As on other campuses, students at the University of Utah have been calling for the school to declare itself a sanctuary for undocumented immigrants, including those enrolled there.
There have been marches, a walkout and a rally at the administration building, where protesters taped copies of their demands to the president’s door. One was that the university refuse to work with, or provide students’ immigration status to, government authorities.
So far, administrators — as on some other campuses — have said no.
This story also appeared in PBS Newshour
"They were concerned about losing federal money," said Marisol Perez Gonzalez, a senior sociology major who along with other students took part in meetings with administrators about these issues, and who herself has Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, status after being brought by her family from Mexico to Salt Lake City when she was 10.
But while the fate of undocumented students is still up in the air, and the effectiveness of promises at other universities to provide them sanctuary still untested, the attention to the issue in Utah and elsewhere has resulted in something much less widely noticed that could also have a big impact: Long-sought additional support is finally being added on campuses to help these students succeed in college.
Read more at The Hechinger Report: http://hechingerreport.org/colleges-quietly-help-undocumented-students/