America is considered the land of opportunities. If you can dream it, you can achieve it, or so goes the legend of the “American Dream.”
Sophia Aimen Sexton
But many talented and accomplished immigrants face significant obstacles continuing their careers in the United States. This limits not only their upward mobility but also the growth of their new communities.
My friend Angela Rovegno is one of 2 million immigrants and refugees in America who are unemployed or underemployed. In her native Peru, she earned a master’s in criminology and a law degree and spent four years working as a prosecutor while volunteering at juvenile detention centers, helping young people rehabilitate their lives and reintegrate into society.
“The best time to help someone is when they are young,” she said. “Without proper support, they don’t have the skills to move forward on a positive path.”
Angela was successful, financially well off and happy. Then, at age 26, everything changed. Her family owns a famous Italian bakery in Lima, and their last name is well known, which made Angela and her siblings the target of extortion attempts. Angela reached a breaking point after police alerted her to a botched kidnapping and extortion attempt aimed at her daughter, Gabriella, then almost 1 year old.
“Before I became a mom, I had no fear,” Angela told me. “But from that point forward, I knew I had to do whatever was required to protect her.” In 2006, she left everything she knew to start over with Gabriella in the United States.
Angela and Gabriella spent those first years living in New Jersey. Her family was safe, and she married an American man she met through a cousin. Even so, she remembers that period as the hardest time of her life.
“I wasn’t coming to the U.S. for opportunities,” she said, but rather “running from danger.” But her Peruvian law degree didn’t allow her to practice in America, and repeating law school with a young child to provide for simply wasn’t possible. She had no choice but “to give everything up.”
Like Angela, nearly 50% of recently arrived young immigrants have a college education, according to a report by the nonprofit Upwardly Global. And yet 71% of those polled – people who worked in healthcare, law, STEM and other fields experiencing worker shortages here – faced barriers getting the education and certifications required to be hired in their profession. Sixty percent said they believe their skills are undervalued here.
So many new immigrants have to start over in America. Angela found a job in a hospital kitchen, moved into waitressing and eventually became the manager of a local Italian restaurant.
In 2011, after her second daughter was born, she and her husband divorced, and Angela and her daughters moved to Fairfax County to be closer to friends. While her children now had “access to some of the best education in the country,” she still struggled to find a career path that used her ample skills and education.
A friend suggested she get her teaching certificate, since she had loved working with children as a lawyer. In 2013 Angela began working as a Montessori preschool teacher. She still misses her legal work but loves making an impact.
“I hope if I can plant a little seed of love in their hearts, they will grow up knowing there is good in this life, even when they experience difficult times,” she said. Angela also completed a two-year psychology course to aid her education work. “I like to always be filling my mind.”
She knows her new career is important, especially because the early education industry is grappling with a critical worker shortage. Still, she makes far less money as a teacher than as an attorney, and her own upward mobility stalled as she moved from job to job along the way. She does remote legal consulting back in Peru, but it’s not the same as being able to build a law career in the country she calls home.
And yet, keeping her family safe was worth the personal cost. “I did the right thing coming here,” Angela said.
But why should she have to choose between safety and a career? If immigrant professionals had more pathways into their fields of expertise, America would benefit tremendously: from their knowledge, contributions and higher disposable income. Virginia’s immigrant population holds immense talent and knowledge, so much of it untapped.
Angela is proud of the example she’s set for her daughters. By starting over and building a career as a teacher, “I’m showing them, when you get knocked down, you have to stand back up,” she said. “I’m teaching them to push themselves to do more than they think is possible.”
Sophia Aimen Sexton is a professor of English at Northern Virginia Community College’s Annandale campus and co-founder of the nonprofit Female Refugee Education Empowerment.
(18) comments
I don't understand why she didn't enroll in the in-expensive Paralegal program at NVCC, which even grants credit for previous experience, and then obtained employment in a public, private, non-profit law office, of which there are many in NoVA.
For Everyone's Information: Peru is a Constitutional Democracy (check it out on Wiki). Crime in Peru varies compared to the U.S. (check it out on Wiki). Owners of successful business in many countries hire private security to protect themselves and their families. Finally, if she felt truly threatened enough to become a refugee I don't understand why she didn't go into the bakery / restaurant business here with her family's backing and herlegal expertise.
Wow, it sounds like you know a lot more about her situation than she does! How long have you lived in Peru?
I am tired of these kinds of features from the Media. If the Media aren't featuring some group that monthly receives major national attention, the Media feature local special interests that receive major local attention. And continually look for events the Media can sensationalize. When not packing their printed newspapers and news blogs with biased editorial opinion, editorialized news, ads, infomercials, pop ups, and so on.
FACTS: A million LEGAL immigrants have been allowed into the USA every year for decades. Current population of the USA is 335 million, will be 400 million in about 25 years. About 100 million of the current U.S. population is struggling economically. Who among the Elite are planning for America's future? No one.
The USA is an escape for everyone who is fed up with the nation where they live, whether Mexico, Cuba, Syria, Afghanistan, etc. Immigration has been, is, and will be a source of cheap labor, whether building canals in 1823 or cleaning hotel rooms in 2023. The Elite who have profited, are profiting, and will profit have the gold and make the rules, about immigration and everything else. They don't clean the bathrooms in their McMansions, do the landscaping, and so on.
