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Undocumented students are immigrants who were brought to the country as children. They’ve been raised in the US and studied at American schools but have done so without any guarantee that their degrees will enable them to work in the country. Obama changed that with his executive order relaxing deportation rules for 800,000 young immigrants.
The president’s announcement has been called a “mini Dream Act” as it mirrors the legislative proposal first offered in 2001, to give permanent residency to certain undocumented individuals in America. And though Obama’s order does not outline a path to citizenship, it offers hope for many Dream Act dreamers with ambitions to work in the US.
With help from several organisations like United We Dream and Dream Activists, we asked Dreamers to tell us where they were born and where they are now, and to describe their dreams and how they plan to achieve them.
Their stories are now available online at the Guardian as part of our Dreamers’ dreams interactive.
We hope that you’re as inspired by these stories as we are. Nearly 20% of participants hope to work for the US government, with a particular desire to work on immigration policy. And 25% say giving back to their community is a big priority for them; nearly 30% say they will provide for their parents. 67% say they’ll achieve their education goals by working through college.
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