Abstract
This exploratory study examines the experiences of undocumented students at Hawthorne College, an elite, liberal arts institution with sanctuary status. Drawing primarily on a questionnaire and qualitative interviews, it considers 1) whether undocumented and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) students on a sanctuary campus experience the characteristic psychosocial difficulties that mark the lives of undocumented students elsewhere and 2) the extent to which institutional policies mitigate these challenges. The research reveals that sanctuary is neither a panacea for undocumented students’ concerns nor is it a meaningless symbol. Students are protected from some typical barriers to college success, experience other barriers in classic ways, and face still other constraints quite differently in a privileged, high-pressure educational environment. The study adds to emerging research on the undocumented experience in higher education and offers preliminary insights into the promises and limits of the sanctuary campus movement.
Highlights
For most undocumented youth in America, the path to a college degree is fraught with difficulty
There’s no special sanctions that come from being a sanctuary. . . it has very little legal basis, but I felt like it was a promise for Hawthorne to support us—undocumented and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) students
Discussion & Conclusion In this study, we explored the experiences of undocumented students attending an elite, sanctuary college at a paradoxical historical moment in which undocumented students faced both overt anti-immigrant policies nationally and pockets of unprecedented institutional support
Summary
For most undocumented youth in America, the path to a college degree is fraught with difficulty. Bureaucratic, legal, and psychosocial challenges, state-level barriers to admission, poor-quality secondary education, and lack of access to information all pose steep barriers to college access and completion (Abrego & Gonzáles, 2010; Contreras, 2009; Gonzáles, Suárez-Orozco, & Dedios-Sanguineti, 2013; Pérez, Cortes, Ramos, & Coronado, 2010; Suárez-Orozco et al 2015; Villarraga-Orjuela & Kerr, 2017).
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