LIMITATIONS, FUTURE DIRECTIONS & IMPLICATIONS

This research project was completed during the summer of 2020 in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. Rather than being on the UNC campus, this year's MURAP was done completely remotely, as made possible by amazing, dedicated programming. With this being said, I conducted my analysis through the use of a preexisting archive, in part due to limited ability to access populations with whom I could collect original data. In the future, under less limiting circumstances, I hope to expand upon this project in a number of ways.

The interviews that I used to ground my analysis were conducted some as early as 2013 and some as recent as 2018. To paint a more cohesive picture of the current state of school practices, I would follow up with the ten interviewees to gage if their approaches and perspectives have transformed in any way. Beyond that, upon establishing an understanding of the school structures that Latino families are put at odds with, I would hope to interview families themselves to expand on my current work to not only understand how schools approach integration, but also how Latino communities experience and perceive these efforts.

While I conducted this project, I was located in my hometown outside of Boston, Massachusetts. Having gone through the Massachusetts public school system myself, in the future, I am interested in conducting a comparative analysis between school systems like those in North Carolina and those in a state like Massachusetts with a relatively small Latino population.

Addressing the inadequacies in how school administrators approach working with Latino parents must address the nuanced ways in which oppression persists at all structural levels. Reforming school institutional practices is of the utmost importance, but these efforts will only be successful and sustainable if if they happen within, and take into account, larger social ideologies and structures.

Many immigrant parents are crippled by the fear of deportation. In schools, this fear inhibits these parents' ability to communicate with their child's school. While schools expect all parents to be vocal and active participants with their child's teachers and school community, little-to-no consideration is given to the fact that immigrant families fear interactions with authority, even school administrators. Given this, it is imperative that the United States rethink it's perspective on immigration. Dehumanizing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids and mechanisms of border control traumatize immigrant populations and inherently diminish their ability to be felt as active participants in U.S. institutional settings. Rethinking the treatment of immigrant families in schools beyond necessary, but these efforts must be met with a larger paradigm shift about the role that immigrants play in society and the legitimacy of border and migration control.

Any approach to bettering how schools work with immigrant populations, under all circumstances, must center the perspectives of immigrants themselves. Centering immigrant voices in posing solutions is integral because as my findings reveal, institutionally proposed solutions perpetuate inequality and alienation. Upon entering the educational space and being told to act in ways beyond their lived realities, immigrants enter a situation in which their voices have no ability to shape and question their reality and the validity of what is being mandated of them. By engaging in dialogue, immigrant families create a space where their experiences and perspectives are not undermined nor disregarded. While language barriers can pose a need for readjustment, they must not, and cannot, be perceived to be completely incompatible with community led reform. This shall become a space conducive to liberation, validation, and the development of the perception that change is possible and necessary.

While I hope that my work as a researcher, who is not geographically a part of the communities that I studied, has value, the only way for immigrant populations to be liberated is for them themselves to engage in dialogue about their varying realities and how their needs are and are not met by institutions.