I did not want to begin with I, for it has a curious tendency to arrest the YOU and quickly divert attention away from the US. However, as it is, I believe that for this unique moment, it shall do no harm…

 I can’t seem to fully master the art of introductions so I will just be blunt: My name is Mara and I am undocumented. I used to think that that reason alone was enough for me to start blogging, yet now I know that my desire for public expression has exceeded personal frustration— It has surpassed my need for self preservation. I am just so outraged by the way the U.S. immigration system so ruthlessly dominates people’s lives that silence...

This Valentine’s Day weekend, students from all over Massachusetts put a hold on their dates and came out to UMass Boston for a weekend of sharing, training, leadership, and organizing. The Student Immigrant Movement and the United We Dream coalition co-hosted an impressive movement-building training for almost 100 youth. These new leaders of the movement were instructed in the organizing concepts of Shared Story, Shared Strategy, Action, Shared Structure, and Relationships, and learned what it means to be a leader in their communities. Experienced trainers flew in from all over the country to talk about these five key principles of organizing, and participants broke into facilitated groups to put their newfound knowledge into ...

STUDENT IMMIGRANT MOVEMENT (SIM)

PRESS STATEMENT

For Immediate Release

Wednesday, Jan. 27^th, 2010

Contact: Jose Palma: (781) 244-3357

Deivid Ribeiro: (508) 292-5163

…And We the Youth Shall Lead Them

Boston, MA – Today, the Joint Committee on Higher Education is holding a hearing on [S. 603] the Equal Access to Higher Education bill that would make immigrant students who grew up in MA pay equal tuition rates as their...

Meeting the Clinton 12

Our next day in Clinton, following the inspirational storytelling of the evening before, we met Theresa and Maurice of the original Clinton 12. Would they find our stories touching? Could they relate to our struggles? Could they sympathize with us and continue to provide inspiration and hope? They walked in to the Green McAdoo Cultural Center at around 10 AM, chatting with us and answering our questions about their experiences as if we were just another group of students. We then began telling our stories. The tone changed. Immediately after we finished, Theresa looked around the room in awe and surprise. She said what we went through did not compare to her...

As we find ourselves in the middle of our pilgrimage to Little Rock and drive through Tennessee, we begin to reflect on how this trip started. Yesterday on a Sunday morning, we gathered at the Charles St. AME Church in Dorchester with members of the African American Community who gave us an incredible send off. The service started and we could feel the love and energy in the atmosphere.

We all sat together through the service, people were singing, praying and celebrating god’s presence. In the middle of the service, Pastor Groover asked all the guests in the church to stand up. A group of people stood up, us included and one by one everybody introduced themselves. When it got to our group, we...

Last June 23rd, things got moving.  We synchronized Dream Act Graduation Day all over the country: The US Capitol in Washington DC, Los Angeles City Hall, St. Matthews Church in Arizona, San Jose City Hall, the Colorado State Capitol, Miami Dade College, St. Ann’s Church in Chicago, St. Mary’s Church in Indianapolis, Johnson Memorial Park in New Jersey, Senator Hagan’s office in Greensboro (NC), Mason Park in Houston, and even a campsite in Montana heard the message of Dreamers looking for social change. We undeniably would have had events in places like Massachusetts, Wisconsin, and New York – but we decided to make our...

In the weekend of August 22 and 23, SIM Statewide leadership came together for one of our annual retreats. The second retreat of 2009 served as an opportunity to re evaluate our organizational goals, set up new strategies and also re-connect with our stories and stregthen our relationships. The main focus of the retreat was to learn about strategy and story telling. 30 of our leaders came together and participated in the two day retreat. We would like to thank all of the businesses that donated food for our retreat.

As of July 31st all congress members of Massachusetts support the DREAM Act! This whole journey started with a trip to Washington D.C on June 13rd. At the time only 3 of our Congressmen (Capuano, Olver and Markey) supported the DREAM Act.

When we got to D.C, we met about 700 student leaders from all over the country. There, we had a mock graduation event and proceeded to go to the capitol and lobby our congressmen. After a long day of hard work in D.C we were able able to get three more co-sponsors (Delahunt, Frank, McGovern) for the DREAM Act.

Whithin two days of being back in Massachusetts, we got an e-mail from...