It was only the second day of the spring semester at The Blake School in Minneapolis when social studies teacher N’Jai-An Patters learned that two blocks from her house, Renée Good, a U.S. citizen protesting Operation Metro Surge, had just been shot and killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent. Patters had 20 minutes until her AP government class. “I was very stirred up,” she said, “and came into class wanting to acknowledge it, not wanting to facilitate a discussion, and not having lots of answers.”
In that moment, her role as an educator shifted, as the impact of the city-wide immigration crackdown filtered into students’ lives in a new way. Since the operation began in December, many students have been directly affected by immigration raids or the threat of more to come. Many parents and at least nine children and teenagers have been detained. At several schools city-wide, attendance has dropped by double-digit percentages, and by more than half at a public charter school with an 85% Latino population. Minneapolis Public Schools also closed for two days in early January, citing safety concerns following a clash between Roosevelt High School students, staff, and ICE agents.
The crackdown has also incited protests by the thousands, even amid sub-zero temperatures, intensifying after the Jan. 24 killing of Alex Pretti, another protester. On Wednesday, Feb. 4, border czar Tom Homan announced at a news conference that the Trump administration will withdraw 700 federal immigration agents from Minnesota, en route to what he called “a complete drawdown” to pre-Operation Metro Surge levels, around 150 agents. He did not specify a timeline, saying “this is smarter enforcement, not less enforcement.”
Amid the disruption, teachers at schools across the Twin Cities are adapting the classroom experience and their role as educators, teaching differently or offering support to students that goes beyond their job description. They’re building a new and evolving playbook for what it means to teach in a time of fear and unrest.
At some schools, the very way learning happens has changed because of nearby ICE presence. Many students have opted for virtual learning in districts offering it. That change “gives a COVID vibe,” said Tracy Byrd, a Washburn High School English teacher, some of whose students have chosen to attend class remotely because they fear leaving their homes.
He’s found that the switch to virtual learning has slowed curriculum progress because he’s sometimes teaching the same lesson multiple ways within a class — once for those online and another time for those in the room. As a veteran teacher and winner of the Minnesota Educator of the Year, he found alternative learning methods. “I’m okay cutting things out, because what’s being added in is real life, and we can connect ourselves from the text to the real world, and get as much meaning from that as we could from our textbooks.”
He’s far from the only Minneapolis educator making current events a classroom topic. At Blake High School, social studies teacher Amanda Pomerleau said of those who instruct in her subject, “Our job is to help contextualize the world.” Patters is also doing that. She fields questions from her students about, for instance, the Insurrection Act, which Donald Trump has threatened to invoke to squash protests. In her AP government classes, she tries to get students to think about “ICE as a political issue” and to consider the information they take in critically, considering source, bias, and motivation, “regardless of which side it comes from.”
Other teachers are connecting their classroom material to current events more thematically. Katarina Fernandez, a Blake High School English teacher who identifies as Latinx, said that because “literature inherently offers opportunities to either escape or lean into issues playing out in the world, we’re able to explore those ideas through something that maybe feels less real and a little bit more distant.”
Exploring the immigration crackdown academically is impossible at the majority-Latino public charter school where Grace, an English language development specialist, teaches. She asked for her name and school to be withheld out of fear that she or her students might be targeted by ICE. “Class for me has turned into ‘how do we process what’s going on?’” she said, adding that learning cannot be central. “The goal right now is survival and mental health support.”
Some teachers like Grace are taking action after the final bell rings, organizing groceries and supplies for their students and families who fear leaving home. Grace’s school turned its auditorium stage into a food pantry, stocked via donations from individuals and organizations. She said, “Families can request food, and we deliver it to them.” She also fields calls from parents whose students were detained and helps students process when their parents are arrested.
Lindsay, an ESL teacher at a high school who also asked that her last name and school be withheld to protect her job, said her school district banned teachers from engaging in mutual aid for students or expressing personal opinions about ICE. But: “Frankly, I’m just breaking the rules.” She felt obliged to after watching students with formerly perfect attendance records stop coming to school. “It just wasn’t an option not to do something.” Now, she’s working 12-hour days. “When I get home, I’m organizing who needs what, which families need what, making sure that they have a safe contact person who can deliver.”
As many Twin Cities teachers continue to adapt their teaching and roles to the ever-evolving crackdown, coming into class is a source of centeredness for some. At home, Patters and her children have witnessed several ICE raids on their block, which has kept her kids from sleeping through the night and has put her “in a space of hyper-vigilance.” Because of this, school has felt more stable than home. She said, “I would rather be here, answering questions from kids or mobilizing faculty.”
Several of the teachers consulted for this story said the community and students are giving them hope right now. Byrd from Washburn High School said that students “will find ways to thrive in spite of all of these difficulties.”
For their part, teachers are aiding one another so they can stay responsive, said Megan Place, an English as a Second Language teacher at Highland Park Senior High School. “Everybody is ready to go. There will be teachers once in a while who tear up, so if you’re on your prep hour, then you go take over for them. Everybody has been really good at stepping in whenever they see the need.”