“Crying is an everyday thing”: life after Trump’s “Muslim ban” at a majority-immigrant school

One early February day at a New York City middle school, a sixth-grade boy sobbed uncontrollably in the hallway during a break between classes. When teachers asked him what was wrong, he’d said received detention. But that punishment wasn’t a first for him. So why the dramatic reaction to everyday school discipline?

When the tears stopped, the preteen explained that he and his family were from Senegal. With President Donald Trump’s executive order banning residents of seven majority-Muslim countries putting immigrants at the center of national news, he was terrified that getting into trouble at school could mean he would be deported.

Jane Brown*, a New York City school administrator, relayed this story to Vox. At her school, where the majority of students are immigrants, primarily from Yemen, she said this type of emotional outburst in reaction to political discourse has become increasingly common since Trump began condemning Muslims and Mexican-Americans from the campaign trail. In the wake of the order, or so-called “Muslim ban,” things have only become more tense.

Stories of children stuck in war-torn countries, separated from their parents, or denied medical treatment, and the report of a 5-year-old US citizen who was detained at Dulles International Airport for hours were among the highest-profile narratives of the human toll the order took in the chaotic days between when Trump signed the executive order on January 27 and a judge issued a stay on February 4.

But it’s affected other children, too, in ways that have nothing to do with travel plans and are not limited to kids with direct ties to the seven listed countries. Whether or not the ban ultimately passes legal muster, its unsubtle message about the place of immigrants and Muslims in this country has shaken many children in a way no court’s ruling will be likely to undo.

Once Trump signed the order, chaos and confusion ensued, creating logistical nightmares at airports accompanied by nationwide protests and legal challenges.

With adults taken aback by the order’s constitutional and moral status, it’s no surprise that kids and teens are experiencing confusion and uncertainty.

Brown said her students’ politically inspired anxiety began to rise through campaign season, and peaked with the first mention of the “Muslim ban,” the election itself, and inauguration.

Lately, conversation at the school’s morning circle, during which kids in each classroom pass around a toy ball and take a chance to speak to the group, has focused on the latest from the administration on immigration. Typical prompts include “What have you heard?” “What do you know?” and “What are you concerned about?”

Since the travel ban was announced, “crying is a regular thing,” Brown said. “Kids were sobbing, especially immigrant children, saying they were going to get sent back to Guinea, Senegal, Yemen. They were totally distraught. And then one kid would try to explain to another kid about deportation and it would turn into an argument about, ‘You’re going to get deported.’ ‘No, you are.”

She noticed the eighth-grade students have a better understanding of the ban than her sixth-graders. Along with age, home life can shape kids’ grasp of its meaning and their level of concern. “Students whose families are more engaged with religion or go to a mosque tend to have more information, whereas kids who have less of a community organization supporting them are mostly only hearing things from other kids at school, so there’s more fear there,” she said.

That the order does not actually provide for deportation, and that it’s limited to Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen, are details that don’t provide great comfort to children. The reaction of the student from Senegal — not one of the listed countries — who feared he’d have to leave the country is a perfect example of this.

Educator and activist Debbie Almontaser, the board president of the Muslim Community Network, says the angst from the order casts a wider net than a literal reading of it might suggest. “Though there are seven countries that have been identified, it has rippling and chilling effects through the entire Muslim community, locally, nationally, and internationally. This is a fear that everyone is feeling,” she explained.

She said children who may not understand the legal details can pick up the underlying debate about to what extent immigrants and Muslims are welcome in the United States — and, more importantly, the uncertainty and the fear of what could come next. “In such a contentious time and one that has so much uncertainty and for American Muslim adults, I can’t even imagine how children are feeling,” Almontaser said.

Sirry Alang, an assistant professor in the department of sociology and anthropology at Lehigh University, studies how social and geopolitical factors shape health over the lifetimes.

