Tuition-Free Programs to Undocumented Students

Parents Forum
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But the undocumented are working in many cases. The IRS is happy to take their money, as are the states. Does it matter that employers are hiring, in many cases knowingly, undocumented workers? The employers face no penalities for this. Why shouldn’t the children of those taxpayers have some ability to obtain a college degree and pay the same tuition other taxpayers pay and be eligible for financial aid. Kids whose parents are in jail would be eligible for in-state tuition and financial aid even though their parents may have committed pretty major crimes and are clearly not paying taxes while in jail and in fact are costing the state a lot of money for their incaceration. Why should taxpayers who don’t have kids or are full pay at private colleges supplement tuition? How much do the very few undocumented students really cost compared to others?

Found this:

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This isn’t exactly true. The reason a state offers discounted tuition has less to do with current residents paying taxes and more to do with potential residents paying taxes. Generally, students who graduate from public universities tend to stay in the state where they graduated. Thus, it stands to reason that offering selected students discounted tuition, that those students will graduate, stay in state, and work in fields that offer above-average wages that will further boost that state’s economy. It’s why some states offer loan forgiveness or tuition waivers to students pursuing higher-paying and in-demand careers such as those in STEM or medicine. It’s also why the state may be better off economically by offering free or discounted tuition to qualified undocumented students - it is less of a drain on taxpayer dollars to educate them and get them into jobs. Otherwise, the state (and local communities) will likely see an increase in entitlement enrollments, an increase in crime, and an increase in blight.

As far as those students taking a seat away from someone else … that is highly unlikely except for a couple of extreme situations (possibly Texas). Most state schools have admissions and/or scholarship thresholds where a student either meets the requirements or they don’t.

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Because the IRS defines who has to pay taxes as workers, whether they are legally here or not, the rational being that they are benefiting from streets, water systems, police and fire protection, libraries, parks, public television and many other things available to everyone in the community. The IRS isn’t concerned with legal status.

All children already receive a k-12 education. A state might decide that it also wants to provide education to age 22 or through an AA degree or at a tech college, but I wouldn’t find it unreasonable for a state to decided no, k-12 is enough and we aren’t providing more unless the student pays for it.

Colorado didn’t give instate tuition to undocumented students, even those who had graduated from a Colorado high school, until recently. A lot of the students went to New Mexico because they did grant it. Some of the high schools also didn’t graduate their students when they were 18 but kept them as full time students until they were 21. The district would pay for tuition, books, transportation at community colleges for anyone registered at their high schools. The state put a stop to that, but did then extend instate tuition to undocumented students who had graduated from a state high school.

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@jonri, NY recently passed a bill which opens up TAP, Excelsior and other state money as well as in state tuition for colleges for all who graduate from a N.Y. state high school

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I am sad to say that I do not agree with funding undocumented immigrants. There are so many kids in Texas that cannot afford college. There are so many kids who do not get into Texas or Texas A&M because they are not top 6% or 8%. For tax payers in this state, they are already upset that their children cannot even get in to begin with. My cousins in East Texas have kids that could not afford to attend and they did not get much help. When you pay taxes, you do the right thing, perhaps your family lives in South Texas and came here legally, you have a hard time with funding going to families that are here this way.

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^^^ According to Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board data, only about 2% of Texas college students are undocumented, and of that 2%, most are in community college with only about 28% in four-year colleges. So, according to that data, only about one-half of one percent of all college students are undocumented students in four-year colleges. Even at the University of Texas or Texas A&M, those are VERY small numbers.

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The number of undocumented students actually attending college (or what type of college) is not really the issue though - it’s the amount of money approved and set aside in the state budget (and by universities) in anticipation of incoming undocumented students. Just as an example (and these aren’t actual numbers) if there’s $25 million in publicly funded grants, and $5 million is set aside specifically for undocumented students entering college, it’s not as if unused funds will be re-allocated to legal citizens. They’ll either make sure all $5 million is given away or they’ll save it. In short, that $5 million is not available to anyone other than undocumented students.

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It’s not purely the issue of paying taxes that is at hand. Many illegal immigrants pay state taxes. They also pay social security taxes, sales tax , property tax ( even if indirectly via rent) , federal income tax, etc. Not all of them, but many. It does not entitle them to social security benefits, federal financial aid. In some, perhaps many states those international students here legally, say their parents here on work visas, do not have access to certain government benefits.

Our enforcement of immigration rules is inconsistent, at best, and horribly, crazy, in my opinion. It’s insane, imo, to offer up the goodies for those who break law, even as we spend billions trying to keep out illegal immigrants and send those we catch back to their countries. I can’t even think of it, it’s so insane.

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We already captured 400,000+ illegals this year, more than all of last year. And we’re releasing 1,400 illegals into the USA every day, so if you like paying to educate foreigners, you will get to increase your generosity.

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I like educating humans. I don’t give a hoot where they started out in life. I love watching the benefits to life as the mind gets exposed to worlds of information.

Its really tough for me to comprehend the “leave them in the gutter” mindset.

I just introduced my youngest to the movie, Yentl, last night. Birth lottery definitely sucks for some, so it’s rewarding to know we can make a difference. Even in the movie (history) it was difficult for birth lottery “winners” to understand, so I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised to see that part hasn’t changed.

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Education is a noble profession but your “leave them in the gutter” comment is extreme rhetoric.

There is a finite amount of money for education, so the choice is to use it for American citizens or foreigners.

