Survival of the committed

The student volunteered to be the first one to give her presentation in class. It included telling us a lot about her life. 

She comes from a Latino immigrant family and is the first to go to college. The hopes of a lot of people are riding on her, and she has more than met the challenge.

Throughout her college years she has taken demanding courses and has added a course most semesters to the normal load so she could graduate early. When school was not in session, she has always worked, sometimes two jobs, to earn money for tuition and simply to buy the things she wanted. She has her graduate school plans mapped out and alternative plans if she needs them.

Here was a driven young woman who also came across and kind and thoroughly likeable. The students burst into spontaneous applause when she finished. (Having set that precedent, they continued to applaud for each and every presenter. Mary Baldwin students are a supportive bunch.)

One student queried, “When do you sleep?” She replied that she devotes four or five hours a night to sleeping, and there have been times when that simply wasn’t enough. Students were inspired by her work ethic despite serious questions about how long a body can hold up without getting enough sleep.

A day later it occurred to me that her willingness to sacrifice and work unrelentingly reflects not only a desire to succeed but tremendous faith in the promise of America to reward her efforts. No one believes in that promise more than people who have come here from all over the world to cast their lot with us. They will not keep doing it if the country cannot keep rewarding their hard work.

The native born may put up with high unemployment and diminished opportunities, but immigrants have options. They have moved before and they can move again. We can argue among ourselves about whether or not the United States is still the land of opportunity, but the choices of immigrants will probably tell the tale as accurately as any measure we might devise.

According to one account I read, there is already evidence of a brain drain that may accelerate. Engineers and scientists are coming to the conclusion that they can do better in India. There is concern that without their talents the nation will decline. It might be just as true to say that a brain drain is a symptom of decline and diminishing opportunities and not merely a cause.

Aside from the loss of American-educated immigrants to contribute to scientific and technological advances, I see another loss. We need energetic people from around the world to inspire our native-born population. The effect of the immigrant student’s presentation was electric. In the same class are three Korean exchange students who are here for one year. Students listen to them. They are curious about what people from elsewhere think of us. They want to hear the good and the bad. A part of the good has always been a fine system of higher education and good opportunities to make your way in the world if you were willing to work hard.

The current economic downturn has cast doubt about our ability to deliver on that promise. It is fundamental to our identity. The rest of the world has counted on us to be the place where people could make it regardless of race, religion, or circumstances of birth. The children of ordinary people could achieve success. There were a lot of countries that never made such an outrageous promise, but we did. We need to make sure that we are not the generation that let the promise slip away.