In January, the Trump administration rolled back a decades-old Department of Homeland Security memo that protected sensitive locations such as schools, hospitals, courthouses, and places of worship from immigration enforcement. These protections once ensured that students — especially those from mixed-status or undocumented families — could attend school without fear of deportation. Now, with those safeguards rolled back, schools nationwide are bracing for potential raids from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), fueling widespread anxiety.
For many students, particularly those from immigrant families, this anxiety is manifesting in their everyday lives. Rebecca, a high school teacher in El Paso who has been teaching for eight years and asked to withhold her last name to avoid professional retaliation, sees it as “a real slap in the face and an assault on everything that I know a school should be, which is a safe place for students to learn.” “You can’t learn if you are in an unsafe situation,” she added.
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Betty, a teacher at a Chicago public high school, who also asked to withhold her last name, works in the same district where US Secret Service agents were mistaken for ICE agents outside a Chicago elementary school last week, inciting panic. She also spoke to increased anxiety in the community.
“I have students who are born here, but their parents are undocumented, so they’re very concerned about their parents,” she told Teen Vogue. “Their parents are asking, ‘What are you going to do if we come home from school and we’re gone, we’re deported?’ These kids are worried every day about their parents being taken away. It’s heartbreaking to hear these conversations, but it’s real for them.”
Rebecca added, “We know that parents that come from or students that come from mixed-status families are going [to be] impacted in their decisions on whether to keep attending school, how they get to school.”
Rebecca and Betty aren’t alone. Educators nationwide report rising absenteeism as parents keep children home out of fear.
Gabriel is a Venezuelan immigrant who attended high school in Miami during the first Trump administration and only received Temporary Protected Status (TPS) during his senior year. He, too, asked to withhold his last name to protect his anonymity. Gabriel explained that the presence of ICE in schools would have fundamentally altered his ability to access education and feel safe. “When I first arrived…I learned that schools were a protective place, and that truly allowed me to grow… I think it’s really unfortunate that students could have this opportunity stolen because I know a lot of families are going to be distrustful.”
He explained that, for his parents, who are still waiting to hear back on their asylum case, the rollback of school protections would have made it impossible for them to feel safe taking him to and from school. The fear of enforcement, he said, would have forced them to make impossible choices — between his education and their family’s safety.
Now, educators like Rebecca and Betty are grappling with how to keep their students safe. Rebecca explained, “We’re all having to decide what we’re going to do in a moment where we’re sort of the last person standing between a kid who should be learning in their classroom and an immigration official who’s there to take that right away from them.” She shared that these situations felt similar to asking herself what she would do in the event of a mass shooting: “And I think that that’s why, as terrible as it is, teachers are kind of prepared for this moment, in a way, because we’ve always had to think of that worst-case scenario.”
Betty shared, “If ICE showed up at our school, there is absolutely no way I wouldn’t do my job to protect my students. You’re not coming into my room [without] a signed warrant from a federal judge.”
“I can envision myself accompanying my student, like, down to some sort of legal office or something if they need me to. That’s what I’m willing to do as a teacher,” Rebecca added.
It’s also become essential for them to educate themselves and their students about their rights. “I told my students, I said, ‘Hey, I printed this out. I put this up here. These are your rights... If you would like to come up and take a photo of this, or if you would like me to print a copy of it for you, I will,’” Betty said. By giving her students easy access to information, Betty hopes to empower them to act in case they encounter ICE agents. “I wanted them to know, and I wanted them to feel prepared,” she added.
Rebecca also emphasizes the importance of informing her students about their rights if an ICE agent comes to their home. “We just tried to educate ourselves about what an officer is and is not allowed to do. So we kind of learned a little bit about having a judicial warrant and the ability to question an officer on whether or not they have a judicial warrant,” she explained.
Jennifer Babaie, an attorney at Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, a legal nonprofit for immigrants in El Paso, underscores the critical role of education in empowering both families and educators during this time of uncertainty. “Our job in this scenario is to train community members, principals, school advisors, anyone willing to listen…that they do have rights,” Babaie said.
She explained that educators are often unsure about when they should or shouldn’t cooperate with ICE. “It’s not their job to be legal experts about when and when not to cooperate, but that’s not the kind of training a teacher or school counselor would get. That’s where we’re seeing a real need for us to go out and try to advocate and educate folks.”
Babaie has been actively providing “Know Your Rights” training to teachers. “One teacher reached out to me asking if we could help them provide some ‘Know Your Rights’ training for their students, “That’s the next step: to make sure that teachers are not only aware of their rights, but that they’re passing that information down to the students who need it most.”
Unfortunately, educators heavily depend on the support of their school districts, and that support varies widely. Betty shared an internal mass email sent out by Chief Executive Officer Pedro Martinez to Chicago Public School (CPS) teachers and faculty following a Secret Service appearance at a Chicago school, reaffirming the district’s policy:
Other communications from CPS also encouraged staff to access resources such as “Know Your Rights” guidance documents, workshops, and immigration services for families, emphasizing that schools remain safe spaces for all students. “I feel like we’re getting the right kind of support from CPS. They understand that the fear is real, and they’re helping us prepare,” Betty said.
Rebecca, however, has been frustrated by the lack of guidance from her district. “The first thing I waited for was maybe some guidance from our district, especially because we live in El Paso, and we are a border city, and this is likely to impact us. But there hasn’t really been anything official that’s come down from the district to teachers,” Rebecca explained. Districts rely on state funding for financial support, and officials in states like Texas have expressed support for Trump’s crackdown on undocumented immigrants. (Texas governor Greg Abbott has even questioned the right of undocumented immigrant children to attend school.)
Even as district support differs, Babaie emphasizes that high school students can help their families prepare for potential immigration enforcement actions. She stressed the importance of families creating their own safety plans in case of an emergency. “My advice to students in high school is to think about what safety planning looks like for your family,” she said. “This includes identifying trusted contacts, making sure younger siblings know who to reach out to, and understanding their rights.”
Babaie encouraged students to use their family and neighborhood networks to create a system of support. “There are lots of ways we can use our family networks, our neighborhoods, to be supportive of one another,” she added.
