The ICE impact on campus

Welcome back! It’s been a head-spinning news week in terms of administrative action, so let’s dive in!

Talk about this

No. 1: Immigration’s empty seats

 Some K-12 school districts report that classroom attendance is significantly down: “From New York to Los Angeles, Chicago and Denver, school districts have reported students staying home in fear that they or their parents could be deported.” (USA TODAY)

Questions:

• Talk to professors and academic advisers to see if there’s any such effect on your campus. 

• How are international students responding/feeling? Are they worried or do they feel confident in their ability to study in the U.S. without issue?

• Does your school keep stats on how many students might be studying or working at the university without full citizenship? How might you visualize that information if you got it?

• The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated that in 2023, foreign-born workers, including undocumented people, made up almost 20% of the U.S. labor force — about 29 million people. Which begs the question … 

• Is there any department at your university that might potentially hire undocumented workers? How might that happen? (If you know of any student reporting on this kind of thing, please let me know!) 

• It’s not implausible! The Center for Migration Studies, along with other groups, believes that “as many as 8.3 million undocumented immigrants work in the U.S. economy, or 5.2 percent of the workforce … work in construction (1.5 million), restaurants (1 million), agriculture and farms (320,000), landscaping (300,000) …” What university doesn’t employ construction crews, food service workers and landscapers? 

• Remember to walk your students through best practices of dealing with vulnerable people when reporting on these kinds of stories. El Tímpano from California’s Bay Area has some great resources for transparency and safety. (I’ll also link below in the resources section). 

Related: Know your immigration cards

Green cards: Allow you to live and work permanently in the United States.

Gold cards: Just $5 million could buy you citizenship.

Red cards: A credit card-sized rights document, produced by The Immigrant Legal Resource Center which says, “All people in the United States, regardless of immigration status, have certain rights and protections under the U.S. Constitution. The ILRC’s Red Cards help people assert their rights and defend themselves in many situations, such as when ICE agents go to a home.” 

No. 2: The AP fights back

AP sues Trump administration officials after being blocked from presidential events

I have a feeling this is going to be an ongoing classroom topic — perhaps something to ask your students to keep tabs on all semester?

It promises to be colorful. From the above story: “ ‘The AP’s frivolous and demented lawsuit is nothing more than a blatant PR stunt masquerading as a First Amendment case,’ said White House spokesman Steven Cheung. ‘They are clearly suffering from a severe, debilitating case of Trump Derangement Syndrome that has rotted their peanut-sized brains. We will defeat them in court just like we crushed their leftist reporters at the ballot box.’ ”

Assign this

Speaking of stories with long legs, welcome to Colleges, K-12 schools ordered by Trump administration to abolish DEI or face funding cuts (LA Times)

By now I hope you’ve started reporting on the impact of any DEI offices and personnel on campus, but don’t take your foot off the gas. It’s critical that we teach burgeoning journalists not just to report on politics, but to focus on their local impact on real people. 

How will your students and college media keep up? For advisers, I suggest some kind of project management tool (like a shared Google sheet with sources, links and past reporting) that can be passed down to future staffers/leaders. At minimum, be sure to tag/categorize these stories as they publish on your website so you can easily track previous reporting. This is going to be a moving target, and your future students will thank you now for your organizational skills.

• The shot across the bow: The Dear Colleague letter

• There are some good ideas here for questions you can ask university officials (think scholarship offices, admissions, international programs): After Sweeping Anti-DEI Guidance, What Should Colleges Do?

• The Chronicle of Higher Education has built a DEI Legislation Tracker that monitors official actions by state.  

Localize this

How Trump’s Medical Research Cuts Would Hit Colleges and Hospitals in Every State (New York Times)

R1 folks, don’t just stop with the math. This might be a great opportunity to build on relations with your university PR shop, which is going to be eager to use the press to demonstrate the necessity of these research dollars. Ask them to connect you with some researchers who could be hit hardest. 

• Find out how long these university-employed scientists have been studying their area of expertise.

• Maybe they have a leading national reputation in a niche area. 

• Who else will be impacted by the tighter funding, from university employees like grad students to sick people?

• Whoever they are, hand them the mic and let them go off. 

Bonus points if this sends your students to areas of campus they’ve never explored before. (Keep in mind — and be sure to explain — that there are legal challenges to this proposal, which makes reporting on it a moving target.)

Resources 

Here are some helpful links to ensuring source safety when reporting on immigration stories.

• Annotated Bibliography: Protecting Immigrant Sources (El Tímpano)

• Talking to Journalists: What You Need to Know (PublicSource.org)

One last thing

Wait, so this is about speed and not … skilled contortion?! 

Feedback

My work needs your support, and I work for you. Please send any ideas or feedback about this newsletter or any other issue to [email protected]. Thank you sincerely for reading!