‘Can I just be a kid?’ Students shaken by immigration raids seek help from school counselors

A new school year brings an array of feelings: excitement, anticipation, nervousness, homesickness. Maria Caballero Magaña, a K-8 school counselor in Oxnard, knows these feelings well — familiar companions as students return to campus.

This year, however, she and other counselors detected acute emotional reactions: anxiety, sorrow and fear after a summer of intensified immigration raids.

Families in this majority Latino, agriculturally-centered part of Ventura County are still coming to terms with the mental health consequences of immigration enforcement. Children and their parents express worry that they may be ripped apart at any moment. Some already have.

“People were emotional, angry, fearful, and it affected everyone,” Caballero Magaña said from her office at Juan Lagunas Soria Elementary School. “Because if it wasn't happening to you personally, it was happening to your neighbor, it was happening to your best friend’s family.”

“I have never experienced anything like that,” she said.

The Oxnard School District isn’t alone. Immigration raids are straining mental health among children and school communities across California, a state where about 1 million children have a parent who is undocumented and about 300,000 students are undocumented themselves.

Experts say these raids and their aftermath may also have long-term consequences. Constant vigilance and worry puts children at greater risk of developing chronic anxiety and depression. Those who are separated from a parent face a host of social and emotional challenges.

Instead of focusing on classes and friendships, children and adolescents in targeted communities are forced to confront issues beyond their years, said Mario Prietto, a psychotherapist at Sylvia Mendez Clinic, a student and family wellness center operated by St. John’s Community Health in Boyle Heights, just east of downtown Los Angeles.

“They set these big dream goals for the future, but then they also are stuck in this present,” Prietto said. “They’re like, ‘Can I just be a kid or do I have to all of a sudden be an adult?’”

Oxnard’s summer of fear

In July, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents swarmed a licensed cannabis farm in Camarillo, detaining hundreds of workers. One man died trying to flee from agents. That event and raids prior brought panic into Oxnard classrooms, said Vanessa Ruiz, a mental health clinician with 14 years of experience.

During summer school, Ruiz said, she was called into a classroom where kindergartners were repeating their parents’ worries — often, what parents heard on the news — but not understanding the gravity of the situation.

“I know some of the kiddos that I was working with [would say] ‘Oh, my mom is crying, my dad is crying,’ and so that's what they wanted to talk about,” she said.

Children with a parent in detention told Ruiz they couldn’t sleep at night. They stayed up wondering when mom or dad would come home.

The seaside city of Oxnard is one of the most diverse communities in Ventura County. The influence of immigrants has long been established here. Vibrant murals downtown tell the story of early settlers and of immigrants working and building the region’s agricultural industry.

Ruiz and Caballero Magaña described the days following the raids as heavy in Oxnard schools. According to the school district, at least half a dozen children were separated from a parent over the summer, most often a mother.

School officials called the families of every student in the weeks after the raid, checking in on them and offering counseling and support if needed. Ruiz said students who were separated from a parent were connected to more intensive county mental health services.

Ruiz says she’s noticed a particular burden for oldest children. They speak to her about having to protect younger siblings if a parent is taken, she said. First-born children are taking on new responsibilities, like helping their parents look for and speak to immigration lawyers.

Caballero Magaña says students she has counseled who don’t know if their parents will come home from detention may react in a range of ways.

“You're starting to see a bit of a shutdown in some cases,” she said. "Others are super emotional, and others are like, ‘I'm OK.’ There's a variety of emotions going on.”

Absences and canceled appointments

Around the state, the consequences of immigration raids have shown up this year not just in the emotions of children and teens, but in their behavior.

Children in areas affected by raids are more likely to skip school. After immigration operations in the San Joaquin Valley earlier this year, according to one Brown University study, schools in Kern, Tulare, Kings and Fresno counties saw a 22% increase in absences compared to previous years.

In Los Angeles, therapist Maria Jarquin directs school-based mental health centers on behalf of Venice Family Clinic. She estimates that schools refer about 10 to 15 students to her mental health center each week. As many as a third of those referrals are prompted by stress and anxiety over ICE activity, she said.

“Just in this short [school] year, I've seen promising students withdraw from activities that they love because this fear consumes their energy,” Jarquin said.

Some students have told Jarquin that they like to keep their cellphones on their desks so they can text their parents every so often and make sure they’re safe.

“Can you imagine taking a lesson of geometry when a part of your brain is tracking and texting your parent every once in a while?” Jarquin said. “That’s really, really difficult to do.”

But at a time when kids and their parents may need significant support, they may also be more hesitant to seek it, said Prietto. Most of his youth patients are students at Los Angeles Unified schools who are growing up in mixed-status households.

