Paul Rochford

Mamadou Aliou Labe Diallo (second from the left) joins InsideSchools staff and family at the Rally for Immigrant Students. On June 6, 2024, InsideSchools joined the Rally for Immigrant Students, organized by the New York Immigration Coalition, to advocate for more resources and schools for immigrant students.

When 17-year-old Amadou* arrived in New York City in March, his first priority was to enroll in high school. With his eyes on a career in business and dreams of starting his own company someday, he wanted to get on track with others his age as fast as possible. But when it came to getting enrolled in a public high school as an older teen from Senegal without any official school records, he found himself hitting dead end after dead end.

“What’s a MySchools account?” “How can I speak with my child’s teacher who doesn’t speak any Spanish? “Do my kids get a school bus?” “I used to be a mechanic in my home country, how can I get a job doing that here?” “Will it snow this year?” These were some of the questions asylum-seeking families posed to InsideSchools during workshops held this fall at New York City’s Department of Homeless Services (DHS) shelters in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, and Queens.