“The travel ban exposes children to discrimination based on national origin, religion, and race,” she said. In her view, this experience, especially as it’s paired with societal discrimination by those emboldened or encouraged by the administration’s policies to fear Muslims or immigrants, can have consequences. “Discrimination is not only bad for children and families who experience it morally,” she said. “People who are discriminated against are less productive and less healthy.”

Children like the 5-year-old who was detained at Dulles Airport or those who were temporarily separated from their parents as the result of the ban face the most obvious stress. But those who just hear rumors from their friends or sense their parents’ fear about the administration’s next move are at risk, too.

“Experiencing stressful events earlier on in the life course — school age — has significant and lasting effects on health and well-being over a child’s life span,” Alang said. “Things like psychological distress, emotional and behavioral problems, poor academic performances. It also increases risks of physiological and chronic conditions that are linked to stress, like gastrointestinal issues, cardiovascular diseases, that not only affect the child but tax other systems such as health care, education, and social services.”

Last Spring, Teaching Tolerance, the Southern Poverty Law Center’s education arm, took an informal poll of educators to gauge how the presidential campaign had affected the climate of K-12 schools across the country. More than two-thirds of teachers reported that students — mainly immigrants, children of immigrants, and Muslims — had expressed concerns or fears about what might happen to them or their families after the election.

Erlanger A. Turner, a clinical psychologist and an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Houston-Downtown, told Vox in an October interview about those findings that there is significant research on the negative impacts of both subtle and overt racism on individuals’ psychological and physical health. “When children are the recipients of racist rhetoric, it can lead to anxiety, depression, and concentration difficulties that might hurt their academic performance,” he said. There can be long-term consequences, too: psychological symptoms or even health risk such as high blood pressure later in life.

Turner said these concerns apply to the anxiety children are experiencing over the travel ban in the same way they did to those who were stressed by being taunted by classmates during the campaign season. “Children often emulate their parents’ responses to events; therefore, if adults in their lives are distressed and struggling to cope with thoughts of being deported from the US, similar emotions will be experienced by children,” he said.

Key to his research is that this harm can occur even for children in families who do not face any concrete consequences from the ban. In Turner’s view, the belief that a person is being discriminated against can be enough to cause her harm.

“I know there has been a lot of discussion regarding the specifics of the ban or whether it affects American citizens,” he said. “However, research shows that perceived discrimination or unfair treatment of disenfranchised groups may result in negative psychological outcomes such as stress. In addition to children experiencing increased anxiety, stress, and academic difficulties due to poor concentration at school, these fears may also lead them to have identity confusion. Many of these children may be US citizens and may struggle with understanding how their ancestral culture of origin (or religious affiliation) leads to questioning their sense of belonging. They may have questions or be conflicted about their identity as an American, which will cause more anxiety or negative emotions.”

Even non-Muslim children who are generations removed from their family’s arrival in the United States face their own set of consequences from the ban and the public debate that has surrounded it.

“Children will have varying understanding of these policies, and this confusion could certainly lead to misunderstandings about groups of people,” said Rachel Annunziato, an associate professor of psychology at Fordham University. “I worry that children may well be influenced by interpretations of the ban on TV or at home that could translate into a sense that bullying behavior is okay.”

She says the experience of her 5-year-old twin boys offers an example of how this applies to kids who’ve just begun to absorb basic lessons about diversity and fairness. “We just had a beautiful segment about MLK at school only to now hear of things like a ‘ban’ and a ‘wall.’ It is very confusing and scary for them, when we just learned that all people are the same,” she said.

But parents are also seeking ways to teach their children how to express solidarity with others, while ensuring their kids don’t absorb negative views about Muslims — or come to believe that discrimination is acceptable. Francie Latour is the co-founder of Wee the People, a Boston arts-based social justice advocacy group for parents and children. Recently, members held an event titled “To Islam, With Love,” during which kids made Valentine’s Day cards for the Muslim community, to be delivered to the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center. It was one of several arts and social justice events for children since the election, but the surge of interest in this particular event far exceeded Latour’s expectations.

