Objectives
Introduction
I am an 8th grade language arts teacher at Northwest School of the Arts in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district, Charlotte, North Carolina. NWSA is unique in several ways. The school houses grades 6-12, totaling about 1,200- 1,250 students of which 450 are middle school students. Approximately 75% of the students are African-American, 20% Caucasian, with less than 5% Latino or multi-racial. The economic backgrounds range from upper-middle class to poverty. Most of our students probably fall in the range of lower-middle class. A magnet school, NWSA's middle school students do not follow the typical language arts schedule. Instead of having language arts every day for 90 minutes, our students follow an A-day/B-day schedule which allows them to take four electives per semester as opposed to the two offered in the traditional setting. Each middle school grade level has only one core teacher in language arts, science and social studies - a big difference from the much larger middle schools that may have up to six language arts teachers per grade level.
My interest in this seminar is quite simple; I want my students to understand a culture that is very prevalent in the city of Charlotte, North Carolina. Too often I find my students jumping to conclusions and passing judgment about Mexican Americans or other Latino cultures in their communities. I am hoping to use the unit as an experiment of sorts to see if the students still have the same negative stereotypes about Latinos, specifically Mexicans, after reading the articles, personal narratives, poems, and political cartoons and viewing a docu-drama film. The overarching goal for my entire unit is to provide students with enough information about Mexican immigration that they will be able to create their own viewpoints by drawing conclusions about the information I will expose to them.
The school district breaks its middle school language arts classes into three categories: Standard, Standard Plus and Honors. My unit will be taught in my Standard Plus and Honors classes, consisting of about 115 of the 140 students in the eighth grade. As mentioned above I see these classes for 90 minutes every other day. Ninety percent of the reading I use in this class is the same as my Honors classes; the modifications lie in the activities and pacing. The Honors students score above grade level on the EOG test and are capable of higher-level activities; most of the class is driven by discussion of topics in the texts read in and out of class. This unit will be taught during the first nine weeks. Because the texts I choose in the beginning of the year for my Standard students (who score below grade level on the EOG test) are usually a lower lexile (reading) level, I will likely select only a few of the resources mentioned in this unit. The texts and activities for my Standard classes will be modified in order to achieve the necessary level of mastery for each objective.
The principal of NWSA believes more strongly in the quality of instruction than the quantity of instructional time and I strongly agree with him. For example, NWSA consistently scores above the average CMS traditional middle school on the Reading EOG despite having only half of the instructional time of the traditional middle school teacher. Since NWSA is not a Focus (low performing) school, I do not have to adhere to the scripted Focus Lessons mandated in such schools. This allows me to integrate my choice of literature, film and other readings into the mandated Pacing Guide. The Pacing Guide divides the year into four 9-week grading periods.
Instead of using the preferred readings listed in the Pacing Guide, which include many different articles (none of which are connected by an overarching theme) illustrating all of the text organizers, I have chosen articles that all center around the concept of Mexican immigration. Doing so will enable students to have a cohesive unit that incorporates the reading strategies with meaningful text. The unit will last approximately four to five weeks and has all the signs of an inter-disciplinary adventure, always welcome in middle school curriculum, even as it adheres to the North Carolina Standard Course of Study and meets objectives in five of the six Competency Goals.
Juan González's Harvest of Empire serves as a great tool for me to introduce facts about Mexican immigration. I will begin introducing historical facts during the time of "Manifest Destiny" by having students copy notes provided on the overhead, outlining excerpts of Harvest of Empire. Students will then analyze how crippling this doctrine was to races and cultures in the past and how it presently affects certain races in America thru a class discussion. Next, I will create a timeline of events that outlines the waves of Mexican immigration throughout the 19th and 20th centuries that will be distributed to the students. Students will also view Hispanics at Mid-Decade, tables and charts providing statistics on immigration available on the Pew Hispanic Center website. I will ask them what the statistics reveal about Mexican immigration in the U.S. This will provide a summary of past and present immigration trends in the U.S. Students will create cause-effect graphic aids on why Mexicans immigrate to the U.S. and the impact their migration has on Mexico and the U.S. Students will read an article from The Center for Immigration Studies that briefly summarizes why Mexicans continue to immigrate since the first major wave 150 years ago. They will analyze a speech by Susan Myrick, and other primary sources from both sides of the immigration debate in order to learn how to compare and contrast different perspectives. Our on-going discussion of the problems immigrants face and the possible solutions to their struggles will culminate in an essay at the end of the unit.
