A community intervention strategy to increase immigrant youth resilience

In institutions of higher learning across Arizona, undocumented students often go unnoticed. Many of these students were brought into the U.S. as young children and many have graduated from Arizona high schools. Arizona's Proposition 300, implemented in 2007, has impacted undocumented students by denying them state sponsored financial aid and in-state classification for tuition. This has resulted in a growing concern as to how undocumented students and college staff are going to deal with this mandate. In this study, the following two research questions were developed to investigate this issue: (1) How will this mandate impact undocumented students' lives?; and, (2) What are the obstacles these individuals will face when they can no longer afford a higher education? Using an action research approach, a website was created to provide the undocumented students as well as the community information about Proposition 300, college access and resources available.;Data were collected through administration web statistics, a 42 question survey, blog postings and follow-up interviews. The website was open to any interne user, which allowed people from various geographic locations to participate.;Quantitative analyses gathered from website statistics indicated significant activity from participants. The total number of website visits from participants was 752, viewing 3,310 total pages and averaging 6:44 minutes per visit. Participants visited the website from various locations throughout the U.S. and from Mexico and Puerto Rico. Of the participants (n = 299), many indicated they were female, students and Hispanic. Most participants found the website useful and confirmed high resilience characteristics and, due to the website, felt optimistic about their educational future.;Qualitative analyses gathered from survey data (n = 299) and blog postings (n = 64), indicated that the greatest concern of undocumented students was that they could not afford the increase in tuition mandated by Proposition 300. Participants perceived the blog as a place to voice their views and a safe place where they could share information in support of undocumented students. Participant stated in the post survey interviews and the blog that as a result of the tuition increase, students would have to decrease the number of credit hours they enroll in or move to a state that does not require undocumented students to pay higher tuition rate if they are unable to mitigate the tuition increase. Overall, the web site helped many participants cope with the effects of Proposition 300 by providing them information related to scholarships, college access and Proposition 300.