South Carolina has its share of migrant farm families with school-aged children. Too often, those families have little access to resources or don’t know how to find them.
Fortunately, there is the Colleton County School District’s Migrant Education program.
“It really opens your eyes when you’re working with a non-English-speaking student, and you’re trying to teach them math, English or reading,” said Presbyterian College senior George Crosby.
For the past two years, the Walterboro native has been working with the program whose purpose is to ensure the children of migrant workers have the same opportunity to meet the state content and student performance standards that all other children are expected to meet.
According to Charleston’s The Post and Courier, South Carolina ranks among the top 10 states for legal Mexican farm workers who come to the U.S. through a government-sponsored program.
Sean Gruber of the Colleton County School District said, “Any school district can consider itself lucky if it has alumni who are willing and able to work to benefit their home communities. All of us at the Colleton County School District appreciate the work George Crosby has done while interning with our Migrant Education Program. The staff of CCSD wishes him success in whatever career he chooses.”
Providing education and food
While still a student, Crosby is employed by Colleton County School District as a field recruiter.
“I go out and talk to migrant families and try to qualify them through the migrant education program,” he said.
“I do a lot of legwork working with people at the local and state level to get the migrant families signed up. We want to make sure we have the right documentation for these families so that we’re able to provide educational and food services for them.”
How the program came to be
This past summer Crosby took on an internship to focus on the policy aspect of the program. “As a political science major, I wanted to see how what I learned in class translates to the real world,” he said.
Since he has been working with the migrant education program, Crosby wanted to see how that program came to be.
Serving those in need
Crosby works with a wide range of age groups, from preschool students to 22-year-olds who haven’t received their high school diplomas or equivalent degrees. He helped tutor children in migrant camps throughout Colleton County where farmers typically provide mobile homes for the migrant workers to live in.
“This year has been a little different with the coronavirus,” Crosby said. “We’ve tried to do everything virtually, but it’s hard because migrant families don’t have resources like the internet or WiFi.”
Fortunately, the migrant education program was able to receive funding for mobile hotspots. They also issued Chromebooks, owned by the school district, to the children of migrant workers.
To get in touch with the families, Crosby had to make frequent trips to migrant camps and to the places the migrant workers work. Many times, Crosby had to contact their employers.
And because of the coronavirus, Crosby takes extra precautions to keep himself and others safe. He always wears a face covering and keeps hand sanitizer with him.
“I wear gloves if it is questionable if any family member has been in contact with anyone with Covid-19,” Crosby said. “Plus, I don’t enter homes and always maintain six feet of distance from anyone I meet with.
Crosby is in his last semester at PC. He’s in class during the week but spends most weekends helping migrant families.
“I still try to qualify families who are moving in,” he said. “Since I’m at school, I can’t be as hands-on, but the school district will contact me if a family is moving in so I can get them registered for the upcoming year.”
Crosby’s still thinking about what he wants to do after he graduates. He said he may go to law school, but he wants to keep working with the school district and the migrant families in some capacity.
“The Hispanic community, especially in the lower part of the state, has been hit hard during the pandemic,” Crosby said. “I’ve been fortunate to work with Dr. Vanessa Nelson-Reed (director of the Federal Programs for Colleton County) and others at Colleton County School District to make sure we are doing everything we can for these families.”
