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Once upon a time, a knight in shining armor rode his gallant steed into a village where he was met with cheers and celebration. I like to believe that these heroes still exist 鈥� I know one named Fluviano. He鈥檚 a student in my English language development class.

He does not ride atop a gallant steed; he toils alongside them after school at the local race track. Fluviano grooms and tends to the racehorses to make money to help his family. Before school most days, he sweeps the streets in order to save a little more.

Fluviano is from Guatemala. He is short in stature, but built with taut, bulging shoulders Each day, he plows his way through class with the grit and perseverance of someone who knows he has no safety net. 

After all, the Trump administration has both increased the intensity of immigration enforcement and the uncertainty about how reliably federal enforcement agents will follow the rules. This, along with many other federal education and immigration changes, is creating an untenable situation for Fluviano and other students. There is the pressure to self-deport. The threat of deportation casts a far-reaching shadow that obscures vision and thwarts dreams. 

This is a mistake 鈥� it鈥檚 bad for children, schools, communities, and the United States.

A few years ago, Fluviano fled his country with his mother to escape the gangs that were pressuring him to join them. His country is rife with corruption and danger from the drug cartels that intimidate young men to join their ranks.

Fluviano is quick and smart and funny. He is just as hardworking in the classroom as he is out of it. The monsters he fights are no fairy tale: the drug cartels, the poverty, and, above all, the ignorance that threatens his and his family鈥檚 future, sometimes even in the name of the law. These days, he keeps on having to step away from learning to take mysterious calls from 鈥渉is lawyer.鈥�

Kids shouldn鈥檛 need a lawyer 鈥� let alone one they have to talk to during school. Our classroom should be a place where heroes like Fluviano sharpen their sword. Our four walls should shelter him to learn a new language, embrace differences, gain an education and experience kindness.

Right now, however, thousands of children are having their academic and social development interrupted by threats from chaotic, amplified and violent immigration enforcement efforts. They鈥檙e also having their linguistic development harmed by changes at the federal level 鈥� efforts to stop funding and the closure of the office that supports those services.

For the past 30 years, I have been privileged to spend each day with students like these. My classroom is always a mix of cultures and languages. Students all greet each other warmly and try to help the newest students. Halaa from Kuwait guides William from China through our daily routine. Jose from Venezuela is learning Japanese from Nobu. Isabel from Cuba shares her love of K-dramas with HeeJin from Korea. Daisy from Mexico, who was crowned queen of her village before coming to the U.S., brings that same sense of community service to California, where she volunteers her time at the local library. 

These students are here to build a better life for themselves. They simply want a safe place to work, succeed and contribute. In 2023, first- and second-generation immigrants comprised of total higher education enrollment. Heightened immigration enforcement 鈥� including near public school campuses 鈥� and other threats to immigrant families put all of this at risk.

The classroom is a place of stability and routine that is often absent in a newcomer鈥檚 home life. I know this story all too well: The classroom was my solace when my parents were deported during the 1980s. I have never really left it as I enter my 31st year as a public school teacher. The classroom is a village where we help one another navigate through the difficulties of life and assimilation. It is a lifeline, a place of healing, where one can become equipped to save oneself, to learn  skills, traditions, history and belonging.

Right now, however, many children are afraid of going to school. More than 145,000 U.S. children have a parent being detained by immigration authorities during the second Trump administration. An estimated 650 California students are being detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. This coincides with rapid declines in student enrollment, especially in California K鈥�12 schools, as birth rates and immigration rates fall.

that at least 10% of immigrant families have kept kids home from school. All of this is bad for kids 鈥� and for our economy. We need students like mine to get the best education they can so that they can contribute as much as possible as workers, consumers, and taxpayers. Our country is stronger when it鈥檚 growing. 

Fluviano wants to contribute to the village, to join a community whose power comes from their voices and whose strength comes from their kindness. He wants that not only for himself, but also his two younger sisters who have been stuck behind in Guatemala. Each day he fears for their safety. He wants them to join him here to be part of a community that builds instead of divides. 

The United States is blessed with tens of thousands of students just like Fluviano: hardworking individuals who simply want a good life, to live in a safe neighborhood, to work to support their families and to be a part of building a thriving community. All they want is the American dream. 

These students will grow up to be the building blocks of our society: engineers, lawyers, construction workers, firefighters, gardeners, homemakers and maybe even teachers, like myself. Helping students like Fluviano is helping ourselves.Their quest is not to save but to give them the opportunity.

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