Let's Talk UNLV

0:00:00
Alright, welcome to another segment of Let's Talk UNRV on KUNV. You're with your co-hosts Keith and Renee. Renee, how was your weekend?

0:00:14
Oh, it was great. So this past weekend I went to San Diego, beautiful city if you've not visited, and I got on the jet ski.

0:00:22
Now Renee, you know we're Facebook friends, right? So I saw some of those pictures you posted.

0:00:28
It was awesome. And so if you have not done it, I would strongly encourage you to give it a try. I think the family would enjoy it.

0:00:35
Yes, I know. San Diego's on our to do list soon for the summer. This past weekend, I actually went home to visit my mom and my dad during, you know, so I hadn't seen them since the pandemic. And I took the boys with me because of spring break. So they got to hang out, you know, in rural Missouri. And, you know, my 12 year old got to drive the car for the first time. So, you know, so he's addicted. So he's correlated driving a car to being in the country in Missouri.

0:01:00
Right.

0:01:01
So he's like, well, dad, when are we going back? When are we going back? When are we going back? And then the five year old, he got to drive the riding lawnmower. So now he thinks he's a proficient driver too. So I, I just created some problems on my hands, but you know, I really enjoyed overall just this great weather. You know, we absolutely it seemed like we turned the corner and I want to just enjoy this 75 to 80 to five degree weather until that 95 to 100 you once it hits it hits. But you know, I'm really excited about this segment today. You know, we we hear a lot of conversations around the deferred action for childhood arrivals, which is short for DACA, or means DACA. And we have today with us Mariana Sarmiento, who's a dreamer, an advocate, and the resource coordinator in the Office of Diversity Initiatives. Mariana, welcome to the show.

0:01:49
Yes, thank you so much for having me. I'm so glad to be here.

0:01:52
Well, briefly, could you share just a little bit about sort of what you're currently doing in the space of resource coordinator as it relates to maybe the DACA population?

0:02:02
Yeah, absolutely. So I provide a lot of different types of support for students on campus, but I think the main thing is providing individualized support. So you know, growing up as an undocumented student myself in Nevada, it was very difficult to try to navigate going to college, but then also while I was in college navigating the different resources or support systems that were available. So I'm really glad to be able to do that now with students that are at UNLV or interested in coming to UNLV. And what I like to do with students is really just have individual one-on-one meetings with them to understand what their concerns are, what questions they have, and then try to address those as best as I can. That's one of the aspects of what I do on campus. Another thing that I do is provide education and information and training about how to better support undocumented students. So I work with faculty and staff on campus to try to remove any of those barriers that keep students from accessing resources and I also just provide a workshops or events for students to learn more about topics like financial literacy or their DACA eligibility if that's something that's available to them, or any other sort of resources on campus.

0:03:17
Great, so kind of talk to me about your story as being a Dreamer, and what resources did you find most helpful, and have you seen a change now in the students that you help? I mean, are the needs similar, dissimilar? What do you think?

0:03:32
Absolutely. So back when I first started at UNLV, there was very little information about support for undocumented students. It was still very taboo to talk about someone being undocumented or even disclose that I was undocumented myself. This was actually right at the start of when the DACA program was created. Up until that point, a lot of folks were living in the shadows, living sort of hidden and not really wanting to disclose their status for fear of repercussions or consequences. For me, the biggest source of support really was those individuals that were advocates and that would, you know, explain things to me or knock down those barriers that I face going to school, particularly in terms of financial aid and just getting financial assistance.

0:04:21
Yes, so tell us a little bit more about that. What are some of the hurdles specifically to financial aid because we hear that a lot and our listeners may not really understand some of the barriers that exist. So can you share more about that?

