NEW OXFORD Pa.
Uprooted from his native Mexico and overwhelmed by an unfamiliar language, Jorge Lua-Ildefonso was miserable on his first day of school in the United States just five years ago.
He wasn’t sure he would make it beyond his first week in eighth grade.
“I felt fear because it was my first time,” said Lua-Ildefonso, now 18. “It was terrible. I couldn’t understand what I was supposed to do, what they were saying.”
He overcame the language barrier and graduated from high school this month, thanks to a program that helps to educate the children of migrant workers, who frequently cross school district boundaries and state lines in search of seasonal work in the agriculture, dairy, fishing and food processing industries.
Lua-Ildefonso and 161 other migrant students successfully completed their schooling this year in Pennsylvania after receiving extra instruction through the nation’s migrant education program, established more than 40 years ago amid President Lyndon B. Johnson’s efforts to combat poverty.
Educators say the stories of students like Lua-Ildefonso show how motivated many young Hispanic, Asian and other foreigners are to assimilate and follow the path of immigrants before them.
