As the COVID-19 crisis has made startlingly clear, the success of immigrant parents and their children are inseparably linked. Providing holistic support for immigrant students and their parents through the two generation approach to education and service delivery empowers immigrant families to learn together—and is of urgent importance, as younger students are already being left behind with the move to remote learning and parents are struggling to maintain a safe and stable environment.

Today, the Education Collaborative addressed the following letter to the DOE Chancellor—read the full letter here.

Immigrant families are in crisis right now. Many immigrant families are struggling, having to deal with illness, loss of employment, food anxiety, housing insecurity, and the risk of not meeting basic needs.

Public education has undergone a seismic shift overnight due to the COVID-19 outbreak. We are grateful for New York City’s educators and school staff, who have risked their safety to teach youth, support families, and feed the hungry. However, on a systemic level, this unimaginable moment has underscored profound inequities in our school system and then compounded them.

Today, immigrant advocates released new data from the Migration Policy Institute revealing that 4,200 newcomer immigrant youth, ages 14-21, are not enrolled in school. Multilingual Learners/English Language Learners (MLLs/ELLs) have the highest dropout rate, 26%, of any population in the city.

This report identifies the pressing need to invest in educational resources for emergent multilingual learners (EMLLs) and their families in New York. Drawing on interviews conducted across the state, the report reveals the unique challenges these families face when trying to access quality early childhood programs for their young children (0-8). It provides specific and comprehensive recommendations to increase access to quality early childhood education for the growing population throughout the state.

Since 2018, Fifth Avenue Committee, LSA Family Health Service and Masa have, through the NYIC's LIFE Project, empowered immigrant families to enroll in NYC's Pre-K and 3K programs. Along the way they have identified effective strategies and common barriers.