Andres Uribe, NMSU sophomore and participant in the NSF-REU program led by government professor Neil Harvey, presents Eco-Maps to fellow students and community partners as part of his research. (NMSU photo by Xavier Dominguez)
Source: NMSU News Release
July 31, 2024
WRITER: Xavier Dominguez, (575) 646-1614, xavierd2@nmsu.edu
New Mexico State University sits approximately 40 miles from the United States border, one crossing point located in El Paso, Texas, where migrants travel from around the world after extensive journeys in pursuit of a new life. NMSU students and students all around the country have the opportunity to conduct firsthand research on immigration policy and understand migrant experiences with the National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduates program.
“We know this is a big issue, nationally and internationally,” said Neil Harvey, NMSU government professor and principal investigator of an NSF REU program. “That is not going to go away anytime soon, so for us, it’s important to educate and provide students hands on opportunities to meet with a variety of agencies and organizations that are responding to this issue, including migrants and asylum seekers themselves.”
Harvey’s three-year grant has one more year before he applies to renew it for a third time.
Since its beginning in 2018, the NSF-REU program lead by Harvey in partnership with co-principal investigator Jeremy Slack from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Texas, El Paso have been able to train 50 students from universities around the country. Over the past five years, undergraduate students have gained experience working with community partners by conducting research to better understand the impacts of U.S. immigration policy. Ten of them have been from NMSU.
“We are proud to say that we are meeting that goal by providing many students who may not have had those opportunities to do research, particularly at the undergraduate level,” Harvey said.
Students participating in the program are tasked with choosing a topic of their choice to conduct field work and interviews with various community partners such as Border Servant Corps, Kiki Romero Municipal Shelter for Migrants in Ciudad Juárez, and Sacred Heart in El Paso; this also includes interviewing migrants to understand more on their topic and the journey they have faced.
In July, students from six universities including NMSU and UTEP gave presentations about their summer research.
Two NMSU students were selected to participate in the program this year. Andres Uribe, a sophomore this fall, double majoring in social work and government, and Alejandra Camacho, a junior this fall, majoring in government with a supplementary major in law and society. Other students came to NMSU this summer from the University of Texas, El Paso, Centenary University in New Jersey, University of California Berkeley, University of Texas at San Antonio, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, University of North Carolina and Duke University.
Uribe focused on incorporating social work by using Eco-Maps to provide a holistic approach to immigration and migration policy. Eco-Maps are a tool used by researchers to assess and highlight the quality of family, social, and community relationships by mapping out their social environment. Uribe used Eco-Maps to understand how different systems interact with one another and the impact on migrants’ behavior when coming into the U.S. and their overall journey.
“What people are facing when it comes to migration are their hardships and difficulties with the CBP One (Customs and Border Protection) mobile application when applying for an appointment to seek asylum,” Uribe said. “What I learned from the shelter is that there is a lack of institutional support where there is an imminent concern for funding to preserve jobs doing this great work.”
Camacho’s research addressed violence and extortion of immigrants by Mexican officials.
“We saw the repeating pattern of Mexican officials, whether it was police officers or the National Guard,” Camacho said. “There was just a lot of instances where migrants told us their stories about how they were abused either physically or verbally.”
Camacho analyzed 25 out of 45 migrant interviews conducted by the cohort, listening to stories about their journey and hardships.
“It’s quite transformative. I think it’s one thing to read about all of these topics at a distance, become somewhat knowledgeable and read the literature and scholarship, which is important in itself,” Harvey said. “However, it is another to spend time with migrants, with the staff of shelters and to meet, as we have done, with representatives of the Border Patrol to hear their perspectives.”
Both students discovered a lack of financial support for organizations needed to assist asylum seekers.
“What shocked me the most was how little funded the organizations that are meant to help migrants,” Camacho said. “It’s really shocking to see these very helpful organizations for both migrants and the communities receive a lack of funding and the lack of resources that they really need.”
What Camacho discovered during her REU experience further motivated her to pursue a career as an immigration attorney. However, she still hopes to continue her research and become more involved.
“A lot of organizations we went to in Mexico, El Paso, and here in Las Cruces provided volunteering opportunities, so I would very much like to stay active with them and try to help any way I can,” Camacho said.
“Doing research as an undergraduate student, even just initial exposure to research it makes you think about things such in a different way,” Uribe said. “I have interest in pursuing graduate school and so for me, the program has made me realize that there’s so much that still needs to be researched and there’s still so much that can be done in the area to improve it for migrants or people already living here.”
Harvey has been working with colleagues at NMSU to create a PhD. program called Transborder and Global Human Dynamics, which begins next year.
“I could see from the undergraduate level of interest and getting people to come here, spend time, learn and do good research. So, I thought we can continue that at a graduate level or a Ph.D. level. And we are happy to announce that it’s now been established for Fall 2025.”
