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By: Allan Colbern, Shawn Walker, María del Pilar Báez Lara, Katie Marie Glenn, Lauren Kater, Shelby Busha

Abstract:Ìý

ÌýThe United States Supreme Court ruled in Plyler v. Doe (1982) that all childrenÌý
regardless of their legal immigration status have a fundamental right to K-12 education.Ìý
Despite education being a fundamental right, it remains fragile and contested forÌý
undocumented immigrants. Federal courts have had to reaffirm Plyler multiple times,Ìý
including issuing a permanent injunction over California’s Proposition 187 (1994), whichÌý
banned undocumented children from K–12 public schools and required officials andÌý
teachers to report anyone they suspected of being undocumented to federalÌý
immigration authorities. More recently, the courts blocked Alabama’s HB 56 (2012)Ìý
provision that required schools to check and report newly enrolled K–12 students’Ìý
immigration status. The entanglement between postsecondary education andÌý
immigration, which falls outside of Plyler’s protection, has grown more pronounced overÌý
the past two decades. Federal immigration law in 1996 opened the door for states toÌý
actively regulate undocumented immigrants’ right to postsecondary education,Ìý
including banning admissions or creating discriminatory hardships by denying in-stateÌý
tuition or financial aid. While a rich scholarship covers these policies and their effects,Ìý
no systematic study exists on the news framing of the intersection between educationÌý
and immigration. This article examines 40,469 news articles published from 1980 to 2022Ìý
in six national and state news sources in the United States to explore theÌý
(dis)connections between education (K-12 and postsecondary) and immigration.Ìý
Combining machine learning techniques and social network analysis with qualitativeÌý
coding, we show that reporters’ use of a range of experts creates a deep conflation ofÌý
education with immigration enforcement and illegality framing. Despite quests forÌý
journalistic neutrality, we argue that the use of experts by reporters prevents immigrantÌý
education from being a topic on its own or a topic where immigrants are framedÌý
primarily in a positive and inclusive way.