Critics of California’s immigrant embrace should hear the remarkable stories of my LA students

“Where are the rest of them?” As about 400 soon-to-be high school graduates stood behind us ready to march out onto the field last week, teachers surveyed the crowd with disappointment as we realized some families were missing.

It’s not hard to understand why.

Roughly a quarter of all students in Los Angeles Unified School District lack legal status. The student body at our school consists almost entirely of immigrants, many of them lacking citizenship themselves or have parents and relatives that are undocumented.

Outside, school police patrolled to guard against a potential Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid. There were rumors that a school about four miles away would be targeted. A day prior, district officials decided that this year the graduation would be broadcast on Zoom.

For many immigrant parents, graduation day is the culmination of decades of sacrifice, and many braved the threat of an ICE raid and came anyway. Others, perhaps wisely, decided to watch from home.

They deserved better.

While President Trump says he is defending Los Angeles from a “foreign invasion,” the only invasion we see is the one he is leading. Unfortunately, many Americans are cheering him on and vilifying immigrants, Angelenos and Californians. Perhaps I’m naive, but I believe that if they could see these families and their struggles up close, they would change their views. 

At my school, we don’t see a dystopia of lawbreakers and freeloaders. We see an often heroic generation of immigrant parents working hard to provide for their children, while also sending remittance money to family members in their native countries. We see students who are (usually) a pleasure to teach, and parents who are grateful for teachers. 

When I looked at the names on the graduation program, there were so many stories I wish our critics could hear: like the student in my AP U.S. government class who from a young age worked weekends for his family’s business but made it into UCLA on a scholarship; the girl who had faced homelessness this year; the boy with learning issues who powered through my AP class thanks to an effort so obsessive that his friends would tease him over it. He got an ‘A,’ which some of the students ribbing him did not.

Many students have harrowing, horrific stories of how they got here — stories they almost never volunteer.

Like the girl growing up in an apartment complex in San Salvador, where once girls reached a certain age, they were obligated to become the “girlfriend” of a member of whatever gang controlled that area. They came for her when she was 14, but she was ready, shooting a gang member, then slipping out of the country. She migrated through Guatemala and Mexico, desperate to find her father in Los Angeles. 

She told me this story at parent-teacher conference night, as tears welled up in her father’s eyes. It’s touching to watch their loving, long-running argument — he wants her to manage and eventually take over the small business he built, but she wants to become an artist instead.

To this day she does not know whether the gang member she shot lived or died. 

At the graduation ceremony, our principal asked all those who will be joining the armed forces to stand up and be recognized. These bright, hard-working young people are a windfall for the military. Were they born middle class, most would have gone to college. Instead, they often enlist, most commonly in the Marines, for the economic opportunity — the so-called “economic draft.” Also, one of the benefits of enlisting is that they can help family members adjust their immigration status.

One Salvadoran student who came to this country less than four years ago knowing little English managed to get an ‘A’ in my AP class. He’d sometimes come before school to seek help parsing through the latest immigration document he’d received. Usually, whatever I read did not provide much encouragement.

He earned admission to a University of California school, where he’ll be studying biomedical engineering. Perhaps one day he’ll help develop a medicine that will benefit some of the people who don’t want him here.