Testimony of Carol Joyal:
Mr. Chairman, and Members of the Subcommittee on Claims and Immigration:
I appreciate the opportunity to appear before the Subcommittee to describe some of our family's mostly school related immigration experiences. I am a native Californian, a former teacher, and the parent of a Black child.
During my son's academic years he always experienced a mix of cultures, but the increase in the immigrant school population was very rapid, especially after 1985. Though most of the children in his high school were making accommodation to change, not all were.
A rival high school gang, mostly immigrant youth, tried to take over the area in a reign of terror. My son was pulled from our house and severely beaten. The seven hooded attackers used an ax handle to crush his nose, beat him on the back of his head, and to try to break his leg at the shin.
We encouraged our son to talk with authorities, and then had to hide him for fear of retribution. We became convinced the crimes in our area were economic ones also. These youth were poor, in a community with growing disparity in incomes.
While in hiding he attended a Los Angeles school, and was surprised at how self-segregated it was. It was okay to talk with other ethnic and racial groups in class, but not at recess or breaks. The school snack bar area was Hispanic, mostly Central Americans, the cafeteria seemed to have imaginary lines drawn, with sections for Blacks, Armenians, Tongans, Samoans and Whites. Asking about the segregation tradition, my son was told you were a "sell out" if you violated this. There was rapid immigration, but not rapid assimilation, a familiar pattern in our high immigrant school areas. We talked about attitudes of race beginning at home, and changing very slowly, if at all, and the fact that many of our immigrant groups had lived in societies where there was only one race.
While on Easter break from school, we unwittingly became involved with a group of immigrants who had auto accidents for profit. Though my son was only slightly injured, I had some permanent nerve damage, and a wrecked car. And on return to our home from Los Angeles, the threats continued for some time. He was advised not to use certain fast food establishments after dark. And in fact, it was months before he dared to go out unaccompanied after dark.
Our family was also aware of many students living alone, or not in their homes. These "parachute children" are left alone with strangers or family members by their parents, who remain in other countries, so the children can attend our schools. Often they are parented via fax machines, and are very lonely. There may be as many as 200,000 of these youngsters freely attending our schools. This is costly, and our school districts are already having severe economic problems keeping up with the constant increases in student population.
I believe our schools are making a tremendous effort to educate all California children, but they are simply overwhelmed. Community problems become classroom problems. We have trouble recruiting teachers due to a scarcity of housing and a high cost of living. Our school facilities are desperately in need of repair, yet the state needs to build a school a day to keep up with the influx of new pupils. California needs major financial help to even cope. I see no solution to solve the problems associated with so much immigration without assimilation in our school and communities.
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