By Jason Ethridge
The Scene staff
President Donald Trump has made immigration a key issue in the campaign leading up to the Nov. 6 midterm elections.
His administration also has taken a series of controversial steps, including reducing the number of immigrant visas, separating children from Mexican parents entering the country illegally, sending troops to stop a caravan of Central American refugees and proposing that the United States spend billions on a border wall.
The debate is of interest to many students, faculty and staff at Forest Park, the most international campus in the St. Louis Community College system.
“There are a lot of soundbites out there — soundbites that don’t really help people understand some of the issues surrounding immigration,” said Global Education Coordinator Layla Goushey, also an associate professor of English. “Even in my own family, there are those who don’t understand.”
Goushey was moved to tears when talking about 12-year-old Mario David Castellanos, one of thousands in the caravan, mostly from Honduras and Guatemala. She said he wanted to find work in the United States to help his family back home and walked more than 1,000 miles with no parental supervision before he was physically assaulted and detained by Mexican officials with no known release date.
“Why are we in our foreign policy not looking into these issues instead of creating inflammatory rhetoric about what’s going on?” Goushey asked, noting that many refugees are fleeing their homes because of gang violence and extreme poverty.
The subject of immigration hits close to home for Goushey.
“My dad was a Palestinian refugee who never finished high school,” she said. “He never got the opportunity that I did and that I try to give to those I teach.”
Forest Park has 250 to 300 students from other countries who speak English as a second language. A few are international students utilizing F-1 student visas with plans to return home after their educations.
The vast majority of students from other countries are known as “non-native-speaking” or NNS students, who want to stay in the United States permanently.
One is Astou Conte, 24, an English major who arrived nearly 18 months ago from Senegal with her family. She is occasionally homesick and doesn’t enjoy the stress associated with life in the United States, but she considers it a land of opportunity and looks forward to seeing what she can achieve.
“We have the chance to work,” she said. “We can have enough money to do whatever we want.”
Many international and NNS students take classes through the English as a second language program at Forest Park. Some are involved with its International Club, which has about 50 members.
The sponsor is Keith Hulsey, an English professor and coordinator of the English as a second language program. The club provides a place where students from other countries can feel comfortable, introduces them to campus and allows them to practice their English.
American-born students also can join the club if they want to learn about other cultures and meet people from all over the world.
“We all benefit each other,” Hulsey said.
While every international and NNS student has a different set of circumstances, many are concerned about recent White House hostility and the way immigrants are portrayed by some media outlets, Hulsey said.
“The current administration is certainly not pro-immigrant, either documented or undocumented. They are trying to drum up a fear of the immigrant to rally their side, I suppose.”
Information technologies major Dalia Foqa, 17, is a Palestinian refugee who came to the United States with her family three years ago. She said they have all suffered discrimination because of their clothing and customs.
“The U.S was not really welcoming,” Foqa said. “Some people don’t like others. They punish people for how they look and what they talk about.”
Despite the challenges, “nothing could have stopped” her from coming to the United States, she said.
Business administration major Suzan Jaff became a U.S. citizen in April after emigrating from Kurdistan nearly six years ago. She and her husband received special immigrant visas, thanks to his job as a contractor with the U.S. Army.
Even though Jaff already has her citizenship, she’s concerned about changes in societal attitudes toward people from other cultures.
“Things have changed a lot,” she said. “In some good ways, but in many bad ways for immigrants and refugees.”
Hulsey said the U.S. reputation as a safe place for people seeking democracy and freedom has suffered in recent years, even among its allies.
“This is a country of immigrants,” he said. “We need to be able to accept the people who are the weakest, the neediest, who need the most help. We should be bigger than the politics that are going on.”