Vassar Quarterly - Summer 2018 - 23

Saúl Ulloa '15
West Michigan Works

At the American embassy in Mexico City this June,
a girl stood in front of banners protesting the U.S.
government's practice of separating families entering the country without documentation. The policy
was later reversed. Left: Saúl Ulloa '15.

Erika Blum '90
Colorado Immigrant
Rights Coalitionn
The distinction between refugee and
immigrant can be blurry, says Erika Blum
'90, an organizer with the Colorado
Immigrant Rights Coalition (CIRC) in
Boulder. "Refugee is a very political term-
it all depends on what countries the United
States will grant refugee status to," she
says. Meanwhile, millions of "economic
refugees" come here from Mexico and
Central America because they can't find
work in their home country. When she
sent her children to a bilingual school in
Boulder a decade ago, she came into
contact with many immigrant parents,
some of whom were undocumented.
"I thought they had done something
wrong, that there was a form they hadn't
filled out, or they hadn't hired the right
lawyer," she says. Instead, she found out
that many of them had been living in the
U.S. for years, trying to apply for legal
status, only to be denied. "For 10 million
people in this country, there is nothing
they can do to obtain lawful status under
current laws," she says, noting that the
last time the immigration system was
reformed was in 1986 when a one-time
amnesty was offered. Meanwhile, she says,
many employers in the agriculture and

Ulloa, David Leathers / AP Images: Gerardo Vieyra picture-alliance dpa

Immigration is hardly an abstract concept
for Saúl Ulloa '15, whose father was a
migrant farmworker from Mexico. "Questions of identity and belonging were present
throughout my childhood," the Grand
Rapids, Michigan, native says. It wasn't
until his last two years of high school,
while attending an international school on
scholarship in the United Kingdom, that
Ulloa found his calling. Given the option
to take a history class on Europe or on the
Middle East, he chose the latter because
he knew very little about the region.
"I realized that my understanding of the
Middle East and my attitudes and perspectives were highly colored by the political
situation in the U.S.," he says.
Eager to learn more, he studied Arabic
at Vassar, and then after graduation went
to Jordan on a Cornelisen Fellowship to
improve his conversational Arabic skills
and to work for agencies helping refugees
from Syria and other countries. That work
compelled him to return to Grand Rapids
to help refugees who had come to the U.S.
for asylum. He serves as Refugee Career
Coach at the job development agency
West Michigan Works.
Ulloa says, "One of my clients told me,
'I didn't walk through the desert with my
wife and kids to come to the U.S. and
receive cash assistance. I came here to
work.'" Ulloa helps his clients create
resumes, pick out clothing for interviews,
and apply to jobs in local businesses.

He also helps them learn English and
obtain driver's licenses, an essential
component to getting to work in rural
areas. "Many of my clients in their home
countries have never driven a day in their
lives," he says. "I have helped them go from
nothing to getting a license and buying
a car, which is very exciting for them."
Ulloa has observed firsthand the
current decrease in refugees admitted to
the United States, which has caused his
client list to dwindle from 50 to around 25.
He has also seen the human impact of
policies such as the administration's travel
ban on people from predominantly Muslim
countries. "I've had clients come to me
shaking and in tears because their father
passed away and they couldn't be there for
the last few days because they were afraid
if they left the U.S. they wouldn't be let
back in." Given the part that the U.S. has
played in the conflicts in the region, he says
it is only right that we open our border to
help those whose lives have been impacted
by them. "As a country of enormous
resources," he says, "if we have the ability
to provide refuge and shelter to people in
need, it is our moral obligation to do so."

VA S S A R Q U A R T E R LY

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Vassar Quarterly - Summer 2018

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