immigrationIt’s a well-known fact that Goshen, IN, draws in a number of undocumented immigrants. The Record does its best to cover the events and issues surrounding immigration in the GC community.
It’s a well-known fact that Goshen, IN, draws in a number of undocumented immigrants. The Record does its best to cover the events and issues surrounding immigration in the GC community.
October 11, 2012
Urrea to speak on borders
Luis Urrea, a Mexican-American poet, author and novelist, will speak in convocation this Monday, Oct. 15. Urrea has authored 14 books, including mysteries, historical novels and non-fiction narratives. Urrea, who was born to a Mexican father and an American mother, often writes on issues of love and loss through a dual-culture perspective. Last spring, students in Ann Hostetler’s Latino Literature class read Urrea's “The Devil’s Highway,” a 2005 Pulitzer finalist in non-fiction writing. The novel follows 26 Mexican men as they travel through the Arizona dessert. The men encounter heat, Border Patrol and for some, death. Steph Swartzendruber, a senior,...
March 28, 2012
Undocumented immigrant shares her story on stage
At the C. Henry Smith Peace Oratorical Contest at Goshen College this year, Aranza Torres stood on the Umble Center stage alone, about to reveal her most intimate secret to a crowd of 300 students, faculty and staff, and community residents. Her hands were shaking, but not from simple stage fright. It was the fear of revealing a secret that might put her life in jeopardy. With the words “Our DREAMs can’t wait” cast in large letters on the screen behind her, Torres announced that she was living in the United States illegally. That night, she went on to advocate...
November 16, 2011
Goshen student from Nigeria becomes U.S. citizen
After waiting six years and traveling roughly 6,000 miles, Idris O. Busari, a junior broadcasting and public relations major from Nigeria, became a United States citizen on Nov. 4. Busari's journey toward American citizenship started about six years ago when he met his future wife, Erica, online. At the time Busari was in Nigeria, but as they got to know each other better she traveled from the U.S. to meet him in person. Over the next few years, Erica visited Nigeria four or five more times. After her last visit she filed the correct paperwork to get Busari to the U.S....
November 2, 2011
Fall mainstage examines hardships of immigration
Arthur Miller’s “A View from the Bridge” will be performed in the Umble Center for the following two weekends. The show, presented by the Goshen College Theater department, will showcase theater students’ talents. The play has six different show times during two weekends. On Friday and Saturday of both weeks, the show will start at 8 p.m. On the two Sundays, the show will start at 3 p.m. and this Sunday’s show will feature an ASL translation. “A View from the Bridge” is one of Arthur Miller’s less recognized works. Written in 1955, the play is classified as a modern...
October 26, 2011
GC students DREAM big
Goshen College first-year students Yesenia Orellana and Aranza Torres became fast friends during a summer program that helps Goshen students prepare for the transition to college. The two young Latino women found that they both knew people who were struggling with being undocumented. “We felt very lucky to have the opportunity to attend college when we knew that there were many of the 65,000 undocumented students that graduate [high school] every year that would not be able to attend college like us,” Orellana said. When Orellana talked to a local Elkhart County group, Indiana’s Dream Initative, she heard about the DREAM...
October 27, 2010
Flores calls for solidary through observing, hearing others
Anton Flores shared the reason he walked away from a career as a tenured professor to a lifestyle of solidarity with immigrants in a special chapel on Wednesday morning. Flores, a former social work professor from La Grange, Ga., likened his calling to Exodus 3:1-10, highlighting that God “observed the misery of his people in Egypt and heard their cry.” “The first step of a call to solidarity is to observe misery,” said Flores. For him, his moment of observation began when he and his wife decided to adopt a son from Guatemala. Their eyes were opened to the...
October 14, 2010
Speaker, activist Anton Flores to speak at GC
Speaker, teacher and activist Anton Flores, “a prophetic voice of justice for immigrants,” will be on campus Oct. 27 - 29. Flores will present a special chapel at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 27 and again in chapel on Friday morning, Oct. 29 at 10 a.m. Both chapel events will take place in the Church-Chapel, and Flores will visit with other campus groups as well. Four years ago, Flores left the security of his job as professor at LaGrange College (Ga.), to live in solidarity with undocumented immigrants. In order to get to know the Hispanic community better, Flores opened...
April 21, 2010
Goshen students walk in solidarity for Dream Act
This past spring break, 11 Goshen College students traveled to LeGrange, Georgia to show their support for the Dream Act, an immigration reform bill by walking alongside the "Dream Walkers" for 10 miles. The Dream Walkers walk 1,500 miles each year from Miami, Florida to Washington, D.C. to bring a voice to immigrant students who are unable to attend college because they are undocumented. For the Goshen students it was a chance to show support for underprivileged peers. Emma Brooks, a first-year, said, “they are amazingly smart and talented individuals that cannot succeed because of where they were born, while...
March 11, 2010
Nieto rallying for the DREAM
Many students are rallying around a national reform bill, the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act (DREAM Act). The bill will reach Washington, D.C. on May 1 and several Goshen College students plan to be there. The aim of the DREAM Act is to aid minors brought by their parents to the U. S. as undocumented immigrants, in attaining the opportunities that their peers have: things like a high school diploma, college degree and the potential to work in the U. S., things you cannot do without a social security number. If the DREAM Act passes it would...
March 25, 2009
CITL presents Goshen immigration research
With a large number of local immigrants, it only seems fitting that Goshen College would be leading the way in research and studies on immigrants. On Thursday, the Center for Intercultural Teaching and Learning's Lynda Nyce and Jerrell Richer's International Economics class presented their findings from research on local immigration trends. Nyce, a visiting research fellow from Bluffton College, discussed her ongoing research through a grant from CITL in her presentation, "Transnational Migration in the Goshen Context: Implications for Higher Education." A native of Goshen and professor of sociology at Bluffton, Nyce was interested in coming back to study her...
February 11, 2009
Immigration tax: a response
Letter to the editor: I found Annalisa Harder's article "Alumnus proposes Goshen immigration tax," which appeared in the Jan. 29 issue of the Record, to be unclear on several points and inaccurate on several others. After identifying these and my concerns with this tax, I offer some other suggestions for improving the lives of the many undocumented immigrants living among us. The first unclear aspect in the article was the interchangeable use of "illegal immigrants" (used once) and "immigrant(s)" (used 12 times). What is at issue is that some immigrants have documents recognized by the federal government for employment and...
January 28, 2009
Alumnus proposes Goshen immigration tax
Miguel Cruz, a Goshen College alumnus, is working on a tax to benefit immigrants, the economy and the local government. An article in the Elkhart Truth published last week described illegal immigrants lying about their number of dependents when they file their W-2s. This has resulted in Goshen receiving less money from the state because Goshen can’t prove the actual population. According to Miguel Cruz, immigrants are actually encouraged to make the exaggerations by their employers. Cruz, along with Charles Mumaw, are proposing a flat tax for immigrants in which half of the money would be set aside and refunded...