Juan Manuel, a burly 31-year-old day worker from Mexico, received the nickname \u201cConan\u201d during his first week at the Day Worker Center of Mountain View.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I arrived, a coworker said that Conan <\/em>is the name of a wrestler in Mexico,\u201d Manuel said. \u201cHe said, \u2018you look like him. Do you mind if I call you that here?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n For three years, Manuel has been coming to the Day Worker Center, a central place for laborers to connect with employers who need temporary work in jobs like carpentry and landscaping. Students from the Stanford Immigrant Rights Project (SIRP), an undergraduate organization spreading awareness about immigration justice, have been collaborating with day workers like Manuel each Saturday since last quarter.<\/p>\n \u201cDay laborers can come here and work out a fair wage,\u201d said SIRP member Lauren Swartz \u201911. \u201cOtherwise, there\u2019s the danger that an employer could drop off workers on the street without pay after they\u2019ve been landscaping all day.\u201d<\/p>\n A group of 15 SIRP members come weekly to offer English as a Second Language (ESL) tutoring and build relationships with the workers.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we all would like to see our broken immigration system being repaired, as it affects human lives and neighbors in all our communities every day,\u201d said Minh Dan Vuong \u201911, one of the founding members.<\/p>\n The idea of SIRP originated during the popular Alternative Spring Break (ASB) trips last spring quarter. Many of the SIRP volunteers participated in the Arizona or San Diego programs.<\/p>\n SIRP President Sharada Jambulapati \u201912, an Arizona ASB alumna, commented on the great resulting influence of her trip.<\/p>\n \u201cAfter our Arizona trip, our group felt really stirred by what we saw at the border in terms of border patrol, vigilantes, human rights issues and in terms of what these immigrants face,\u201d she said. \u201cWe had a lot of questions. How do we not make one service trip temporary? How do we make it so that it can contribute to change?\u201d<\/p>\n Swartz took part in the week-long San Diego trip entitled \u201cCrossing the Line(s): Immigration in San Diego\u201d in which students got a first-hand look at immigrant communities along the border. She, too, noted the impact she felt after directly witnessing border crossing experiences.<\/p>\n \u201cWe learned that people are human beings and shouldn\u2019t die when crossing,\u201d Swartz said.<\/p>\n Executive Director of the Day Worker Center Maria Marroqu\u00edn sympathized with the challenges of day workers, having immigrated from Mexico in 1996. The hardships she saw inspired her to create the Center as a resource for the workers.<\/p>\n \u201cI came here 17 years ago as a former teacher without any English,\u201d she explained. \u201cI had a very hard time finding employment, so I did housecleaning. These day workers have children in universities in Mexico or elsewhere and this is the only way for them to provide for them.\u201d<\/p>\n SIRP members and other volunteers also offer lunches and workshops on topics like CPR training or computer skills.<\/p>\n \u201cConan\u201d Manuel said he comes to the Center every day and signs up on a daily list to get temporary work in the neighboring community.<\/p>\n \u201cToday there are two lists on the wall with 88 men on one list and 17 women on the other list,\u201d he said in Spanish and English. \u201cIt depends who can do a good job and who has experience.\u201d<\/p>\n When asked what he enjoys about the Center, Manuel said the community aspect was key.<\/p>\n \u201cI like the family of friends,\u201d he said. \u201cWe share the food from 11 to 11:30, and then have ESL classes for three hours. Meanwhile, you wait for work.\u201d<\/p>\n Marroqu\u00edn said she appreciates the Center\u2019s relationship with SIRP.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m very excited honestly about this,\u201d Marroqu\u00edn said. \u201cIt was sort of my dream to have youth involved with the Day Worker Center because I had an assumption that many people in this area really believed life is easy and take many things for granted.\u201d<\/p>\n Marroqu\u00edn believes that SIRP students offer a vital perspective in addition to English tutoring and skills training.<\/p>\n \u201cEnglish is important, but all the different experiences that the students bring are highly appreciated,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s very important to have the workers and students learn about their different cultures from each other.\u201d<\/p>\n Jambulapati believes the Stanford community can learn from the Center amid prevailing misconceptions about immigration.<\/p>\n \u201cThe media often portrays immigrants as stealing our jobs or wanting economic gains for themselves, but the reality is that they have no options in most of their countries,\u201d she said. \u201cThey want to provide for their families and the media doesn\u2019t put a human face on them.\u201d<\/p>\n Jambulapati and the other SIRP members are planning a number of events to raise awareness about immigrants\u2019 rights issues this year. They have also worked with the Stanford Labor Action Coalition (SLAC) to assure that campus landscaping workers receive fair treatment.<\/p>\n SIRP member Justine Corella \u201911 hopes to bring other student organizations to the Center.<\/p>\n \u201cAlthough SIRP is a new group, I feel that it has great potential to raise awareness at Stanford in the future, especially through the outreaches to the Day Worker Center,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n To foster discussion about immigration issues, SIRP hosted a screening of \u201cRabbit Proof Fence\u201d about Australian border fences on Nov. 19.<\/p>\n \u201cI encourage people to [watch it] because border issues are important to immigrant rights,\u201d Jambulapati said. \u201cThe movie will open people’s eyes to seeing that fences are not the best solutions since people will risk everything, including their lives, to cross the border. Instead of militarization, we need more policy and humane solutions for the problem.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Students Work for Immigration Justice Juan Manuel, a burly 31-year-old day worker from Mexico, received the nickname \u201cConan\u201d during his first week at the Day Worker Center of Mountain View. \u201cWhen I arrived, a coworker said that Conan is the name of a wrestler in Mexico,\u201d Manuel said. \u201cHe said, \u2018you look like him. Do […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-134184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=134184"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134184\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}