0:04:34
Yeah, definitely. So folks, for folks that don't know, there's this misconception that undocumented folk have access to sort of like public benefits. But the reality is that if someone is undocumented or is a DACA recipient, they don't have access to federal funding typically, and that includes the FAFSA. So for students who might want to go to college but may come from low-income backgrounds, they can't rely on the FAFSA to provide, you know, Pell Grants or loans or anything like that. So often students have to fund their education through private scholarships or really things that don't require citizenship and don't require the FAFSA. So this can definitely be a struggle for students as it was for myself. And at that point, UNLV didn't really have a way of determining financial need for folks who weren't eligible for FAFSA. And it wasn't until later on after, you know, student and faculty organized and really asked for these things that we got that change in the form of the alternate need determination form. So to kind of answer that other question that you had, I've definitely seen a change over the years, not just in the culture of, you know, understanding who undocumented students are and what they go through, but also in actually creating resources for them. So about two, I want to say two and a half years ago, was when my position was created as resource coordinator. And this is one of the first positions in the state that's focused specifically on undocumented student support, which I think is really important because we're a state that is very heavily undocumented. About 7% of our population in the state is undocumented, and that's actually the highest in the entire country. So while places like California and Texas might have larger numbers of undocumented folks, in Nevada, it's more likely that a neighbor or a friend or a colleague will be undocumented.

0:06:28
And I know you mentioned the alternate needs criteria now for accessing funding. Could you talk a little bit about that, how students find that information, what information is needed from them and their families to be considered for that financial support?

0:06:48
Yeah, absolutely. So the alternate need determination form is always going to be available on the UNLV Financial Aid Office website. You will always be able to find the most updated version on that site. It's really important to keep in mind that there are deadlines associated with submitting the form. So typically the form will be available every October of every fall semester, October 1st typically. And this has a deadline, a priority deadline of November 1st, which basically means that you have that month to submit it. And because these funds are very limited and are first come, first serve, it's very important that students submit that form within those first weeks of October. They can, if they, you know, for some reason miss that priority deadline, they can still submit the form. And I absolutely encourage students to submit it anyway. It's just that there will be definitely less chances of them getting assistance if they submit it after that November 1st deadline. And so another thing to keep in mind with the form is that the assistance is available for the upcoming year. So say for example, I want to start at UNLV or get assistance for the fall 2022 semester, I would have to make sure that I submit the form in the fall of 2021. So that's really important. And then as far as the actual form itself, there are different steps to it. So first is really just filling out your name and entry and information like that. But the bigger part of the form is actually submitting or going online to a different website to calculate what your financial need is. And it's really important that students read all the instructions very clearly and submit all parts of that form, which includes taking screenshots of the family contribution calculator. So once they have all of that information together in terms of like the screenshots and the form itself, then they would submit it to financial aid and that's how they would get that assistance. You mentioned this notion of living in the shadows.

0:08:48
How did you come to grips that you didn't want to live in the shadows anymore? And then how do you now take that to now support the students that you're now serving? Yeah, absolutely. So it's a very personal decision

0:09:03
to disclose your immigration status. And I never tell students, right, like you have to do this or you have to do that, because it's a very, very personal decision. And people might choose to stay quiet about their status for different reasons, whether they're afraid of repercussions or somebody outing their status to, whether it's ICE or somebody else. We don't really know what people go through. And so I never want to tell folks, oh, you should share your status. Again, that is a very personal decision. But I think for me personally, I felt courage because I had DACA. And I think DACA makes a big difference because I do have some kind of protection from deportation and I do have work authorization. So in a sense, I feel more protected. And I know that oftentimes for the people that do choose to come out of the shadows, it's because they have DACA or they have some kind of protection. So I think for me, my journey really started as a student activist and really meeting other undocumented students like myself and really deciding that I wanted to share my story because I felt it was important for others to understand what our struggles were and what the barriers were that we were going through to even just survive, much less graduate from UNLV. So I realized that there were risks involved with me disclosing my status, but I chose to accept those anyway, because I felt that it was more important for me personally to share that so other people understood.

0:10:40
Could you talk a little bit about your work on the Student Support Network and the Faculty Task Force related to this effort?