Although most of the unit is comprised mostly of non-fiction texts, I refer back to the title of the unit, Examining Mexican Immigration Thru First Person Point-of-view. I find that when teaching any one genre of literature it is imperative to make connections to other genres to enhance the overall understanding of the concepts taught in the unit. Introducing short stories, poems and political cartoons from Lengua Fresca, a book comprised of contemporary Latino writers, edited by Harold Augenbraum and Ilan Stavans, will provide many different perspectives on immigrant life in Mexico and the U.S. I will also use The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, which I have taught for the last five years. While reading the book I ask students to explore themes surrounding the patriarchal community from which the main character yearns to one day escape. This book will accompany me in my unit in several ways - by demonstrating the first person point-of-view as well as illustrating the debilitating stereotypes faced by a migrant immigrant who disappears into the North. I am most excited that my once small unit on The House on Mango Street has developed into one that now incorporates news articles, graphic aids, fiction, poetry and film to illuminate the perspectives of Mexican migrant families on both sides of the border. The fictional and poetic language of Cisneros juxtaposed with the sobering statistics and personal stories of the non-fiction text will make the topic real and meaningful to my students.
I am excited to present the film Alambrista, whose title alone will enable a discussion of epic proportion. The word alambrista has several meanings; it translates to mean "undocumented immigrant" or "acrobat" because the word's stem derives from the Spanish word for wire (Carassco, 140). Conventionally it means 'wire jumper' since the border in some places is protected by a barbed wire fence. Being able to explain the significance of the symbolism of an illegal immigrant's migration to the U.S. as a perpetual journey over a "tightrope" requires the type of critical thinking skills my Honors students need to employ in this unit. While viewing the film, students will have to answer discussion questions in their notebook; the book Alambrista and the U.S. Mexico Border provides a wealth of higher-level thinking questions. After viewing the film my summative assessment will require students to write an essay comparing the main character's journey throughout the film to those studied in the texts described above, thereby synthesizing all of the knowledge they gleaned from the first-person perspectives provided in this unit.
Latinos in North Carolina
The Latino population in Charlotte is growing rapidly; from 1990-2000 it increased nearly 400% (Miller). The need for more education about Latino history and its impact on the present-day United States, the conflicts faced by Mexican immigrants living in North Carolina, and contributions by Latino authors has become a necessity in Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools.
NWSA has a very diverse student body, but it does not have a large Latino population. The students I have taught at NWSA have parents who arrived from Puerto Rico, Mexico, Cuba, and El Salvador; many of those students are multi-racial. Three years prior to teaching at NWSA I taught at a school that had a very high number of foreign-born Latino students, many of whom did not speak English. During my three years there I did not see much of an effort to change the curriculum despite the changing faces of the school. I think this unit will open the eyes of my students, many of whom have developed harsh stereotypes about Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants. I have witnessed these stereotypes in class discussions and in actions and reactions around the school. I also want to make the important connection to the few Latino students I teach. In the past Latino writers, except Cisneros, were not included in my curriculum. Since the number of Latinos in Charlotte is growing rapidly, I anticipate the number of Latino students in my classes will increase - prompting a needed change in the curriculum.
Living in Charlotte for the past five years I have witnessed the ever-changing face of the city. Teaching in CMS has afforded me the opportunity to watch the demographics of the classroom change culturally, racially and socially. Despite the rapid increase of Latinos in North Carolina there is no focus on cultural "equity" in the curriculum - very few Latino authors listed in the Pacing Guide and no attention paid to the historical, cultural and economical significance Latino immigrants have on the United States or North Carolina. According to a study by the Center for Immigration Studies', North Carolina's immigrant population has increased over 300% between 1995 and 2005 ("NC Immigration Court Fact Sheet"). Although this report did not include an ethnic breakdown of the immigrants, other studies have shown that Latinos are the largest immigrant group in the United States, Mexico accounts for 6.2 million, or 56% of the 11.1 million illegal Latin American immigrants, according to one estimate. The number from most other regions of Latin American remained more or less constant between 2000 and 2005, while the number of unauthorized Mexicans increased by 1.5 million (Pew Hispanic Center).
