Proviso Township High School D209 Board members meet Feb. 15. (Photo courtesy of PTHSD209)

A suburban school district board voted last week to send a message of support to undocumented students and parents.

Proviso Township High School District 209’s school board voted 5-1 to approve a “welcoming and safe school resolution” Feb. 15.

“We want to reaffirm the community that Proviso would like to become a welcoming and safe district for all students,” said D209 Superintendent Jesse Rodriguez.

The new rules specify that the district will not help identify any student or family member based on immigration status.

“It is not the role of PTHS D209 to determine the citizenship or immigration status of any of its students or families, nor enforce federal immigration laws,” the new resolution states.

New rules forbid employees, volunteers or other staff from inquiring about immigration status of students or parents and resolves that no student or parent can be discriminated against or harassed because of immigration status. The new rules also forbid federal agents from Immigration custom Enforcement (ICE) from entering district property without contacting the superintendent and school lawyers in advance.

Board member Claudia Medina, of Forest Park, said she has worked for over a year to educate the school board and administrators about undocumented students and their needs.

“We had counselors [mistakenly] telling students they can’t apply for college or can’t accept scholarships because of their immigration status. That’s ending now,” Medina said.

The district has 49 percent Latino students, according to the Illinois Report Card. The Hispanic population is growing in the ten feeder towns that send students to Proviso East and West high schools, and Proviso Math and Science Academy.

Anecdotally, Medina said she had met students — “mostly boys” — who drop out of school because of their undocumented status. “They give up hope,” Medina said.

A Puerto Rican immigrant himself, Rodriguez said his own experience with two close undocumented Mexican classmates who were allowed to obtain residency status gave him a first-hand look at the struggles and triumphs of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. All three friends ended up as school administrators.

“I was fortunate to learn from them to persevere, and to support each other’s challenges. It was enhancing my own spirit when I helped them,” he said. “I saw how

afraid they were and how hard it was for them. But I also saw how proud their parents were to make the decision to follow the American dream.”

Likewise among students in Proviso, Rodriguez said undocumented students get support from the close bonds they have with their childhood peers who grew up together.

The district hosted several workshops in the past two years on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) immigration policy, that issued a social security number to high school graduates, persons with GEDs and members of the military who arrived in the United States as children. This allows them to work legally in the U.S. and apply for student assistance, making college affordable. The DACA program was halted by a Texas lawsuit, and President Donald Trump has not yet officially declared what his position on DACA will be.

Starting last year, immigration attorneys and advocates gave presentations to the board and administrators about how to make undocumented students and their families feel safe and included in the schools.

“There’s a huge amount of fear in the community right now,” Mony Ruiz-Velasco, executive director of P.A.S.O. (West Suburban Action Project) told teachers, board members and administrators in March. “Hundreds of families have been detained since the beginning of the year,” Ruiz-Velasco said. “Unfortunately, to a lot of immigrant parents, schools are seen as an extension of the government,” she said.

Medina said P.A.S.O itself grew out of a student group at Proviso West High School in the early 2000s. Undocumented students protested, calling themselves the DREAMers, after the proposed federal DREAM Act, which would have paved the way for undocumented high school graduates to receive in-state tuition rates at public colleges and universities. The DREAM Act was never passed.

“We have told students some of the first DREAMers were students from Proviso,” Medina said. “They changed the lives of so many people.”

Not all the board members agreed that the resolution was the right step.

Dan Adams, of Melrose Park, who cast the single vote against the resolution, said the district already had a policy not to inquire about immigration status. Adams wondered if the district’s $4.5 million in federal aid would be jeopardized under Trump’s new executive order threatening to cut off funds to “sanctuary cities.”

“I have a problem putting a spotlight on it,” Adams said. “Now you’re shining a spotlight on us saying hey, we’ll do what we want, we don’t care.” Adams said school personnel couldn’t stop ICE agents from coming onto campus if they wanted to.

“This [resolution] means absolutely nothing and you’re giving the kids a false sense of security,” Adams said.

Safe zones have been established in other states such as at the Los Angeles Unified School District, which forbids ICE agents from entering 1,400 district schools without a warrant. Proviso may be the first district in Illinois to establish something similar, Rodriguez said. He was hoping other districts would follow Proviso’s lead.

State Rep., Emanuel Chris Welch (D-Hillside, 7th), a former board president of D209 sponsored a “Sanctuary State” bill (HB426, the Illinois Safe Zones Act), that would give schools, medical facilities and places of worship the right to refuse to cooperate with ICE agents to detain anyone based solely on perceived immigration status. The new bill also would allow local law enforcement the right to refuse to work with ICE. The federal census estimates around 450,000 Illinois residents may be living in the state without legal residency status.

Medina said she hoped the district’s policy could be made even stronger to specifically mention other civil rights protections, including the school district not participating in any form of religious registry or bigotry against LBGTQ students.

“This is not a Latino issue. This is a civil rights issue,” she said.

Rodriguez said the board would be examining the rules and fine-tuning the resolution in a policy committee.

“Teachers and staff are very excited about the resolution because they see it as a social justice issue,” Rodriguez said. “It took a while to educate the administrators and the board about the need” for undocumented students and family members to be supported, he said.

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— Proviso D209 passes ‘welcoming safe school’ resolution —