When my best friend and I graduated from Wasatch High School last year, our lives went in dramatically different directions. It’s not the pandemic that’s to blame. It’s my immigration status.
While she’s been juggling her job at Walmart with college finals, I’ve been home with my parents, occasionally babysitting for my cousin and a friend of the family. I desperately wanted to start college this semester but, as an undocumented immigrant, I’m unable to hold a legal job. That means I can’t earn enough to pay the $4,000 tuition at Utah Valley University each semester.
But last week, my Christmas wish came true. A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to start taking new applications for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program that currently allows 650,000 young people who came here as children the right to work and protects them from deportation.
My older brother, 24, and sister, 23, both received DACA when they were teenagers, and it’s made a huge difference in their lives. They were able to get jobs and put themselves through college. My brother is now a mechanic and starting a construction business, and my sister just got her dream job teaching first-grade Spanish.
But President Donald Trump shut down the program in 2017. By the time I turned 15 and was eligible to apply, I couldn’t. I’d missed my chance completely. This summer, our whole family celebrated when we heard the news that the U.S. Supreme Court had restored the program. We immediately called an immigration lawyer, and I was devastated to learn that the government was not accepting new applications. I was left out again.
I can’t tell you what last week’s news means to me. I came to Utah from Mexico with my family when I was 3 years old. I went to U.S. schools all my life and never thought of myself as different. Throughout high school, I wished I could get a part-time job like my friends — I always dreamed of working at PacSun — but my family told me to be patient until DACA came back.
But when I missed my first semester of college, I became worried. Before, no part-time job meant I couldn’t earn money for a car, a new iPhone or Starbucks. Now it meant I couldn’t move forward with my life. My parents wanted to help, but they’ve seen their workload in construction and housekeeping plummet during the pandemic. To work at the places that pay decently — and are hiring right now — you need papers.
As one of 300,000 additional Dreamers able to apply for DACA, I soon hope to have those documents in hand. As a group, we’re eager to succeed. Of the 1.3 million DACA-eligible immigrants in the United States — including more than 15,000 in Utah, 81% have graduated from high school and taken a college class, according to New American Economy. Many, like my sister, are working on the front lines in health care or education.
I’m not sure what job I’ll get or what I’ll study in college, but it feels great that I’m on the right path again. This week, I’ll send in my application and cross my fingers that it’s processed in time to register for the spring semester.
My ultimate dream, of course, is to become a citizen so I can proudly claim my place as an American. I hope Congress makes that possible in the next year.
It’s funny how teens are told to get a job and go to college. I never expected that forces beyond my control would stop me from the basic responsibility of earning a paycheck or working toward a career. Now that I can earn money to invest in my future, I’ll also be able to help my family. At 18, I’ll be a real adult. And it will feel amazing.
Marisol Cuevas
Marisol Cuevas lives in Heber City.
