Middlebury Scholars Travel to Advocate for Asylum Seekers in Texas
Alondra Carmona and Britney Lux, rising third-year Posse Scholars at Middlebury College, used their spring break as an opportunity to serve, traveling across the country to Texas to welcome and support asylum seekers from Central America.
In early February, Alondra and Britney organized and led a Middlebury Alternative Break (MAlt) trip to Texas. MAlt trips are student-led service trips during a break from classes designed to meet the needs of communities on a local or global level.
Alongside 10 other undergraduate students, Alondra and Britney traveled to San Antonio, Texas, to partner with the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services (RAICES), a nonprofit organization whose mission is to promote justice by providing free and low-cost legal services to underserved immigrant children, families and refugees.
While in San Antonio, the Middlebury students took on two primary roles. First, they helped family members prepare for so-called “credible fear interviews” with U.S. officials, one method used to identify whether someone can request asylum. Second, the students oriented the families once they had been released from a detention center.
“We decided to go out and do something about it.”
“We each know someone who migrated to the United States and was able to find a home here, but that is not the case for many coming from Central America,” Alondra says of the Middlebury group’s motivation. “These immigrants are being persecuted, mistreated and dehumanized. We decided to go out and do something about it, to offer help in any way we could.”
After working 10- to 12-hour days, the MAlt students returned to an Airbnb in downtown San Antonio, taking time to cook dinner and reflect together on the day. They discussed challenges they faced and lessons they took away.
Alondra and Britney hope to continue to support asylum seekers. They plan to participate in future MAlt trips and find ongoing ways to support their communities, and they hope that their fellow MAlt trip participants will do the same.
“My hope is that what our group took from this trip doesn’t end in Texas, that it follows them into their careers and adulthood,” Alondra says. “That somewhere along the line, [because of this experience], they will make a greater impact in society.”