0:10:46
Yeah, of course. So one of the organizations on campus, one of our registered student orgs on campus is called the UndocuNetwork. The UndocuNetwork is an org that we started a few years ago and it was really focused on providing a network of support for other students and also just bringing in allies to support immigrant communities. I'm now the advisor for the org and I'm super glad to know that students are still putting together workshops and information sessions for other students to take advantage of. And in terms of the faculty task force on campus, this is called the Indocu task force. And it's just a group of different faculty, staff, and students from across campus. And we join, we get together every month to really talk about what some policy issues are that we're seeing right now in immigration, any updates, any resources that we have, and then just really identifying any barriers that we're seeing coming up for students.

0:11:47
So I'm sure in this group you've talked about how to navigate COVID, particularly for this population. Perhaps share some of those resources and ways that you navigated COVID for DACA students.

0:12:01
So I think that when I think about COVID and this pandemic and how it's impacted folks, I really do feel that in a lot of ways undocumented folk have been left out of a lot of these conversations. And that really does lead to underutilized resources for a lot of our communities. So one of the biggest things with COVID was federal funding and federal release for immigrant communities. So those stimulus checks that were available for folks to use, right, are not necessarily completely available to undocumented communities. So someone is eligible for a stimulus check as long as they have a social security number and they complete their taxes. And so with that being said, DACA recipients are eligible for stimulus checks, and I often get those questions from students themselves about that. So if anyone's listening and you're a DACA recipient, you can absolutely get a stimulus check. However, if someone is undocumented and files taxes with an ITIN or doesn't have a social, unfortunately, they're not eligible to receive stimulus checks at this time. But at the same time, we do have other sources of emergency assistance available on campus. So it's really, really important that you reach out and look into those. Another big issue with the pandemic has been access to vaccination. So there's, again, also this misconception that people need to have health insurance or need to have a social to access vaccines, and that's not the case. And that's the case in any state, including Nevada. So if you are living in Nevada and you want to get a vaccine and you sign up, you can definitely either leave the social security number option blank or enter zeros. And then also keep in mind that you don't need to have health insurance. So they ask for this for folks that do have it, just so obviously they can keep that in mind. But if you don't have health insurance, it's not necessary. And another thing that makes students nervous is actually going in for their vaccine appointment and being asked about their social or being asked about whether they have health insurance. And I just want to, you know, encourage you to go anyway and to not be afraid of that. Healthcare workers are really comprehensive and really understanding of people's situation, so that shouldn't be a concern. Another one last thing that I'll touch on with that vaccine information is about identification. So if someone is undocumented and doesn't have a social security number, they're not eligible for a state driver's license, only for driver's authorization cards. So sometimes folks have concerns that if they go to get a vaccine, then they have to bring some kind of state ID, but they can also bring their consular ID from their home country or their embassies. And they can also bring their driver's authorization card as well. As long as it has their name and their

0:14:51
information on it, they should be good to go. And I know through your work and in all your many conversations and meetings, what are some of the common themes that are emerging in terms of current barriers that this population

0:15:04
faces? Yes, so apart from those financial barriers, there are also barriers in just actually, honestly, I think the financial barrier is a really big thing, but I want to touch on that a little bit more. So there are key differences between DACA and undocumented students that folks might not always understand. So someone who is documented or has DACA, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival, can legally work. They have work authorization to work in virtually any job that they want to. And sometimes for students, this is really really helpful because that's the money that they use to pay tuition. But if someone is undocumented and doesn't have DACA then it's much harder for them to pay for school because they either might have to work under the table or they might have to work jobs where they're more vulnerable to exploitation or lower wages. So that just makes it more difficult for them to even just live much less pay tuition. So I think a big issue that we see now is although DACA applications are open currently for undocumented young people to apply to, requirements for DACA have not changed in the past eight years, which means that a lot of the students now that are coming into UNLV are not eligible for DACA because they might have entered the country after 2007. So that's just a really big issue that I see right now in terms of legal policy with undocumented students themselves.

