise them on issues like liquidating property or planning for the custody of children if the mother and father depart the U.S. The district has partnered with native organizations that can provide authorized recommendation to households and has held virtually a dozen conferences, together with some on Zoom.
___
Related Press author Valerie Gonzalez contributed to this report.
___
The Related Press’ training protection receives monetary assist from a number of non-public foundations. AP is solely chargeable for all content material. Discover AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded protection areas at AP.org.
Copyright 2025 The Related Press. All rights reserved. This materials is probably not printed, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed with out permission.
