As students prepare to go back to school, Tucson’s largest school district is taking a look at whether it is responsible for educating hundreds of immigrant children who have been separated from their parents after illegally crossing the border.
The question of whether TUSD has the responsibility or authority to educate the children being held in a detention facility within the district’s boundaries has been posed by Governing Board Member Kristel Foster and will be discussed at a meeting on Tuesday, July 24.
“We have a responsibility to educate kids in our district, and we have to find out if we have a right (to educate the detained immigrant children),” Foster said.
An estimated 300 detained minors are being held at a facility formerly used as a hotel and student housing at 1601 N. Oracle Road.
“If that were an apartment complex, those kids would be going to a TUSD school. They’re living there, but they’re not getting schooling,” she said.
It’s unclear what kind of education the students are receiving under the care of Southwest Key, a nonprofit that contracts with the federal government to house the young detainees.
The organization does not operate a charter school, and state Department of Education records show Estrella Del Norte, the Tucson facility run by Southwest Key, is listed as a “residential child care institution,” not a school.
Dan Godzich, associate superintendent at the Arizona Department of Education, said the department has been barred from entering the facility — as have reporters and the public.
“The Arizona Department of Education is not aware of whether Southwest Key is or isn’t providing educational services to these children. We haven’t been allowed in,” he said.
But Southwest Key is advertising online for several teacher openings at its Tucson facility.
The positions require teachers to be bilingual, have a bachelor’s degree in education or a related field and one year of paid or unpaid experience working with youth. The positions require a background check or fingerprint clearance, but do not require a teaching certificate.
Those who have been inside say it’s unclear whether the facility is following state and federal education laws and teaching to Arizona standards or merely engaged in long-term babysitting.
Democratic Rep. Kirsten Engel of Tucson was among a small group of lawmakers who recently got a glimpse inside the Tucson facility on a sanctioned, guided tour.
She said she was told that there are 16 teachers on staff who work directly for Southwest Key.
The students she saw were separated by age and English ability in groups of about 25. The facility claimed to offer instruction in English, math, science, social studies and physical education, although Engel said she saw little proof of that in her brief visit.
“It hardly seemed like a school. They’re taking these hotel rooms that have been converted to classrooms, and there’s no library, there’s no counselors, there’s no gymnasium. … There were no books,” she said.
She and a handful of other lawmakers were allowed to watch a group of teenage students for only a few minutes as they held small personal white boards, practicing writing in English.
“They had to learn how to write in English, ‘Do you want to be in the United States?’” she said.
Democratic Rep. Kelly Butler of Phoenix also visited the facility and remembered the students being taught the sentence, “I want to see my family.”
She said she asked about curriculum and was told it mostly focused on English instruction. But she didn’t see the curriculum or any textbooks and couldn’t get information about how the teachers are paid or answers to a host of other questions she asked.
“It’s really hard to get information, both because Southwest Key is a contractor, and you’re dealing with HHS (the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) and ORR (the Office of Refugee Resettlement). And everybody says you have to talk to the other guy,” she said.
Representatives from Southwest Key, HHS and ORR did not return calls for comment on Friday.
Butler said she doubted that the children were receiving a real education and worried about the ability of the staff to take care of students with special needs.
“I would be very surprised if Southwest Key is meeting the needs of all the children they’re receiving,” she said.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1982 that school districts have a responsibility to educate all children within their boundaries who enroll, regardless of immigration status.
But it’s less clear what obligation districts have to go out and rustle up students who aren’t presented to them, and what authority a district would have to demand access to educate students in federal custody through a third party, according to Chris Kotterman, director of government relations at the Arizona School Boards Association.
“I don’t know if TUSD could force the federal government to make those students available to them, although this really raises an interesting question about what the district’s obligation is,” he said.
Kotterman said similar questions came up when he worked at the Arizona Department of Education in the summer of 2014, when there was a surge of unaccompanied minors illegally entering the United States, many of whom were held in detention facilities.
“We asked these questions, but by the time school started up again, most of those kids had been placed with sponsors,” he said.
The current situation is different because the children are being held for a longer time, he said.
President Trump’s administration began a zero-tolerance policy in April. The policy called for prosecuting all adults who enter the country illegally, meaning when parents enter the United States illegally with their children, the parents are referred for prosecution, while thousands of children have been turned over to the Department of Health and Human Services and sent to shelters like the one in Tucson until they are released to relatives.
On June 20, Trump signed an executive order that stopped separations. And in response to a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, a federal judge ordered all children who were detained under the policy to be reunited with their families by July 26.
That’s been easier said than done, however, as the administration has already missed earlier deadlines for reuniting children under 5.
Engel was told the average stay for the children is 49 days, and that one child had been there for 250 days.
And with Tucson Unified’s school year set to begin on Aug. 2, Engel is worried those hundreds of children who remain in Southwest Key’s local facility won’t be given an education.
“They’re missing out on the education that other kids in Arizona are receiving. And we know very little about what education they’re actually getting,” Engel said.
