More than 20 students gathered in support of the DREAM Act on Monday afternoon in hopes of convincing the government to allow students whose parents came to the U.S. illegally into higher education and the military.
Project for New Mexico Graduates of Color (PNMGC), along with other student groups, organized the rally, and a phone blitz will take place throughout the week.
Rep. Martin Heinrich and Sen. Jeff Bingaman each support the bill and sent representatives to Monday’s rally, said Christopher Ramirez, project assistant for the Office for Equity and Inclusion.
“We are lucky in this state because we are celebratory about this act while people in other states are still demanding their rights,” Ramirez said. “We are able to have our delegation recognize not only the work that students have done but acknowledging education.”
Students will call New Mexico Delegation members who promised to vote on the bill. The national legislation would allow undocumented students to remain in the country if they earned a high school diploma or the equivalent, don’t have criminal records and spent two years in a university or the military, according to OpenCongress.org.
UNM President David Schmidly and acting president Paul Roth sent a joint statement to the rally supporting the bill.
Breda Bova, the President’s Office chief of staff, said the president supports the bill because it would give a better life to students struggling for education in America.
“We gladly proclaim the University of New Mexico’s support of the Development Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act. New Mexico has taken the lead in giving all students the opportunity to aspire to a better life and now it is time for the country to take action on behalf of its students. We urge congress to take swift and decisive action in passing the DREAM act,“ she said.
According to PNMGC, about 65,000 immigrant students graduate each year from U.S. high schools and are uncertain about their future.
The DREAM Act would help students who were brought to the U.S. illegally as young children. To qualify, aspiring students must have been in the U.S. before age 16 and be of “good moral standing.” The bill would allow individuals to enlist in the military, attend college and gain eventual citizenship.
Twelve universities around the country have supported passing the DREAM Act, according to PNMGC’s Lead Project.
“Now we have administrative leadership saying we support the DREAM Act, we support students, and other universities should see this as model of how other presidents should act,” said Eric Castillo, lead project assistant for PNMGC.
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Student Natalia Gurule said the bill will allow immigrant students to contribute to the country’s growth.
“I wholeheartedly support the DREAM Act,” she said. “If you have a student with potential who has been in the country for an extended period of time, why not give them a chance to become something?”
