{"id":202609,"date":"2015-12-02T13:39:52","date_gmt":"2015-12-02T18:39:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=202609"},"modified":"2023-08-09T13:44:06","modified_gmt":"2023-08-09T17:44:06","slug":"visiting-professor-speaks-on-challenges-of-undocumented-students-high-school-to-college-transition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2015\/12\/visiting-professor-speaks-on-challenges-of-undocumented-students-high-school-to-college-transition\/","title":{"rendered":"Visiting Professor Speaks on Challenges of Undocumented Students\u2019 High School-to-College Transition"},"content":{"rendered":"

For undocumented students in the United States, each step in the college application process can pose a challenge, says University of Hartford faculty member H. Kenny Nienhusser.<\/p>\n

\"H.<\/a>
H. Kenny Nienhusser, assistant professor of educational leadership at the University of Hartford, presents in November at UConn\u2019s Puerto Rican\/Latin American Cultural Center about undocumented students\u2019 transition from high school to college. Photo Credit: Ryan Baldassario<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Nienhusser, an assistant professor of educational leadership at the University of Hartford, met last month with students in the Neag School\u2019s higher education and student affairs program as part of assistant professor\u00a0Milagros Castillo-Montoya<\/a>\u2019s multicultural course. Nienhusser\u00a0focused his discussion\u00a0on the need for high school and college faculty and administration to reshape their behavior in order to help make college a reality for undocumented students.<\/p>\n

Many high school and college educators, he says, have not been trained in how to counsel undocumented students in transitioning to college. This lack of training, he adds, often creates an absence of empathy for these students as they face the challenging college application process.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re not mindful and aware of what it means to be an undocumented student, you won\u2019t be able to translate this concept of understanding into your practice,\u201d Nienhusser says.<\/p>\n

From the Student Perspective
\n<\/strong>Nienhusser\u2019s most recent study examined the types of microaggressions undocumented students face during the college-choice process. The qualitative study zeroed in on 15 New York City high school students from Hong Kong, South Korea, Mexico, and Latin America in their high school-to-college transition.<\/p>\n

The research found each microaggression \u2013 typically initiated by guidance counselors, admission and financial aid representatives, teachers, and administrators \u2013 to be a subtle denial of a student\u2019s college opportunities.<\/p>\n

Four UConn students representing CT Students for a Dream (C4D), an organization working to grant undocumented students Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) status and make attending college more attainable, supported Nienhusser\u2019s research findings with their firsthand experience.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard to complete the [college] application and tax information when your parents can\u2019t help you because they don\u2019t speak English,\u201d C4D member Eric Cruz-Lopez \u201918 (CLAS) says. \u201cYou\u2019re forced to make this life-changing decision on your own, without help from the institution you\u2019re applying to.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is also harder for undocumented students to afford college. While many states grant in-residency state tuition, not many grant financial aid. In Connecticut, however, students must be enrolled in high school for two years (not four years, as the law stood previously) to be eligible for in-state tuition, a policy changed with the help of C4D.<\/p>\n

Being active in the policymaking process is something C4D member Renato Muguerza \u201917 (CLAS) says is essential to improving the future for undocumented students.<\/p>\n

\u201cUndocumented people need to be present at the table when making decisions,\u201d Muguerza says.<\/p>\n

Held at UConn\u2019s Puerto Rican\/Latin American Cultural Center, Nienhusser\u2019s talk was titled \u201cUndocumented Students\u2019 Postsecondary Education Access: The Role of Policies and Institutional Agents in High Schools and Higher Education Institutions.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

H. Kenny Nienhusser, an assistant professor of educational leadership at the University of Hartford, met with students in the Neag School\u2019s higher education and student affairs program last month to discuss the need for high school and college faculty and administration to reshape their behavior in order to help make college a reality for undocumented students.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2427,1855],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2455],"class_list":["post-202609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-educational-leadership","category-neag"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-09 14:55:01","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=202609"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202609\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":202610,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202609\/revisions\/202610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=202609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=202609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=202609"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=202609"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=202609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}