Learning Sciences Lunch and Learn with Dr. Mónica L. Jacobo-Suárez & Dr. Sarah Gallo “Migration and Education across Borders for Children with Disabilities”

In this talk, Drs. Sarah Gallo and Mónica Jacobo Suárez will share initial findings from their collaborative research, supported by Rutgers Global, about educational realities and decision-making for children with disabilities from undocumented families in Mexico and the US. Drawing from testimonio interviews with caregivers and educators in central Mexico and the tri-state area in the United States, they highlight the compounding ways undocumented status and disability shape children’s educational lives across borders, particularly within our current political context. In the discussion, they invite us to imagine toward proactive educational policies and practices on both sides of the border that better center the entangled complications of documentation status and disability across school systems.

Suggested readings can be found here and here!

Bio:

Mónica L. Jacobo-Suárez is researcher and scholar at the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana Xochimilco in Mexico City, within the Department of Politics and Culture. She is a public policy scholar whose research has revealed the unique experiences, needs, and resources of return migrants in Mexico. Her activist scholarship has also contributed to important policy changes to increase educational access for return migrants in Mexico. Her scholarship has been published in leading journals such as The Journal of Global Ethics, Latino Studies, and Journal of Language and Policy and has been funded by Fulbright, CONAHCYT, and Rutgers Global.

Sarah Gallo is an associate professor of Language Education and Urban Social Justice Education at Rutgers University. Her research has brought attention to the ways that undocumentedness shapes the educational lives of elementary school-aged children, their families, and their teachers in Mexico and the United States. Her scholarship has been supported by Fulbright, The National Academy of Education, the Spencer Foundation, and Rutgers Global and appears in journals such as American Educational Research Journal, Harvard Educational Review, and Teachers College Record.