0:16:29
Any non-financial barriers that you would like to share? Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

0:16:33
So in terms of non-financial barriers, I think a big one is access to healthcare. If someone is undocumented, they don't have access to the Affordable Care Act or subsidies from the federal government. And so oftentimes what'll happen is undocumented folks either have to get health insurance through their employer or through the private market. And so they have to just shop around and find insurance, which can be much more expensive than insurance that's subsidized by the government. So that's often a barrier to getting access or getting checkups or dental care or anything like that. So one thing that I always like to tell students about is about what are called federally qualified health centers. So these are health centers that are open to everyone regardless of their ability to pay and regardless of their access to health insurance. And we have them throughout Nevada. You can actually just Google Nevada health centers and a whole list of them will come up in different areas. And again, these are centers that understand that people might be low income and might not have access to those resources. So sometimes they can also work on what's called a sliding scale, which means that they'll charge you less for services if you make less income. So I always just want to make sure that students know that, you know, regardless of their access to health care or their ability to pay, they can go to those centers. And then obviously, if someone is a UNLV student, we have a student health center on campus for them to access, and that's completely free as well.

0:18:08
And could you talk a little bit about, I know you mentioned addressing policy issues, could you talk a little bit about how the barriers and challenges that you just expressed inform policy work that you and others may be addressing?

0:18:23
Yes, absolutely. So I think that when it comes to policy, it's really important to think

0:18:25
about the way that federal policy is divided from our local, state, or city policies. So while there's really not much that we can do in terms of, well, actually, let me reframe that. I don't want to say that there's not much that we can do about federal immigration policy, but often it's much more difficult to change that because we've had the current immigration system for decades and we haven't seen much change in it. But I really think that what I focus on and what a lot of other advocates focus on is more that state and local policy because there are ways that we can make very real change for, you know, protecting our communities from deportation but also increasing our access to resources. So one really good example that I'll give is a law that was passed in the Nevada legislature back in 2019 called AB 275. So this law basically opened up professional licensing in the state for anyone regardless of their immigration status. And this is actually one of the most comprehensive policies in the entire country. So I'll give you like a quick example of what this looks like. Say somebody wants to go to beauty school, and they want to work and eventually open up their own shop. Previously, they needed to have a Social Security number to be licensed to do that. But now, they can actually use what's called an individual taxpayer identification number to get licensed, and then there's no barriers that prevent them from opening a business. And so even if they're undocumented, even if they don't have a social, they can have their own business and be licensed in that and earn higher wages and just contribute to our local economy. So I think that's just a really excellent example of how we can impact policy locally and make a really big change. Maybe touch upon voting

0:20:21
and how voting rights impacts both DACA students and undocumented students.

0:20:28
Yeah, absolutely. So we actually had a workshop, not a workshop, a sort of like informational Instagram live this past year about what are some opportunities that undocumented students can participate in in terms of elections. Because there's this misconception that because undocumented people and DACA recipients are not eligible to vote, that they can't make a change or they can't impact the elections. And that's not the truth, right? We know that undocumented people have a voice. And oftentimes, it's important for them to be able to do things like maybe voter registration or informing people about different issues or maybe even volunteering with our local organizations that we have in Nevada that do outreach to specific racial or ethnic communities. So I always just want to make sure that people know that undocumented people are not powerless, right? They very much have power, and they do have the potential to impact elections as well.

0:21:30
Mariana, could you talk a little bit about the work between your office and EFERS and the UNLV Immigration Clinic?

0:21:38
Yes, oh my goodness. So the UNLV Immigration Clinic is so amazing and they do so many things. I work very closely with them, I think particularly in referring students to them. So oftentimes people don't know that the Immigration Clinic has free legal immigration services for students and their families as well. So as long as someone is a CSN or UNLV student or a family member of a student or a staff member, they can get access to their legal immigration services, which includes things like DACA forms or DACA renewals or marriage visas, or even just screening to see if there is potentially a way for them to adjust their immigration status. One of the big things that I do with them is refer students over to them and vice versa in case a particular student has other resource needs besides legal needs. And then the Immigration Clinic also works with us in terms of doing workshops and events. So right now we have a consistent Instagram live that we do every two weeks where we sit down with Michael Shamoon who is their immigration attorney there and we talk about any immigration updates that we see in terms of DACA or maybe even international students or anything else really that comes up. And we also just talk about any upcoming resources as well. So we collaborate with them in a lot of different ways, and they're a really amazing campus that I encourage you all to follow on social media as well.

