When New York City Mayor Eric Adams issued a notice to asylum-seeking families in January informing them that they would be evicted from temporary shelters after a 60-day stay, they were told that “intensive case management” would be available to help them achieve economic self-sufficiency. In making this pronouncement, Adams ignored the city’s 43-year-old “right to shelter” law, a policy that guarantees temporary housing to all unhoused people who need it.

Unsurprisingly, the help that Adams promised has not materialized.

According to a report issued by City Comptroller Brad Lander in early May, “notices given to families, training for staff, and written guidelines were all inadequate…. Investigators found that the city provides very limited case management services that do little to help asylum-seeking families … and specifically discriminated against families of elementary-school-aged children in shelter placements, making it more likely that their schooling would be disrupted.”

Calling the process “haphazard,” Lander further lambasted the Adams administration for undermining the education of the more than 36,000 migrant children who have enrolled in the city’s public schools since spring 2022. The critique further stressed that while families can apply for additional 60-day placements, the constant movement from shelter to shelter can lead to heightened emotional distress and anxiety.

“Schools should provide kids with a sense of belonging,” Nazarena Cordero, an art therapist who specializes in treating children, told Truthout. “This feeling is impaired when a student does not have the stability of a routine. Being forced to move every few months impacts children’s ability to learn and integrate into a new society. It puts kids in a constant state of crisis. Kids need to feel welcomed, made to feel like they belong and are connected. Constantly being uprooted from the place they’re trying to sow seeds makes them feel alienated, marginalized, and creates a negative ripple effect in all areas of learning, including social and emotional development.”

Teachers and school staff agree. Jeanette Frazier, community school director at Central Park East II (CPE II), a public school in New York’s East Harlem, works with 92 immigrant students — nearly a quarter of CPE II’s student body — enrolled in pre-K through 8th grade. “When they arrive, many of the kids are traumatized,” she told Truthout. “We let everyone, children and adults, share their experiences. Many of their stories are horrific.”

Several students told Frazier about having to hide from La Migra (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) when crossing into Costa Rica, and numerous parents confided that they hid their children high up in the trees where monkeys scratched their faces. “Some of the kids still have scars. These are the traumas they live with,” she said. “We let them talk, try to help them feel safe. Overall, I am in awe of how both the kids and the adults are able to flourish despite what they’ve been through.”

Communication, she adds, is often tricky. Although the school has 10 bilingual Spanish-English speakers on staff, most are Dominican or Puerto Rican. “Spanish varies by country and, at times, we have had to use Google Translate to understand one another.”

There are other challenges as well. Frazier reports that about 30 percent of the nonmigrant students at the Central Park East II school are living doubled up or in shelters. “We want to be a hub for families,” she said, a place where people can get clothing, breakfast, lunch and sometimes supper during the week and during school breaks. “We understand that some people can’t get SNAP benefits because of their legal status.”

And what of the 60-day rule?........

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