The card-making followed a mini teach-in by Elizabeth Dann, an attorney and treasurer of the Muslim Justice League, as well as a parent, who talked about Islamophobia. The Boston Globe reported that 12 students at Boston Latin Academy who study Arabic volunteered to help those who wanted to to write their messages in Arabic script. Once the creative portion of the day began, “it was clear that parents took that ball and ran with it,” Latour said. “They were talking to their kids about why they were there, the fear and the hate that is driving these hurtful policies, and how hurtful these policies are to our ‘friends and neighbors’ who are Muslim.”

“The messages on the cards were kid messages, but they spoke directly to the reason we were all gathered there,” she said. “‘Don’t be afraid,’ ‘You are a rock star,’ ‘You are perfect just the way you are,’ and, ‘Be strong!’ They were all like that.”

“We are in a time when a lot of behavior is being modeled at a high level that could very well impact our children,” Annunziato said. In her view, the nature of that impact will depend on how trusted adults react.

Brown told Vox that after the election, it’s possible to balance the mandate to avoid political proselytizing with addressing students’ fears. “We talk a lot about tolerance and unity and valuing everybody,” she said. When students are distraught or confused, first there’s “emotional first aid,” followed by attempts to clarify and explain what is actually happening. That’s difficult, she said, because “what do you say to kids when you don’t know what’s happening on some level?”

She said teachers are advised to assure students, “We will keep you safe here. You’re in a safe place where people will protect you,” and that her school also reaches beyond students to their families. Their latest project: working on communicating to parents what to consider when making travel plans — or not — for the school’s February break.

And it makes sense, considering the makeup of New York City’s schools. While there’s little data on the precise number of city’s students who are immigrants, according to the Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the Transformation of Schools, in 2011 more than half of all children born in New York City were born to immigrant families. Carmen Fariña, the chancellor of New York City’s Education Department, and Nisha Agarwal, the commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, sent a letter home to parents reassuring them — to the extent possible — of the city’s public schools’ commitment to protect the rights of students.

Meanwhile, Almontaser has received numerous calls from parents as well as social service organizations asking for advice on how to have conversations about the ban with families, in after-school programs, and in classrooms.

“Right now I hope most parents are able to speak to their children and say, ‘This ban has been suspended; you don’t have anything to worry about,’” she said. But with the future of the ban unclear, she also encourages adults talking to Muslim children to remind them that advocates and public officials are working to reverse the ban, and that thousands of non-Muslims “have gone out into the streets to make sure everyone feels safe and welcomed.”

At least in some places, that messaging seems to be providing a measure of comfort to children. Brown says she’s gradually observed a “coming together” among her diverse group of mostly immigrant middle schoolers — a departure from the teasing about countries of origin and ethnic stereotypes that she used to hear. “Now there’s kind of a team mentality at this point, like we’re in this together,” she said.

Through her work with Wee the People, Latour says she’s observed that “well-meaning white parents who have defaulted to very general messages in their parenting — ‘We’re all the same,’ ‘Be nice,’ etc. — are feeling a sense of urgency to get really clear with their kids about what they value, what injustice looks like, and what kind of country they want their kids to imagine and fight for.” Now, she says, parents are working to find the language and the tools to have hard and uncomfortable conversations that they’ve actively avoided having with their kids up until this point.

As far as the children who participated in the To Islam With Love event, she says there was a range of emotional reactions. “There was confusion: ‘Why would our president do this? Why would people hurt someone just for wearing a scarf on their head?’ And there was some fear: ‘Is the president going to try to hurt my family?’ But the strongest response was, ‘I am going to make the most sparkly, most loving Valentine so that whoever gets this will feel better.’ That’s where pretty much all the kids landed emotionally.”

*Name has been changed to protect privacy.