Alejandro Leon

Ethnography

Writing and Inquiry

According to The Wall Street Journal there are about 11 million undocumented

immigrants in the United States of America. What no one takes in mind is that most

undocumented immigrants have families. To most people the children of illegal immigrants are

nothing more than children, but to undocumented immigrants they are family members that they

dont want to get separated from. Through my research, I have found what being a child of

undocumented immigrants is like. I interviewed a child who has undocumented parents.

What I found in my interview was that growing up there wasnt much thought on being a

child of a undocumented immigrant. I also found that growing up all they saw was there parents

work from Monday through Saturday and having only Sunday completely off. Recent events

have provoked fear and frustration. With immigration raids and checkpoints all across America.

Most immigrants come to America a better financial status just like the parents of the person who

I interviewed.

Immigration affect these children in more ways than what we see. According to the

NCLR (National Council of La Raza) we do not only separate families with immigration raids

but also cause economic hardship and psychological trauma. These recent raids have broken

more than just families and homes, undocumented immigrants have rights as well. These rights

were broken during recent raids, during Obamas administration only deported undocumented
immigrants with felonies on their records. This I know by experience since one of my friends got

deported even though his criminal record was clean.

In a article in the New York Times titled Children of immigrants there are about 20

million adults that were born in the United States that have at least one immigrant parent. They

also felt like they were in a cultural limbo having the American Culture that they see in school

and media vs the culture that they were raised with and what a parent was raised with. I can

relate with most of the people from the article since I am a child of immigrants. Ever since I was

a young I always felt like I couldnt be too much of a American or too much of a Mexican.

Recently I view myself as a Mexican American.

According to a study by John Hopkins University children of immigrants have better

grades than their peers. Our findings challenge the view that children of immigrants are lagging

behind children of native-born parents in the transitioning to adulthood, said Hao, a professor of

sociology in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences at Johns Hopkins. Given the same

backgrounds, children of immigrants are actually more likely to follow the best trajectory leading

to positive early adult outcomes. With 24 percent of all American children from immigrant

families, our findings provide fresh evidence for policy makers who are concerned with the

quality of immigrant generations and the skill composition of the future labor force, Hao said.

My hope is that policy makers will look at our findings and work on ways to create similar

protective factors for all racial minority children because these factors allow children from

immigrant families to do well and be resilient despite their lower socioeconomic and racial-

minority backgrounds ("Children of Immigrants Are Coming out Ahead of Their

Peers." News from The Johns Hopkins).

 In conclusion immigrant children are more than just children, they are a new generation.

They are also the future of America and have much to offer with different cultural backgrounds.

Works Cited
Capps, Randy. Paying the Price: The Impact of Immigration Raids on America's Children. Washington,
D.C.: National Council of La Raza, 2007. Print.
Carnock, Janie T. "Growing Up with Undocumented Parents: The Challenges Children Face." New
America. New America, 1 Feb. 2016. Web. 22 Mar. 2017.
<https://www.newamerica.org/education-policy/edcentral/undoc-parents/>.
"Children of Immigrants Are Coming out Ahead of Their Peers." News from The Johns Hopkins University
Children of Immigrants Are Coming out Ahead of Their Peers Comments. Ed. JOHNS HOPKINS
UNIVERSITY. JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY, 13 Sept. 2012. Web. 11 Apr. 2017.
<http://releases.jhu.edu/2012/09/13/children-of-immigrants-are-coming-out-ahead-of-their-peers/>.
Constable, Pamela. "For Illegal Immigrants with Babies, the Anchor Pulls in Many Directions." The
Washington Post. WP Company, 20 Sept. 2015. Web. 22 Mar. 2017.
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/for-illegal-immigrants-with-babies-the-
anchor-pulls-in-many-directions/2015/09/20/d5d7a2f0-570d-11e5-b8c9-
944725fcd3b9_story.html?utm_term=.017c7a2384a8>.
Maucci, Quetzal. "Children of Immigrants." The New York Times. The New York Times, 19 Sept.
2014. Web. 11 Apr. 2017.
<https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/09/21/opinion/sunday/exposures-children-
immigrant.html?_r=1>.Yoshikawa, Hirokazu. Immigrants Raising Citizens: Undocumented
Parents and Their Young Children. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2012. Print.