These migrations have become a hot political issue in North Carolina. Politicians and business leaders are constantly blasted across the front page of the Charlotte Observer debating whether or not the immigrant population is having a positive or negative effect on the community. Sue Myrick, the Republican House Representative for North Carolina's 9th district (which includes Mecklenburg County) and former two-term mayor of Charlotte, recently spoke in response to a Senate Immigration Proposal in 2007. One of her comments really struck me: "No provision in bill to end anchor babies (automatic citizenship for children of illegals born here). Why?" (Myrick). Hers is just one of the many negative viewpoints on immigration that my students frequently encounter in the local media. After reading this my mind immediately flashed to the final scene of the film Alambrista where a Mexican woman is literally clinging to a pole on the U.S. side of the border-crossing station, as she gives birth, to ensure that her child will be born a U.S. citizen and will never need papers to cross - symbolizing the pain an immigrant parent goes through to give her child security- the innate desire to help her child that defines all communities in this countries.
My responsibility is to deliver the facts about Mexican immigration in the U.S. and in North Carolina from the point-of-view of immigrants and their families so students can begin to foster their own understanding of the community changing right before their eyes. I want my students to understand that family concerns motivate most Mexicans who emigrate to the U.S. Statistics support the notion that parents are making the dangerous journey to the U.S. to ensure a better life for their families. The number of male immigrants illegally crossing the border is 5.4 million or 49% of the unauthorized population compared to the 3.9 million females , or 35% of the unauthorized population as estimated in March 2005 (Pew Hispanic Center). The study also noted that of the children of unauthorized parents, 1.8 million are also unauthorized, in contrast to the 3.1 million who are U.S. citizens by birth. The idea that immigrants are coming to the U.S. to provide a better life for their children is evidenced in the numbers above - they stay in the U.S. for a considerable amount of years and have imbedded themselves for the benefit of their families.
I want my students to read immigrants' own accounts of their migration and their time in the United States. In 2006 a 28-year old Mexican father, when asked if the dangers of border crossing affected his decision to cross, told an interviewer, "We don't care if we have to walk eight days, fifteen days - it doesn't matter the danger we put ourselves in. If and when we cross alive, we will have a job to give our families the best" (Cornelius). This first-person perspective is so important to share with my students. After they read articles that describe the conditions of some of the border-crossing areas, and comments of politicians for and against more severe immigration restrictions, they can draw their own conclusions about the debate and see the human side of these issues.
It is important for my all of my students to be able to make a connection between themselves and the city in which they live. My experience as a chaperone for a local field trip has been one catalyst for this unit. Eighth grade students are required to take a field trip to the Levine Museum of the New South, located in downtown Charlotte, as part of their social studies curriculum. The museum is very hands-on and takes the students on a journey from the newly industrialized South of the late 1800s to present-day Charlotte home to several Fortune 500 companies. The maze that leads them from the cotton barrels to the building blocks offers walls of Civil Rights Movement artifacts, sound-bytes and photographs. Every year students utter the same responses as the pass the hood of the a former Grand Master of the KKK, or pictures of the first African-American student attending a familiar high school that resides just down the street from NWSA. This really happened in Charlotte? That's where I'm going to high school next year. Something like that could never happen in Charlotte today. Those images resonate so deeply with the students because it has meaning to them - they recognize the names of the schools, the buildings in their neighborhoods, and the color of the faces of those involved. The ability of a student to see someone else who is his age, his race in his community allows him to make a connection, to identify himself in that exhibit. Reading the first-hand accounts of segregation and integration by students in all the above-mentioned realms makes the experience personal. That experience cannot be replicated by reading a textbook. Before we exit the glass doors leading us back to the lobby there is a very small section devoted to the rising Latino population in Charlotte. I want to provide my Latino students with the same opportunity to personally connect to a story about a student their age, of their color, in their community because there is a major transformation taking place in Charlotte today. A connection needs to be made to their culture, race and community by taking them on journey through time that illustrates the contributions Mexican immigrants have made and are making to the United States.
Background and Strategies
Early Immigration and Stereotypes
Understanding that there is a tremendous amount of historical background information needed to teach this unit, I have provided many resources within this section that provide further explanation.
In keeping with my overarching goal of breaking down stereotypes and making my students more accepting of the growing population in Charlotte, I must begin my unit by providing an understanding of the way Latinos have been stereotyped and mistreated over the last 150 years. Juan González's Harvest of Empire provides an eye-opening explanation of Mexican migration to the U.S. during from the days of early Spanish colonists to the present. In order for my students to understand the significance of Mexicans living in the U.S. today I must take them on a journey throughout time, beginning in 1845 with the inception of "Manifest Destiny" into the minds of Americans.
