Integrating The Study Of Immigration And Related Service-Learning Into Classes

The current political climate has placed immigration and immigrant rights front and center in the day to day lives of many American families.  Many K-12 students today are first and second generation immigrants.    Policies of the Trump administration have produced widespread fear of deportation in their communities.  These policies include the decisions of the Trump administration to:

• end the DACA program, putting at risk of deportation more than 700,000 young immigrants who came to the U. S. as children
• substantially increase deportations of undocumented immigrants
• support legislation that would cut legal immigration by half, drastically reducing immigration of family members of U. S. citizens and legal residents

In this context students can greatly benefit from study of immigration and service-learning that promotes immigrant rights.   

The Curriculum Infusion of Real Life Issues (CIRLI) educational strategy developed at Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago (www.cirli.org) prepares teachers to integrate study of immigration and related service-learning into classes across the curriculum.

• Math teachers can assign students work with data on the extent of immigration and the countries of origin of immigrant populations.  In math classes students can also work with data on the historic and ongoing economic contributions of immigrants and on the crime rate of immigrants compared to others in the 

U. S. (the immigrant crime rate is substantially lower).

• Language Arts teachers can assign literature on the immigrant experience, and have students discuss and write about the lives of immigrants and the challenges immigrant families confront.

• Social Studies teachers can have students study changes in policy and treatment of immigrants in the U. S. over time putting the current immigration crisis in historic context.

Northeastern Illinois University staff have developed a 5 lesson unit on immigration and immigrant rights for high school social studies and civics classes that can easily adapted to grades 6-8 (click here).  Lessons address: 1) the history of immigration to the U. S. and students’ family histories; 2) the historic debate about the value of immigration; 3) increased diversity in the U. S. and misperceptions about immigrants; 4) the dilemma of the undocumented, and, 5) the current immigration crisis and opportunities for service-learning work for immigrant rights.  The Immigration and Immigrant Rights Curriculum and accompanying Reflection booklet are aligned with Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and National Council on Social Studies (NCSS) thematic standards.

Northeastern staff support teachers in bringing this very important curriculum to their students.

For questions  contact 

Dr. Ron Glick, Professor Emeritus and Director of the Network for Dissemination of 

Curriculum Infusion (NDCI) at NEIU. 

You can find information about the Curriculum Infusion of Real Life Issues 

educational strategy on the NDCI website—www.cirli.org.