SUCCESS STORY
Anonymous donor’s gift funds scholarships for immigrant students
Mariana Hernandez’s parents brought her to the U.S. at age 5 from Mexico on an immigration visa, but it later expired. She graduated as one of the top 10 students at Kingsbury High School, but couldn’t afford to go to her first-choice college, private Christian Brothers University. Her immigration problems even priced her out of public schools like Southwest Tennessee Community College and the University of Memphis.
So she enrolled instead at the most affordable school she could find, Mid-South Community College in West Memphis.
That was in 2013. Then last summer, her college adviser Jennifer Alejo told her that a new scholarship program would allow her to transfer to Christian Brothers after all.
“Jennifer just told me to wait it out and that something would happen,” said Hernandez, now 20. “And she made it happen.”
Alejo and others helped create Christian Brothers’ Latino Success Scholarships, backed by an anonymous donor’s gift of $150,000. The program began in the fall and is now assisting 25 people, including 14 freshmen and 11 transfer students. Organizers hope to expand the program, and say it’s specifically designed for students like Hernandez who have immigration problems that hinder their access to many other colleges.
The scholarship program illustrates a broader trend: more colleges and universities nationwide are opening opportunities for teenagers who were brought into the U.S. illegally or on visas that have since expired.
A recent New York Times article attributed much of the change to the 2012 federal program Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which allowed many of these people to register with the government and obtain Social Security numbers and work permits.
As opportunities at private universities open up, advocates are lobbying the Tennessee Legislature to change the law and allow students with immigration issues to receive in-state tuition at state colleges.
Such measures have drawn criticism from groups such as the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies, which argues for stricter immigration policies. The group says these steps offer a benefit to people who have violated immigration law and cut into a limited pot of money for needy students.
Wendy Sumner-Winter, a Christian Brothers administrator involved in the scholarship program, says the immigrant students want to better themselves, a goal that fits American values.
“They are learning skills, trades to compete and contribute to the economy, to society, to future children. Their children will have opportunities that they would not have otherwise had,” she said.
She has met some of the scholarship students in a freshman composition course she teaches. “I can tell you they bring to the classroom an extraordinary sense of purpose. They know why they’re here in a way that a lot of college students their age don’t.”
The 25 students in the Latino Success Scholarships program had a grade-point average of 3.0 in their fall semester classes, higher than the grade-point average of 2.87 for all CBU students, she said.
The CBU scholarship offers a new option for students working with Alejo, who is director of the program called Abriendo Puertas, which means Opening Doors. Abriendo Puertas is a program of social services organization Latino Memphis and receives funding through entities including the Lumina Foundation, a nationwide organization that supports college access, especially for minorities. Hispanics have historically had lower rates of college attendance and completion than other groups.
When Hernandez was a senior at Kingsbury High, she registered with immigration authorities, received Deferred Action status and applied to schools including the University of Memphis. But attorneys for the state Board of Regents had ruled that Deferred Action students had to pay outof-state tuition rates of more than $20,000 per year and also couldn’t qualify for most state and federal scholarships.
Christian Brothers offered Hernandez partial scholarships, that year but not enough to cover basic tuition, which now costs $29, 300 per year.
Today, Hernandez and the other students in the new program qualify for an academic scholarship that cuts tuition in half, to about $14,700. The new, additional scholarship program provides a grant of $6,000 per year. And the students also receive a loan worth $5,000 per year.
That leaves the students and their families about $3,650 per year to pay: a significant sum, but within reach for many immigrant families. Students also pay $50 per month toward loan repayment while they’re enrolled in school. The scholarship program also offers $1,000 per year for books.
The program for freshman students offers a similar structure, though the grant is larger and the loan is smaller.