Since the unit I teach prior to this unit illustrates the suppression of African-Americans during slavery in Frederick Douglass: Narrative of a Slave, students will be able to connect the ideas of racial superiority as a means of economic growth to the similar motives behind racial superiority of white Europeans over Indians, blacks, and Mexicans during the era of "Manifest Destiny." This term serves as a label for the notions of Latin American inferiority in the eyes of many racist white Europeans who relished in their "nation's prosperity. . .its amazing new networks of canals, steamboats, and railroads, as proof of their God-given destiny to conquer the frontier" (González, 43). Phrenologist Dr. Josiah C. Nott, a proponent for "Manifest Destiny" in 1845 wrote, "Whenever in the history of the world the inferior races have been conquered and mixed in with the Caucasian, the latter have sunk into barbarism" (González, 43). As a guide for the teacher, there are several questions to think about when providing your students with this information. These questions can act as a journal or class discussion as the material is being presented or to guide you in teaching this information. What is your reaction to this quote? Are you multi-racial? What would happen if Dr. Nott were living in the present-day U.S.? What connections can be made to slavery in the U.S. (think about bi-racial slave children)?Are there any organizations today that support the ideas of "Manifest Destiny?" During the late 1840s, many Caucasians felt that the world owed them for their marveled discoveries, inventions and conquests and therefore they were afforded the right to continue spreading their ingenuity in any territory in the West they had not yet conquered, influenced or assimilated. Waging war with Mexico to secure Texas, California, and other parts of the Mexican north as part of the Union was necessary in President Polk's eyes. However, with racial superiority and fear of mixed-race barbarians dotting the landscape of the newly acquired land, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was created. It forced Mexico to relinquish the section of its territory that was least densely populated. That section of Mexico developed into present-day New Mexico, California, Nevada, parts of Arizona, Utah and Texas (González, 44). The threat of being over-populated by racially mixed Mexicans was the motivating factor in establishing the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Again, the theme of fear by the "superior" race is examined. The connection to slavery cannot be ignored here.
I want my students to understand some basic facts about the Mexican Americans who were incorporated into the United States in 1848. The relinquishment of the Nueces Strip now created a problem for its Mexican inhabitants. Families were no longer separated by a river, but by a border between two feuding countries. The Rio Grande is actually the name Anglo settlers gave to river; it was called the Rio Bravo by its previous occupants. So, the conflicts between the Spanish-speaking Mexicans living on the U.S. side of the Nueces Strip become more than just a language barrier - families, who at one time could traverse the river without regulations, were now governed under different laws. The Anglo settlers took advantage of illiteracy and the language barrier of their new neighbors and cheated the Mexicans out of land that was (in their minds) rightfully theirs. Here are several questions to guide the teacher's lesson. Were the Anglos fair in their scheme? Why or why not? What was their motivation in stealing the land? The responses will be guided back to "Manifest Destiny" and the job of removing the "obstacle to progress" (González, 100). Violence against Mexicans became more and more prevalent around 1855, with lynching of Mexicans being witnessed into the early 1900s and as late as 1917 (González, 100).More interdisciplinary questions or cross-curricular questions to think about. Slavery and the lynching of Mexicans are happening concurrently. What are similarities both races face? How are their struggles different? How does the quote, "We didn't cross the border, the border crossed us" apply here?
I hope to present additional historical material to my students. I want them to know that Mexicans began migrating to the North in the late 1840s during the California Gold Rush. Thousands of immigrants became migrant laborers over the following decades. I want them to know that cowboy culture developed in the aftermath of the Mexican War, with help from Mexican and Mexican American workers. South Texas had cattle numbering in the millions which profited its new Anglo settlers, but mestizo (Indian and Spanish descent) or mulato (Indian and black descent) cowboys commonly worked the range. Spanish words such as bronco, canyon, rodeo, lariat, and loco were commonly used by Anglos in that industry (González, 44-45). Mexicans did other types of work. When railroads were built during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, thousands of Mexicans labored in construction and maintenance jobs. As González notes, ". . .this historic Mexican contribution has been virtually obliterated from popular frontier history, replaced by the enduring myth of the lazy, shiftless Mexican" (González, 47). As mentioned in my objectives I see this myth alive today in the minds of my own students. The questions that remain are: Where are all the mestizo cowboys in Hollywood's famous Westerns? What does this reveal about the representation of Latin American influence in American history?
