The Florida Board of Governors this week took a step toward barring undocumented students from admission to the state system\u2019s 12 public universities.<\/p>\n
A proposed rule, discussed Thursday by the board\u2019s academic affairs committee, would block these students from enrolling, unless institutions already admitted \u201call academically qualified applicants,\u201d starting in the 2027\u201328 academic year. The committee adopted a version of the proposal<\/a>, but the rule still needs approval from the full Board of Governors. <\/p>\n The rule would be a blow to thousands of noncitizen students in the state. An estimated 8,000 undocumented students graduate from high school in Florida annually, and over 49,000 undocumented students are enrolled in Florida colleges, according to the Higher Ed Immigration Portal<\/a>.<\/p>\n While current students wouldn\u2019t be affected, new students would be blocked form enrolling if they\u2019re \u201cpresent in the United States unlawfully,\u201d according to the current proposal. The committee lightly tweaked the proposal\u2019s language to clarify students studying online at Florida universities from other countries would be permitted to do so. Otherwise, the issue prompted little debate among board members. The public has 14 days to comment on the proposal. The next regular board meeting is in September.<\/p>\n Diego S\u00e1nchez, vice president of policy and strategy at the Presidents\u2019 Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, said the proposal doesn\u2019t make clear what it means for universities to have already admitted all \u201cqualified applicants\u201d or how the system plans to define and verify who\u2019s lawfully present.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s going to create a lot of confusion, not only for students and families,\u201d but also institutions, S\u00e1nchez said. The policy \u201ccould potentially create inconsistent implementation across the public university system.\u201d<\/p>\n Jared Nordlund, Florida state director at UnidosUS, an immigrant-advocacy organization, said he expects the rule\u2014if approved\u2014to function as an all-out ban on undocumented students.<\/p>\n Alexander Lambridis, a junior at Florida Atlantic University, told board members that the policy was \u201cshameful.\u201d<\/p>\n The proposed rule \u201csimply reads like an eviction notice to the American dream,\u201d Lambridis said during the meeting\u2019s public comment portion. <\/p>\n Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis threw his support behind the proposal at a press conference<\/a> Wednesday. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m fully supportive of it,\u201d he said. \u201cI think what they\u2019re doing is the right thing to do. I think it\u2019s putting the students in Florida who are growing up here going to our schools, Florida residents, it\u2019s putting them first.\u201d<\/p>\n Broader Ban Looms<\/p>\n The state\u2019s universities aren\u2019t the only Florida institutions that could soon become off-limits to undocumented students.<\/p>\n The State Board of Education, which oversees 28 state colleges, plans to consider a similar proposal<\/a> at a June 30 meeting; the new rule would allow only those \u201clawfully present\u201d in the country to enroll at state colleges and in adult education programs.<\/p>\n S\u00e1nchez is concerned the State Board of Education is using the administrative rule-making process to make a major policy shift when its general purpose is to implement laws, not create new ones.<\/p>\n And state lawmakers have struggled to get a ban like the ones both boards are considering passed and signed into law. <\/p>\n Florida state Sen. Erin Grall tried this year to push forward legislation<\/a> to prevent noncitizens from enrolling in state higher ed institutions, but the bill stalled in committee. Former state Sen. Randy Fine, now a U.S. representative, also introduced a bill last year that would have banned undocumented students from enrolling in competitive universities, those with acceptance rates of less than 85\u00a0percent, but it was withdrawn from consideration<\/a>.<\/p>\n Nordlund said the repeated legislative failure \u201ctells you that it\u2019s unpopular with people here on the ground. It didn\u2019t really have any legs at all.\u201d<\/p>\n If both proposals pass, he said, undocumented students graduating high school in the state would be left with few choices: attend online programs or Florida private institutions or leave the state. He\u2019s heard some students are intent on leaving, a loss of \u201chomegrown talent\u201d for Florida\u2019s economy and aging workforce and a drop in tuition dollars for Florida higher ed institutions.<\/p>\n \u201cThese kids, they\u2019ve been here their entire life,\u201d Nordlund said. \u201cThe fact that we\u2019ve not found ways to make their economic future brighter out there when we actually need them\u00a0\u2026 it shows you just how backwards the state leaders are.\u201d<\/p>\n Gaby Pacheco, president and CEO of TheDream.US, a scholarship provider for undocumented students, said in a statement<\/a> that the organization\u2019s Florida scholarship recipients and alumni came to the U.S. at age 6 on average. She called efforts to limit these students\u2019 enrollment \u201ccruel and counterproductive,\u201d noting that alumni have gone on to become nurses, teachers and engineers and work in other professions needed in the state.<\/p>\n S\u00e1nchez worries undocumented students might forgo college altogether if they can\u2019t afford private university tuition or a move to another state. He emphasized that Florida has already invested in these students\u2019 K\u201312 education. <\/p>\n \u201cAs a Floridian, my first reaction is why is Florida shooting itself in the foot?\u201d he said. \u201cThe state educated these students\u00a0\u2026 and now wants to close the door just as they\u2019re ready to contribute.\u201d<\/p>\n The state\u2019s efforts to prevent noncitizens from enrolling comes after Florida already did away with<\/a> in-state tuition for undocumented students last year, nixing a decade-old law, as part of a sweeping immigration bill signed by DeSantis. Similar laws have since come under attack<\/a> from the U.S. Department of Justice in 10 other states.<\/p>\n If the proposals go into effect, Florida would join a handful of states that limit undocumented students\u2019 admissions: Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s definitely a pattern that we\u2019re seeing, a broader effort to narrow the entire public higher ed pipeline for Dreamers,\u201d S\u00e1nchez said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Florida Board of Governors this week took a step toward barring undocumented students from admission to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":320386,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[18025,113,684,28,30,29,18024,960,115],"class_list":["post-320385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-career","tag-education","tag-events","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-higher","tag-jobs","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320385"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320385\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/320386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}