More than 14,000 young people in Indiana who have been barred from receiving in-state tuition and accessing public financial aid will have a chance at a full-ride, four-year scholarship, thanks to a new opportunity.
TheDream.US Opportunity Scholarship is being offered for the first time this year to up to 500 DREAMers — undocumented immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children and have grown up here — in 16 states, including Indiana, where they have previously been “locked out.”
“What we consider a locked out state is a state where, because of the policies or legislation in that particular state, DREAMers have had a harder time or more difficulty accessing higher education,” said David Velazquez, program officer for TheDream.US. “The most common difficulty in those states is that even though they’ve been living there for, most of the time, practically their whole lives, they’re still charged out-of-state tuition. And they are banned from accessing any kind of financial aid that comes from tax revenue. It’s virtually impossible for these folks to access any type of higher education.”
Scholarship recipients will receive up to $80,000 over four years toward tuition, room and board and other fees, while pursuing a bachelor’s degree at either Eastern Connecticut State University or Delaware State University. Velazquez said Delaware and Connecticut were the two states open to trying out the program.
“Those school systems and the governors of those states are basically saying, ‘We’re going to open the door to students from places that have shut the door on them. We’re going to let them contribute not only to our school system but we’re also going to allow them to contribute to our community,’” he said.
Velazquez said he expects once other states see the success of the scholarship program, they will want to join the effort.
“This is a completely new initiative, and there are talks with other states and other partner colleges that are interested in opening the doors to these DREAMers from locked out states,” he said. “Folks are really going to start seeing the benefits of letting these driven and successful DREAMers go to college and the positive impact they’ll have in their communities. We expect to see a lot more partner colleges and states that’ll be opening their doors.”
TheDream.US already offers a different scholarship opportunity that many more states and about 70 colleges participate in, which has allowed more than 900 DREAMers to attend college.
Sadhana Singh, who came to the U.S. from Guyana with her parents and younger brother when she was 13 years old, is one DREAMer who has benefited from the program. Singh is currently majoring in communication with a minor in international affairs at Trinity Washington University, but she says her path to college wasn’t as straightforward as it is for many American youth, despite the fact that she graduated from her Georgia high school with honors, ranked 11th in her graduating class and with college ambitions.
“For the most part, I always knew my status. I always knew that I was ‘illegal’ at the time, but I was ashamed of that. I basically just kept it quiet, I didn’t really tell my friends. My thing was to blend in. As an immigrant, you don’t want to stand out. You don’t want to highlight your difference,” Singh said. “Senior year, I basically just pretended that I was applying to colleges, and I would try to join in the conversation with my friends knowing that that wasn’t an option for me.”
Without proper documentation, Singh couldn’t apply to college, so she instead started working at her friend’s parents’ company, where she stayed for nine years. But Singh said she never gave up on her dream of going to college.
“To be honest, maybe I was a little bit delusional about it. I kept telling myself, ‘I’m only going to be here for a year,’ or ‘I’ll only be here for two years.’ I kept moving my goal. I was not leaving my job; I did not have any other options for work or college, but I just held onto it, knowing that college was always my end goal.”
Singh found out about the scholarship from TheDream.US in 2014, and at first she thought it was too good to be true.
“It was a moment of disbelief, but it was also a moment of action, because I knew I had to get into it right away.”
By the age of 28, she was finally starting her college career.
Singh said it was difficult to leave her family, but she knows it was something she had to do.
“Everything that’s going to be worth it is going to be hard, but you can’t be afraid of taking risks,” she said. “You have to take that risk to get to a better place, instead of just being in the same place and wondering what if.”
Velazquez said he’s excited about the opportunity the new scholarship offers to 500 locked out DREAMers, but he is also looking forward to the day when the scholarship is a thing of the past.
“Ultimately, the hope is that this scholarship is eventually no longer necessary. Our hope is that it becomes obsolete at some point and states realize there’s a lot of talent and a lot of minds that are being wasted because they’re not allowing these kids to access higher education in their own states. …
“These are your neighbors, your coworkers’ children, these are folks you might have gone to school with. These are folks who could do great things for their communities, if they were just given the chance.”
The deadline to apply for TheDream.US Opportunity Scholarship is June 9. For eligibility requirements and other details, visit thedream.us/opportunityscholarship.