To discuss stereotypes and racism in connection with Mexican immigration, I will provide my students with information that contrasts the journey, values and assimilation of early European immigrants to those of Mexican immigrants. The attention in this part of the unit will be on family. What risks did European families face? Why? How did they combat those fears? What risks do Mexican families face? How do they combat those fears? What is being done to help and hinder their journeys to the U.S.?
I also want my students to understand that the U.S.-Mexican border has changed over time. Before 1924, when the Border Patrol was created, travel back and forth between the two countries was often casual and relatively easy; proper authorization was not needed and the term "illegal alien" did not exist (Aldama). Thus, the idea of a "borderless economy with a barricaded border" is an excellent representation of the struggles Mexicans migrating to the U.S. began facing (Carrasco, 103). By the mid-20th century the situation had changed dramatically. Mexico and the U.S. were involved in a migration policy that lasted over 20 years, the Bracero Program. The Program was implemented in 1942 as a response to U.S. labor shortages resulting from WWII and it became the "largest and most significant guest worker program of the 20th century ("America on the Move: Guard at Collection Point"). Since the unemployment situation in Mexico was so dire, many Mexicans came in droves. The Program officially ended in 1964 when the U.S. economy began lagging (Aldama). I will present this information to my students, in more detail, in the form of a scavenger hunt. The National Museum of American History has an excellent website (see Teacher Resources) that students will navigate using a list of teacher-made questions. There are pictures of men standing in line waiting for a contract, being sprayed with DDT on their way into the U.S., sleeping in deplorable conditions at a Texan ranch. The most recognizable photograph is of the short handed hoe that caused so much controversy because of its debilitating effects to the worker's backs. In response to the staggering number of Mexican immigrants living in the U.S., "Operation Wetback" was launched by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in 1954. The nation's negative reaction to the number of immigrants they began seeing in the southwestern U.S. stirred fears of job competition and prompted the government to round up as many undocumented workers and other immigrants and deport them back to Mexico (Aldama). Many of the 1 million immigrants deported were taken deep into Mexican territory making it more difficult to make their way back to the border (Aldama). The topic of "Operation Wetback" opens the floor for many possible discussions in class, including racial profiling, civil rights as well as parallels to the current immigrant raids being conducted across U.S. cities.
The debate over immigration often leads itself to the comparison of European immigrants of the early 1900s and the influx of Mexican immigrants of the last few decades. In an effort to illustrate the similarities and differences between the two groups, students will read "How Grandma Got Legal," Border Battles July 28, 2006 by Mae Ngai. Students will create a Venn Diagram, on the dry-erase board and in their notebook, comparing and contrasting their journeys. The major point of contention, as one historian pointed out, is not the idea that many Mexicans are crossing the border into the U.S. to work, but that they are doing so illegally (Ngai). Early European immigrants contributed to U.S. industrialization by providing cheap, unskilled labor by digging sewers, subway tunnels and sewing clothing Similarly, they too were faced with the attitude that they were stealing jobs, were ignorant, criminal or did not seek citizenship (Ngai). Italians, Irish, Jews and Poles were once referred to as "degraded races of Eurpoe" (Ngai). What caused people to have so much animosity toward the new immigrants? The major difference between these two groups of immigrants is that the trip to Europe was so lengthy and costly, most immigrants came here, immersed themselves in the language and sought citizenship. They could, over time, arrange for their family to join them in the U.S., which at that time had very lax immigration laws. "Illegal" immigration was not a buzz word because virtually all European immigrants who arrived in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries were allowed to stay in the U.S. without the fear of deportation. Only 1% of the 25 million who arrived were excluded (Ngai). The myth of the lazy Mexican is dispelled in the following statistics. Illegal immigrants are 94% employed in the U.S. labor force (Cornelius). Of the 11.1 million illegal immigrants surveyed in 2005, Mexicans account for 6.2 million, or 56% of the Latin American immigrant population (Pew Hispanic Center). Overall, 7.2 million "unauthorized migrants" were employed in 2005 in areas such as farming, cleaning, construction, and food preparation (Pew Hispanic Center). Unskilled professions seen here are a reminder of the work done by European immigrants 100 year ago. Latino immigration will continue well into the 21st century for several reasons: the economic crisis in Mexico, the fact that the Latino immigration is of urban workers, not the rural peasants of old Europe and Asia, historically Mexicans have been pushed and pulled across the U.S. border to fulfill job shortages, and there is a great need for unskilled workers as the U.S. population ages (González, 199-205).
