Mar. 20, 2013

Lupe Flores

HACU and bipartisan coalition urges colleges and universities to speak out on immigration reform

The Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) is joining with the Partnership for a New American Economy, the National Immigration Forum and a bipartisan coalition of more than 500 CEOs and mayors in urging college and university presidents and chancellors to push Congress to enact immigration reform that will allow the U.S. to retain the best and brightest minds trained and educated in our country. This alliance has marked April 19, 2013 as a day for campus communities across the country to hold events that demonstrate a joint commitment in changing and improving existing immigration laws.

Many foreign-born students that attain degrees in the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) leave the country due to outdated and restrictive immigration laws that send U.S. trained talent overseas to work in direct competition with American industries. This results in a drain on innovation and entrepreneurship with a heavy cost to the national economy. Key points that support the effort to reforming immigration policy are:

• Three out of every four patents that the top 10 US patent-producing universities received in 2011 had an immigrant inventor
• Every foreign-born advanced-degree graduate trained in the U.S. creates an additional 2.62 jobs for American workers
• By 2018, the U.S. will have an estimated 779,000 jobs requiring advanced STEM degrees, but only an estimated 555,200 advanced STEM degree holders 
• Foreign-born students arriving in our country as children are prevented from attending college because of their undocumented status, denying our country potential talent
  

For more information on how individuals and organizations can participate, visit March for Innovation or the crowdspeaking platform Thunderclap.