0:23:07
We're going to get you out of here on this last question. We talked a lot about the barriers, but also resources. But I just want to know, how do you develop community? You know, we know that through any process of struggle, there's still something beautiful about community, and I want to let you have a chance to really talk about the community that you've established.

0:23:26
Yes, absolutely. So I am so proud of this community that we have in Nevada, but also at UNLV for undocumented students. I think it really comes from knowing that the people that you disclose your status to are going to honor that and are not going to share that information with other people, but also that we take care of each other in terms of just sharing opportunities or resources or even trying to find answers to things that we don't have answers to, right? So I think even in that, like maybe I don't have the answer right now, but I will try to find that answer. And I think that's the case for not just staff, but also for peers and friends and colleagues and other people. It really just starts with wanting to help and wanting to ask those questions. I think sometimes, especially as citizens or people that have legal immigration status, sometimes it is up to those folks to advocate and to really understand how we can help undocumented communities. And at the same time, I also want to encourage undocumented folk to also step into their power, right, and step into their bravery to sort of bridge those connections as well. So I don't know if that completely answers your question, but that's just something that I've been noticing at UNLV that has been really powerful. And I really saw this through our undocu-grad celebration that we had, you know, that we've had in the past few years where we had parents and students and other people just come together to eat and celebrate these accomplishments because we don't always get to do that.

0:25:04
Rene, I learned so much in this segment, you know, through my core work, we do a lot of work with, you know, in the K-12 space where you have undocumented students, families, and sort of hearing some of the resources has been extremely educational for me in order to better connect the participants and the families to these different resources because, you know, some of the key takeaways for me, you know, that I learned is just the different, I didn't know there were differences between, you know, the DACA versus the undocumented population in terms of, you know, access to federal resources, access to health care, and then also just learning about the individualized support through the diversity office and, you know, how they address and resolve concerns of students in this, in these populations. And then also just training for faculty and staff on how to support DACA and undocumented students. So it's just very impressive.

0:26:00
Yeah, and my takeaway is the robust advocacy that's in place through UNLV, beginning with someone like Mariana, the immigration clinic, the forms and the resources and the emergency assistance that's available, as well as the community that is here that we're still celebrating in spite of the barriers. And so it was just so pleasant to hear that this robust resources are in place, and particularly for a minority-serving institution, that it would be befitting for us to have such resources available. So I look forward to hearing more about this organization, the work that Mariana is doing, and again, so glad to have these support services in place.

0:26:47
And you know, just Mariana, thank you for your courage in coming out of the shadows and having these lived experiences that you can leverage as, as you said, becoming sort of the first professional position to really, within the state, to really work on issues that impact this population. So thank you for that, and we look forward to hearing more about what you're doing through your position and how we can better be better partners to support the success of this population.

0:27:14
Absolutely.

0:27:16
I wanted to ask, so all the resources that you described, are they, are there links posted on the ODI website or where can those, are all those links available on the, wherever the university's resources are for the students?

0:27:34
Yeah, we actually have a website. It's unlv.edu slash undocumented and we have all those resources out there as well.

0:27:41
Alright, great. I want to be able to connect our K-12 population to those links.

0:27:47
And then when we have the annual gift day, is the Undocumented Network with the Immigration Clinic is one of those areas where we can give, you know?

0:27:58
Oh yeah, we're accepting donations right now, so that would probably be the best way.

0:28:09
Thank you for tuning in to this week's episode of KUNV Let's Talk UNLV. For my co-host Keith, I'm Renee. Tune in next week, Wednesday at 12, on KUNV 91.5 Jazz at Noon. Tune in next week, Wednesday at 12, on KUNV 91.5 Jazz at Noon. That's a wrap!

Transcribed with Cockatoo