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GateWay

Principal tries to keep students motivated

The Development Relief and Education for Alien MinorsAct, which would give undocumented children brought to this country by their parents a chance at citizenship, was killed by the U.S. Senate in late October.

Although the vote occurred thousands of miles away, it hits GateWay Early College High School principal Yvonne Watterson close to home. If the act passed, students who opted to go to college or join the military could have also become legal U.S. residents.

The bill’s defeat is the latest in a string of obstacles Watterson and her school work to overcome. GateWay’s students are from largely underserved, first-generation populations who would not be able to pursue a college education without the school.

The passage of Proposition 300 made it illegal for the state-funded public charter school to educate students who could not prove their residency. And continuous debate and uncertainty over the DREAM Act does not make it easier for teachers when motivating students to go to class, in hopes that their academic success will be justly rewarded after college graduation.

“They feel so many people think they’re criminals. All they want is to give back to the only community they have ever known,” Watterson says. “They’re not angry. They’re just very sad.”

Watterson talks about an undocumented former student who kept every award and certificate teachers gave him over the years in a box as inspirational mementos.

“He said to me, ‘Now that doesn’t mean anything.’ The children are suffering in the middle of all of this,” she says.

With the help of private donors, Watterson has raised $81,000 to pay for students’ tuition for the next two semesters. Until legislative relief comes along, she must continue pounding the pavement and relying on the generosity of strangers.

Another effort to educate that segment of Arizona’s students was launched last month by the Association Amigos Medios Hispanos de Arizona (AAMHAZ), which hosted the first-ever Annual Gerardo Higginson Scholarship & Hispanic Media Award Gala.

All proceeds fund scholarships for financially challenged minority students attending Phoenix College.

Higginson, senior assistant to Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon, is a former broadcast and print journalist for Spanish media. For information visit: www.maricopa.edu/resdev/scholarships/apply2007old.php

For information about GateWay, visit http.//highschool.gatewaycc.edu.