Napa Valley College Supports Undocumented Students during Action Week, October 19-23, 2020
Napa Valley College joins California Community Colleges (CCC) and its partners across the state for Undocumented Student Action Week, October 19-23, 2020, in an effort to advocate and provide support services for undocumented students throughout our system.
Serving the largest number of undocumented students in the state — including combined totals from University of California and California State University — California Community Colleges are committed to serving ALL students, regardless of immigration status. In its 4th year, Undocumented Student Action Week is a system-wide campaign to advocate and provide support resources for our undocumented student population.
This year’s action week, while virtual, serves as an opportunity to highlight the challenges our undocumented students face in today’s political climate and amid COVID-19. This week serves as a vehicle to advocate to Congress about the financial and moral actions needed to be taken to ensure the safety of undocumented students.
Since President Trump’s 2017 announcement to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, the status and safety of undocumented students on our campus has been uncertain. On June 18, 2020, by a vote of 5-4, the Supreme Court ruled that the administration could not proceed with its plan to end DACA, thereby upholding the program. However, lack of action by Congress on pivotal immigration legislation, as well as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids and detentions over the last couple of years, have only caused more fear among our undocumented student population.
The Dreamers Project Report discusses the state of CCC undocumented students, incorporating findings from a landscape analysis to identify shared challenges in serving this vulnerable population. Recommendations about how to better serve undocumented students, paired with promising practices already underway, are provided here for implementation at the individual, group, and institutional levels for systemic change that benefits California. When undocumented students are able to pursue education and careers, they can create new, brighter futures for themselves, their families, and their communities.
This year the Action Week partners will offer the following audience targeted webinars open to the system. Visit here to learn more and register for webinars.