Today was a fairly normal morning working with the children and teens at the IPS newcomer school. I helped Nelson with the lines on his point-perspective art project. I listened to the concerns and morning tales of other students.
To preface this story, IPS newcomer school is a section of another IPS middle school, Northwest Middle School. I had the art teacher inform me that there was a stabbing the previous day at Northwest Middle school which is located in the same building as the IPS newcomer program. The teacher was concerned for the newcomers safety and their view of the United States education system. She also informed me that there has never been problems with violence among the students in the newcomer, unlike the US citizens enrolled in all the other IPS schools.
This entire situation got me thinking about immigration policies in the United States, past and present. Certain groups and people in the United States like to blame immigrants and refugees for problems that the US has created all on its own. They are cast as criminals and that “we do not have room for them”, when in reality we are not very different at all. People need to stop blaming immigrants for US problems.
One of the course learning objectives is to do outside learning about the focus area countries of our GHS class: China and the Islamic Middle East. I did some brief research of an older immigration policy for Chinese citizens known as the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. This Act prevented Chinese workers from entering the United States until it was repealed in 1943, unless they had permission from the government. This experience at IPS allowed me to make a class connection and to learn about past immigration policies in the US regarding China. It helped me to better understand the differences in experiences of others and especially reminded me to be considerate to refugees and immigrants in a time where they are not always accepted with open arms. It has also most definitely enhanced my sense of responsibility towards society and social justice education.