Border Control
After discussing with my students why Mexicans immigrate to the U.S. in such large numbers I want to share with them some of the most unsettling information I came across in my research for this unit. In order for my students to understand just how much of a "tightrope" walk the journey to the U.S. is for illegal Mexican immigrants, my students will read about the recent tactics to dissuade illegal border crossings. In March 2005, a group of members of Mexican legislatures, federal government officials, academia members, foreign policy experts, and civil society organizations (specific names of all participants are listed in the document) collaborated to create a national migration policy in working toward a shared responsibility between the U.S. and Mexican governments. Both Houses of Mexico's Federal Congress adopted it as a Concurrent Resolution in February 2006, meaning all political forces of Mexico support the positions of this policy ("Mexico and the Migration Phenomenon"). It summarizes the causes of the influx of Mexican immigrants into the U.S. Its accessible language will allow me to introduce two issues with my students: The economic factors in Mexico that lead residents to migrate, and the sacred bonds of family that remain the first priority for many Mexicans. As a U.S. citizen it is odd to hear the word "family" so many times in a document of this genre. This report treats immigrants as real people with authentic stories, not just statistics. I would like my students to consider the author's hope that the two countries create immigration policy defined by ". . .respect for human rights" as well as the ". . .prevention and prosecution of human smuggling, especially women and children, and the protection of the victims of that crime ("Mexico and the Migration Phenomenon").
In addition to this report, I will read other non-fiction reports on Mexican immigration with my students. I have accumulated many articles on border-crossing from various sources such as The New York Times, Charlotte Observer, Yale Herald, SSRC, Alambrista and the U.S. Mexico Border, and Pew Hispanic Center. All are annotated in the Teacher Resources section of this unit. These sources will allow my class to explore, for example, the debate about building a fence at the Mexican border. Students will read an excerpt from Alambrista and the U.S. Mexico Border that explains Operation Gatekeeper. A border-control policy instituted along the California-Mexico border in 1994, it was established with the philosophy of "control through deterrence" (Carrasco, 79). The idea of Operation Gatekeeper was to barricade the border in the more accessible crossing points to deter the passage of illegal immigrants. However, the willpower of Mexicans to cross the border is immutable no matter how life-threatening or costly the journey. Migrants were not deterred to stay on their side of the border, they were simply being redirected to more dangerous crossing areas resulting in the deaths of nearly 800 people since it's inception in 1994 (Carrasco, 79). The new routes are virtual death traps for the migrants who face hypothermia, heat stroke and drowning. The areas in California that migrants are inadvertently averted to are "more difficult terrain" and "the most hazardous areas" as stated by border patrol officials (Carrasco, 85). Coyotes, who smuggle migrants into the United States, are in high demand with tighter border security; they can charge thousands of dollars per person, exploit women by demanding sex in exchange for smuggling, and carry serious mortal danger for those being transported (Cornelius). Students will create a cause-effect chart on the dry-erase board and in their notebooks. I will lead the class in a discussion based on the following questions: What is the correlation between Operation Gatekeeper and the fate of migrants? What does this reveal about the U.S. attitude toward the respect for human life? How does this relate to current border-control debates? Other problems facing the post-Operation Gatekeeper policy are important to consider. As border crossing becomes more dangerous, migrants have often decided to settle permanently in the U.S., unlike migrants 100 years ago who could work for wages here and return to their families in Mexico with virtually no barricades to hurdle (Cornelius). Robert M. Young, director of Alambrista illustrated the familial struggles so many migrants face by noting that, "This film is about people who pick the fruit and vegetables we eat, but because they are moving they don't have time to ripen themselves. . .separated from their family and roots" (Carrasco, 160). All of these concerns and many more are explored extensively in "Impacts of Border Enforcement on Unauthorized Mexican Migration to the United States", Wayne A. Cornelius, if you would like to have your students further dissect the debate on immigration reform. I will assign students to write an editorial based on their perspective on Operation Gatekeeper.
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