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I was tested into Middle School when I came here, so I entered the sixth grade. I didn’t speak English at all. I was very isolated. I was frustrated with my parents, and although I was a kid who loved school and my grades had always been high, I just let everything go. I didn’t want to do well here because I was so upset that I was forced into a life change that I didn’t want. Things changed when I met people who were like me. I started involving myself in extra-curricular activities and doing my best in English. I had played soccer in Mexico on my dad’s team, so I started playing here. I asked my parents to change my classes to all English. I got through middle school and raised my grades so that I was top of everything. I started helping out other students in my same situation. My goal was to change the way children feel when things like this happen to them. I graduated from Rio Grande High School in 2010 and at the time I didn’t know what it meant to be “undocumented.” I didn’t know the actual process of going to college without a legal status, so graduation was a wake-up call for me. I had earned scholarships because of my high GPA. I was offered admission into out-ofstate schools, and I had all the dreams that every student has after high school. But because of my status, I wasn’t able to take those opportunities. I had worked so hard and I couldn’t believe that it was just being taken away from me after proving that I was the right person for all of those opportunities. It changed me completely. I was very upset with my parents. I asked them why they did this to me. I have a dad who has always been very supportive. He and my mom became involved with the community to get me enrolled at CNM (Central New Mexico Community College), knowing that we couldn’t afford other colleges. My mother and I spent the whole month, every day, just trying to register. My old principal worked to get my books sponsored. Some community organizations that I volunteered for helped out with tuition. I started school full-time that summer and got a full-time job at a fast-food restaurant to get money to pay for tuition. I found a small group of students organizing a co-op to gather resources and information for immigrant students trying to go to college. It was called NM DIA. We organized to put pressure on Obama to pass DACA, but then when it happened, I felt like this wasn’t the right opportunity for me. My parents had had another baby and I felt it would expose me and them, so it took me a while to sign up. After college, I became a family intervention specialist. I work with families and students in crises or with behavioral issues at APS (Albuquerque Public Schools). I love the kids and have always had a passion for education. So now I might lose my job because my renewal application was rejected when Trump rescinded DACA. It’s scary. I’m glad my siblings got their renewals, though. My sister is going to medical school and my brother is studying engineering. I have family members in Mexico who are also nurses and engineers, and I’ve asked them if we would do well there, and although they want to tell us ‘yes,’ the answer is ‘no.’ In order to improve my English I had to basically stop my Spanish, so it’s not at the professional level I would need to thrive there. I think we would basically be foreigners. Now that I’m out, as far as my legal status, there are many parents of my students who don’t like the fact that I showed who I really was. They think I am dangerous or that I am not capable of doing my job. One of them told me to go back (to Mexico) and requested that my principal let me go. It’s hard, because I’m the same person I was before I was vocal about my status. I’m doing my best in a situation that I did not choose. I’m just constantly trying to prove that I deserve to be here.
10
New Mexico Kids!
July/August 2018
All of this is especially troubling because I have a one-year-old daughter with my husband, who is in grad school. It’s so stressful that I now get sick and have stress-related health issues. I’m not the only one like me. We are educators, doctors, lawyers. I work hard to improve my community. My daughter’s future should not be affected by my past. I should not be worried that one day, I’ll just be missing – that I don’t come home or that my parents won’t be here. This is where I live. This is what I know and love. And yes, I do feel like an American. I just wasn’t born here.” Udell Calzadillas – 24 years old “I came here when I was a little child, at age three or four, for a brief period of time. Then I left to Chihuahua for six years and was brought back in 2004 and have been here since. When I was a senior in high school, I went through the typical senioritis moments, but it was a little bit more intense because I wanted to study back in Mexico with a plan of not coming back. This was before DACA, because DACA was announced in June of 2012 and I was making my college plans around March of that year. So I planned to go to el Tec de Monterrey. I bought a bus ticket to Monterrey City. I think it was for the 20th of June, and DACA was announced on the 15th. So my plans changed and I ended up not leaving. I had applied to UNM (University of New Mexico), but it was my dream to go to Columbia (University). I got accepted there, but they categorized me as an international student and they did not provide a lot of financial aid. So I thought, ‘I can’t pay this and be living in New York.’ Realistically, I had a higher possibility of getting aid in el Tec de Monterrey. So I went through this process online, through an organization called Dream in Mexico, which was founded by a former Dreamer who left the country, I think in 2010, from South Carolina. Dream in Mexico presented their non-profit in one of the United We Dream congresses I attended in 2011, and so we just kept in touch. I applied to become a Mexican consul last December. At this point, the end game for me is to work as an ambassador or something like that, as a Mexican. I went to school in Mexico first- through fourthgrade. I can speak Spanish. I teach Spanish. I’d be open to the possibility of becoming an American citizen, but I’m not going to sacrifice and beg the government to give me that opportunity. One thing that I learned from being able to travel is that Americans are not seen in a good light. When I was in Turkey and Western Europe, I traveled with U.S. paperwork, but everywhere else I would identify myself as a Mexican and I would have a better experience. The state of this country right now is very precarious, but we are in an election year, so it might change. Worst case scenario is that we go back to square one. We’ve been undocumented before and so that’s nothing different. I guess the difference is that now we’re out and about. I think the activism we see is about Dreamers speaking out not just for themselves but being a voice for those who have even more to risk, like their parents. Sometimes activism is not for everyone, because they have too much to lose. Anonymity has its luxuries, but at the same time, Dreamers now have education, networks, access to resources and can leverage those things. Plus, New Mexico is a unique place. I think the narrative would be different, maybe worse, if you go to other places like South Carolina or Georgia. I’m in a very privileged position here in which I can openly express my Mexicanness or speak in Spanish. I think in New Mexico there is less pressure to assimilate.