Stories
A Meatpacker’s Son Now Helps Other Nebraska Youth Succeed
Growing up in Lexington, Nebraska, in the 1990s, Luis Sotelo witnessed a cultural transition when Latin American workers arrived to fill a demand for labor in a new meatpacking plant. “And today we are seeing a new wave of immigrants in Lexington,” says Sotelo, who serves as chief diversity officer… Read More
Rather Than Innovate in U.S., Foreign Students Now Consider Leaving
Like many international students, Qiao Zhang had hoped to stay in the United States after receiving his master’s degree in quantitative finance from Rutgers Business School. Now, with the future of immigration policy so uncertain, he may go back to China. It’s something a lot of his fellow international students… Read More
A Mexican Doll Shows Kids ‘our Differences are our Strength’
In 2014, Leslie Guzman was trying to think of a way to remind her children of their Mexican heritage. As it turned out, one of her neighbors in Cincinnati had created Mensch on a Bench, a toy that teaches children about Jewish culture. Inspiration struck. She decided to create a… Read More
Immigrants Add Billions to GDP Yet ‘Constantly Under Threat,’ Says Organizer
Argentinian immigrant Beatriz Maya has devoted her career to helping fellow Latinos — both immigrants and natives — build productive, successful lives in the United States. As the founder of La Conexion de Wood County, she helps provide capacity building and cultural activities, language education, and advocacy for an estimated… Read More
Garage Owner Shows How Hard Immigrants Work
Oswaldo “Boler” Castellanos, a Guatemalan immigrant, is pleased with the opportunities that have come his way. But he knows that many others who want an opportunity to create a new life are denied that chance. “I want to show that we are coming here to work hard,” he says. Castellanos… Read More
A Career Economist Makes the Case for Immigrants
Economist Ann Markusen has spent three decades studying what makes the U.S. economy tick. And a recent teaching post in Canada re-affirmed her view that a welcome approach to immigrants is good for a nation’s bottom line. “Canada’s liberal immigration policies and the nonprofit sector’s efforts to find housing… Read More
Local Celebrity Chef Dan Wu Talks Immigrant Entrepreneurship
“When we think about other people’s cultures, the first entry point we have – before music, before dance, before literature, before language – is food,” says Dan Wu, a private chef, MasterChef contestant, and Chinese immigrant who lives in Lexington. “What do you know about Thailand? You know pad thai. Read More
No Immigrant Workers Means No Grapes — or Wine — Say Growers
During the recent recession, there was good money to be made in agriculture jobs in Oregon’s Rogue Valley. Yet, despite hourly rates that reached $20 an hour, few American workers applied. “Despite the huge pool of unemployed people, no one came out,” says Jeffrey M., the owner of a prominent… Read More
A Student of U.S. Immigration Points to Economic Impact
Qingfang Wang had already started a promising career at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, one of Asia’s top-ranked think tanks, when the University of Georgia offered her a fellowship for a PhD in geography. She jumped at the chance. “The U.S. has the best higher-education system,” she says. “I… Read More
Undocumented are ‘Paying Money Into U.S. System,’ Says DACA Student
Victoria Matey came to the United States from Mexico at age 3. By age 15 she had been barred from applying for a part-time job, so she already had a vague idea what it meant to be undocumented. But Matey did not understand the full consequences until she was a… Read More
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