It’s something everyone knows is commonplace, but there have never been any precise numbers as to how many. The Brownsville Independent School District can’t venture to give an accurate guess, to be honest, and they’re not obligated to do so. What they are required to do is to make their best effort to make sure students attending local schools live within the district’s boundaries.

They likely only do a marginal job in meeting that responsibility. The school district is too big, the city is too sprawling, and there is not enough staff dedicated to the task. Should there be? Chisme guesses most Brownsville residents would say yes, but what sort of difference would it make in trying to untangle the interlocking ties of Brownsville and Matamoros?

By federal law and under a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling, the Brownsville school district cannot deny access to public education to a student who is in the country illegally. Access can be denied, however, if a student is not living within district boundaries, no matter a child’s legal status.

In Brownsville, those lines become murky, if not erased all together. Many local students are U.S.-born, but have parents who live in Matamoros. Those same students often have relatives living in Brownsville, so by living with an uncle or aunt in Brownsville, or saying they do, they can attend schools in Brownsville. And a good many of these youths are excellent students because their motivation to succeed is usually more urgent than their Brownsville counterparts.

Take Zaira Gabriela Garate as an example. She is an 18-year-old student who recently graduated at the top of her class at Porter High School, and will attend one of America’s best universities - MIT - this fall. Garate is a U.S. citizen with parents in Matamoros, but who lived with an aunt in Brownsville to attend Porter.

In a Herald story, Garate said many of her Brownsville classmates have no idea of the deep disparity in facilities and resources between schools here and in Matamoros, saying “thousands of students in Matamoros wish they had the opportunities we have here, and (Brownsville students) are just throwing it away.”

Would Brownsville and society as a whole be better off denying educational opportunities to binational students such as Garate? No, it would not. Rules and regulations will only take you so far. Striving for better opportunities, an innate human quality, is sometimes stronger in people who are working mightily to overcome humble beginnings.

Garate didn’t take her opportunity for granted. She’s going to MIT. The migration will continue, as it always has, while school districts and federal agencies work to contain ambitions and hopes within definied borders that, at times, can be easily overcome .

Post from: The Daily Chisme