As for Peru, the Staff of inside Nova should o a Wiki search on Government of Peru and Crime in Peru before printing statements from former citizens of Peru who allegedly escaped to the USA.
Finally, if the Elite who control the United States allow anyone with social, economic, and/or political unhappiness with their governments to immigrate to the USA, legally or illegally, those persons will immigrate here, no matter what the costs and consequences.
How about a few Wiki background searches on relevant information like Government of Peru and Crime in Peru before publishing more personal tragedy stories?
The title should be “America Saved Your Daughter’s Life.” Most of our immigrant forebears, where they came several centuries ago or arrived in the 20th century, have had to adapt to a new country and re-imagine their careers. It is the land of opportunity and you can be successful if you put in the effort and do what you need to do. Unfortunately, laws vary in different countries, so your career was a tough one to transition to a new country. The important thing is that you saved your daughter, and probably even yourself. There are many large churches in this area who offer assistance to immigrants, not just for basic needs but even job counseling and networking. Welcome to the USA. Best of luck to you in your endeavors, Ms. Revegno.
I don't know.. maybe since different countries have y'know different laws you may have to go thru law school again in your new favorite country of choice? Don't want to offend anyone, just an uneducated conservative living off the taxpayers dime. *wink wink*
She could have stayed in Peru. Don’t bitch about America . Ifu don’t like it here go back back to Peru. Lots of people have job trouble.
Please be kind. She didn’t write the title of the article.
Clearly you missed the part about the botched extortion and kidnapping of her 1 year old.
Go read the article again.
America did not stall her career, give me a break. She made the hard choice to move from her native land for the safety of her child, good for her. Sounds like she made some bad choices once she got here, marrying (again? No mention of a first husband) and having another child is not buckling down to focus on a career. Enough with the America bashing stories.
50% of recently arrived young immigrants have a college education. Meanwhile less than 25% of native born Americans who identify as conservative finished college. Tells you all you need to know.
CNN: " Democratic voters are more likely to have a college education than they used to. Catalist, Pew and Gallup all show a trend toward Democrats being more educated than they used to be.
Despite this growing education, however, Democratic voters are still more likely to lack a college degree."
And with all those "gender study" majors, do the degrees they have even count? (hint: no).
That trend went critical in 2016.
"But what also happened in 2016 now looks arguably more significant: College-educated voters, who once leaned Republican, swung hard to the Democrats, including voters in suburban districts who then helped flip the House of Representatives in 2018. The polarization among white voters by educational levels has since grown wider, putting more pressure on Republicans to turn out non-college-educated white voters, a demographic that is shrinking within an increasingly diverse and educated electorate. (Christian Science Monitor, 2020).
Had you finished the CNN quote you would have seen that Democrats without a college degree is 54% (vs. 67% for the GOP). And that shift is growing every year.
And as someone who hires people for a multibillion dollar consulting firm, I can tell you that gender studies majors are worth more than high school graduates. I have hired several.
And Rand agrees "As of Jun 11, 2023, the average annual pay for a Gender Studies in the United States is $58,020 a year." Average HS Diploma annual pay $42,566.
So, yes, they count.
It's clear YOU never finished college as you don't understand statistics (majority of both parties never finished college, but the GOP has fewer college grads and FAR fewer post-graduate degree holders).
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-graduate-schools/articles/what-gender-studies-is-and-how-to-use-the-degree
What You Can Do With a Gender Studies Degree
Gender studies degree recipients often choose to work for advocacy organizations and charities that frequently assist women — such as domestic violence shelters — or similar groups that help lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals.
An undergraduate degree in gender studies can also provide preparation for graduate school in a wide array of fields, including medicine. Gender studies grads frequently become lawyers, social workers, or therapists.
Having a gender studies major doesn't mean you have to pursue a career that relates to gender, says Howe, since someone with this type of liberal arts education can do a variety of jobs that involve critical thinking.
Howe notes that many gender-focused nonprofit roles pay low wages. But one lucrative way to use a gender studies degree and focus directly on sex equity issues, she says, is to provide strategic advice to companies on how they can promote fairness in the workplace and guard against sex-based bias.
A degree in gender studies cultivates a person's empathy and creativity, Howe says, adding that an understanding of gender and race issues is crucial for success in the modern business world. "You really can't run a business today if you are clueless about those things."
As the professional workforce becomes more integrated, a different perspective (other than a CIS-gendered white male) is required, unless you want a flurry of discriminatory legal actions.
As Boomers leave the workforce (kicking and screaming mind you) their influence will continue to wane and they will become less relevant.
Is it the EEOC? They for sure should look into Pat. Hopefully you haven't hired the next Snowden, or perhaps hopefully you have.
Is there an echo in here?
And based on my observations in my field many coming from foreign countries have degrees that come way too easy. Helped train two veterinarians here in the US for 2 weeks and the general consensus was they were really no higher in their knowledge of their professions than that of a vet tech here in the states. So sometimes that "foreign" degree may not reach the standards we have come to expect here in the US.
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