Unauthorized Immigrant Parents: Do Their Migration Histories Limit Their Children's Education?

One of the thorniest issues involving unauthorized immigrants is the situation of their children, the majority of whom are born in the United States. This research focuses on Mexican immigrants, who are a majority of the country's estimated 11 million unauthorized migrants. We show that their trajectory of obtaining legal and citizenship status affects their children's educational outcomes, and that the children who get the least schooling are those whose parents, especially their mothers, remain unauthorized. Pathways to legalization thus do matter, not just for the immigrants themselves but also more broadly for the new generation of Mexican American citizens of this country.