Prietto says that he’s noticed more cancellations and openings in his calendar in recent months. He suspects that’s because families are choosing to isolate, only stepping out for the absolutely necessary. Over the summer, medical clinics in Los Angeles reported a similar trend of missed and cancelled appointments when raids started escalating there.

He follows up with families and offers virtual visits. Some families, he says, are glad to accept the virtual option, but others are too burned out by screens, a common sentiment since the online learning days of the pandemic.

Overwhelmingly, the youth of Generation Z — a group ranging from teens to 25-year-old adults — report mental health challenges, according to a recent poll from Blue Shield of California and the youth advocacy and policy group Children Now. They worry about guns, about the economy, climate change and discrimination. At the same time, says Prietto, teens are savvy and some will seek help on their own, noting they need to vent or that they’re “crashing out.”

Prietto says he is often impressed by young people’s resilience, but he also acknowledges some of his patients are up against harsh realities. They do talk to him about immigration worries, especially what their life would look like were a parent to be detained. “‘Well, if my dad's deported, I have to step up and work,’ that comes up a lot, he says. Children and teens feel the burden to support their families.

Some teens even talk about leaving California themselves if their parents were to be deported. That’s another thing Prietto hears: “‘Maybe I'll go back with my dad.’”

Over time, 'layered forms of trauma'

In September, the Supreme Court temporarily lifted a lower-court order that had barred immigration agents in Los Angeles from “roving” patrols. The Trump administration has regained the authority for raids that are based on multiple factors, including appearance and accent, in Southern California.

Immigrant and mixed-status households are likely to be on heightened alert for the foreseeable future, experts say, raising health risks for children and adults.

Research has shown that children who are at risk of deportation or who have a parent who is at risk tend to have higher rates of depression, anxiety, post traumatic stress disorder and other mental health issues. These types of events are what experts call adverse experiences — and a higher number of adverse experiences can lead to toxic stress, which can negatively impact brain development and overall health.

A team at UC Riverside compiled clinical data and research on children across the country for a report detailing lasting harms from immigration policy. Dr. Lisa Fortuna, a child psychologist and the report’s lead author, wrote that children and parents face “layered forms of trauma.”

Her report cites a a 2020 study published in JAMA Pediatrics, that showed that Latino children ages 11 to 16 who had family members who were detained or had been deported in the last year were at higher risk for suicidal ideation.

Fortuna said that tracks with what she saw when she worked in hospitals in years past — cases where teenagers attempted suicide related to the terror of deportation and family separation.

It’s the feeling of “I will not be able to exist if my life is turned around this badly,” Fortuna said.

Schools offer stability, and an escape

When students miss school, it’s a warning sign for school counselors and mental health clinicians. Children usually need a routine to thrive, both academically and emotionally – and counselors and therapists like Caballero Magaña and Ruiz say if children are absent from the classroom, it’s harder to notice behavior changes and other mental health symptoms.

In its public education system, the state has been investing in mental health needs, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic.

A growing number of public schools in California provide on-site mental health services: access to therapists, psychologists and wellness coaches. A much smaller number of public schools have entire health centers on campus or next door, sometimes in partnership with local clinics; they offer medical and dental services along with mental health care.

In 2021, California launched a one-time $4.7 billion initiative to support youth mental health programs both outside and inside schools. Those programs include setting up hotlines, wellness apps, support groups and training more staff who can support and screen children.

But while some of that state funding is meant to be sustained — schools will soon charge the Medi-Cal program for health services — other state grants, particularly from the pandemic era, were designed to expire. Federal mental health dollars are precarious, as the Trump administration yanks and changes grant programs.

That can make it hard to plan for sudden increases in mental health threats like immigration raids.

Ruiz and Caballero Magaña remind their students of their open door policy — anyone is welcome to come and talk. Their goal, they say, is to simply hold a safe space for students.

Schools provide children and teenagers routine and stability, Ruiz said, and, if even for a brief time, a space where they can escape the heaviness of the outside world.

Child psychologist Fortuna said there is a role for schools, health providers and community groups to rally around youth during times when they may be feeling especially stressed and vulnerable.

“If young people feel like they're cared about, they're heard, people are concerned about what's happening to them, and are trying to implement things to help them, then that can go a very, very long way, and we can't lose track of that,” Fortuna said.

This project story was produced jointly by CalMatters & CatchLight as part of our mental health initiative. 

Supported by the California Health Care Foundation (CHCF), which works to ensure that people have access to the care they need, when they need it, at a price they can afford. Visit www.chcf.org to learn more.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.