Higher Education and Children in Immigrant Families

The increasing role that immigrants and their children, especially those from Latin America, are playing in American society, the authors argue, makes it essential that as many young newcomers as possible enroll and succeed in postsecondary education.

Immigrant youths from some countries find the doors to the nation's colleges wide open. But other groups, such as those from Latin America, Laos and Cambodia, often fail to get a postsecondary education. Immigration status itself is not a hindrance. The characteristics of the immigrants, such as their country of origin, race and parental socioeconomic status, in addition to the communities, schools and legal barriers that greet them in the United States, explain most of that variation.

Removing barriers to education and to employment opportunities for undocumented students poses political, not conceptual, problems.

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