ObamaGRATION: Wave of Young Central American ILLEGALS Test American Schools

Public schools around the country are returning from summer break to face a challenge: integrating and paying for the influx of migrant children who have streamed across the Mexican border this year.

The children, mostly from Central America, are those who have been released to sponsors—usually parents or relatives—while they await immigration proceedings that could take years to complete. As a result, they are settling in communities throughout the U.S., from large metropolitan areas such as New York to small cities like Grand Island, Neb.

The numbers are substantial. More than 37,000 children who crossed the border unaccompanied by parents were placed with sponsors between Jan. 1 and July 31, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The states that received the most children were Texas, with 5,280; New York, 4,244; and California, 3,909.

Because the children generally lack English skills, have often received limited schooling and may have suffered emotional trauma, they present schools with a host of needs that could strain resources.

With the new academic year already under way or soon to start, education officials around the country mostly have struck a welcoming tone. "We have both a legal and moral obligation to teach these kids," said Alberto Carvalho, superintendent of Miami-Dade County Public Schools.

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Many public schools, which must enroll children regardless of their immigration status, already have seen enrollment spikes of these recently arrived youngsters. In the Los Angeles Unified School District, a special assessment center that evaluates such children experienced a 24% increase in Salvadorans and a 21% increase in Guatemalans last school year, compared with the previous one.

The Houston Independent School District reported a 49% increase over the past two years in recently arrived children from a group of regions that includes Central America. Last year, the district enrolled 910 new students from El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, and it expects hundreds more this year.

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