U.S. Latina Denied Student Grant Because Of Undocumented Parents

By Victor Landa, NewsTaco

This story comes from the New Jersey Star-Ledger, and it caught my attention for several reasons: first because this is still happening in our country and second because it points out the obstacles that many U.S. Latino students have to overcome in order to  succeed in places that all other American students take for granted.

The student in question has not been named, she is identified only by the initials A.Z. This is what we know, accordint to the Star-Ledger: she

was born in New York City in 1994 and moved to New Jersey in 1997 with her mother, an undocumented immigrant from Guatemala. Her father is not involved in her life.

After graduating from high school, A.Z., who applied for and met all the requirements for the financial assistance, was denied the tuition aid nonetheless.

In court papers, the Higher Education Student Assistance Authority contended A.Z. was not eligible because her parents were not citizens, and therefore she did not meet the residency requirements.

The decision to deny the grant is based on a subjective reading of a law. New Jersey students are eligible to receive aid if they’ve been residents of the state for one year. A.Z. fulfills that requirement. But, and this is the technicality where the New Jersey officials hung their hats, A.Z. isn’t really a resident because her parents are not citizens.

So the ACLU took the case to court, and it made it’s way to the court of appeals. It turns out that the state of New Jersey has been denying grants to the children of the undocumented since 2005.

The three appellate judges found that after years of adhering to laws governing tuition aid grants, the state authority in 2005 inappropriately began linking students’ residency to their parents’ immigration status.

“In 2005, the agency reversed course without any substantive explanation — instead, inaccurately representing that this significant change was merely a clarification,” Judge Mitchell Ostrer wrote in the 19-page decision on behalf of the three-member panel, which included Judges Francine Axelrad and Paulette Sapp-Peterson.

It’s A.Z., and not her mother, who will receive the aid, so the fact that the parents are undocumented has nothing to do with the grant. But this has been going on since 2005…

“There are hundreds, if not thousands, of kids who are unlawfully denied this assistance every year,” he said. “This is a very un-American concept, to say ‘you’ve done everything you’re supposed to do but we don’t like what your parents did so we’ll punish you.’”