If you want to increase the amount of money in the pot to educate foreigners, then you raise current taxes or borrow from future taxpayers.

We talk about difficult financial choices for education on these boards all the time, I think it’s good to discuss the financial costs to taxpayers.

And if educating foreigners is somebodies passion, there are ample teaching opportunities in foreign countries.

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That’s why we vote. Those who find this an important issue can vote on it. It’s in the state level as to who gets instate tuition and access to state college money.

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@BivalentChomps

Please cite your source on this if you are stating it as fact.

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With the positive correlation between higher education and income, spending money on educating the more capable students is an investment, not a drain. It’s investing in future taxpayers who will pay back more than they drain. Those kept poor by lack of education are more likely to remain a drain on tax dollars. This is true for US kids too, of course. It shouldn’t be either/or. Investment is investment.

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@cptofthehouse I wish it was as simple as voting. Texas has been trying to get this particular bill removed for a while now. The problem is once the money is coming in and used a certain way it is difficult to find a replacement and the affidavit student numbers are not decreasing so the monetary dependency gets harder and harder. Plus this is not mainstream media news not when you have so much other insanity going on.

I don’t think people understand how Texas truly works being a state with no income tax and how this gets funded. Funding for affidavit students in Texas started in 2011 and IS tracked by the State of Texas.

As I did cite my Texas source in a previous post on this thread - 33% of Affidavit Students attended Public Texas Universities in 2017. 8568 students out of 25930. (2018 numbers won’t release till the end of this year). The remaining attended Community College. You can’t draw a correlation between those who attended Community College because admissions to Universities is based on Auto-admit and strict holistic admissions. All you can say is - this is what they got into or picked depending on whatever reason. Auto-admit is very different across districts as are grades/ranking.

Funding for a Public University is different than funding for a Community College. Because tuition is deregulated in the state of Texas it also means each institution has its own rules/tuition/fees. So need-based aid and thresholds are defined differently for each Texas school. (can we make this any more complicated?) Tuition-free might be offered at some institution and might have a different threshold income level than another.

Each institution is going to have target amounts for need-based aid depending on the needs of all students. Think of it as spreading the wealth.

An Affidavit Student going to a Public University that doesn’t qualify for Federal aid programs is only going to receive State aid programs and/or Institutional aid programs. In 2017, the Grant Aid was at 12 million and the Institutional Aid was at 24.8 million for Affivadit students.

Your equivalent US student who qualifies for aid might have Federal aid programs and State Aid programs.

The big difference is the Institutional Aid.

Texas Universities have an Institutional Fund called the Texas Assistance Fund (or better known as HB3015). This is specific to each university. It is funded by taking 20% of tuition (called a tuition fee). **Every student who pays tuition (EVEN if you pay for tuition by a student loan) has to pay the fee.

So for the year of 2017 - 24.8 million was paid via Institutional Funds. Meaning other students/parents paid for Affidavit students full in-state tuition or partial in-state tuition.

Whether you agree or not might depend if it was your in-state student coming out with 8k of loans to cover the cost of someone else’s tuition. (I can’t even think of how much an out-of-state student could owe)

Texas considers it a wash since Tuition coming in from Affidavit students is at 74 million so the 24.8 million other people have to pay (that the state doesn’t have to pay) is still a net gain.

Most people don’t even know this is happening until you look at your Tuition receipt and question ‘What is this Tuition Assistance Fee I’m paying ?’

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It’s never simple. As I said upstream, the money has to come from somewhere, and every dollar used for an illegal immigrant to help pay for college costs, is money not available for other uses. People vote on these issues as a simple question as to whether they want illegal immigrants to have state college tuition financial aid money and instate rates.

All students who go to college are getting access to government funds, whether they are citizens or not, because a log of the money is intertwined. Private scholarships and funds, even at state schools can sometimes go to anyone— OOS, international, etc.

For NY, the question came down to who gets instate tuition rates and access to TAP and Excelsior money. I do not believe the college’s stash of aid and scholarship money was addressed and that was always available to anyone that the college chose.

Texas, being one of the largest states, will be split in many directions as to how to go on these matters. I’m actually surprised that they do fund illegal immigrants, given what I thought was their political bent.

I’m not strongly on one side or the other on this though I strongly support free college for all US citizens— meaning local college tuition to be covered and would like such a program funded before spending money on illegal immigrants getting access to college aid funds.

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That’s the point right there. Spend all you have on your citizens, then if there is money left over you can offer it to non-citizens.

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Actually, the point is investing in both at the secondary education level generally produces a profit. Deciding not to invest in one or the other (or both) often ends up a drain on the system ultimately costing money.

The key for both is investing in kids who have proven capable.

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@creekland - your position only makes sense if you’re rewarding these kids with citizenship and many believe that is what will happen.

When you dangle that kind of reward, you’re going to get more and more people taking all kinds of risks and giving their life savings to coyotes to try and get into the USA to reap this reward. It’s happening as I type.

It’s a reward that the American people never agreed to and when anyone tries to push back against your implied promise, they are labeled as racist and inhumane.

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I haven’t seen a student (or their family) come here yet for a free education. I suppose that could be happening elsewhere. Those I see are merely trying to find a place where they can live relatively safely and provide for their families - something I suspect most of us would want to do if we were in their shoes.

Regardless, it isn’t the academically or trade competent kids who would be a drain on our society, so they certainly shouldn’t be punished. We need more like them. Country of origin doesn’t matter. Provide support for US kids who merely need opportunity too, of course.