Who’s Providing Support for Immigrant Students?

According to data from the most recent census report, 46.2 million people living in the U.S. (15.6%) were born outside the country. About 10.5 million are undocumented.

The U.S. is and always has been a country of immigrants, but they also face a wide array of unique challenges. This is an especially fraught time given the ongoing efforts to pass border legislation that would dramatically reduce asylum protection and limit pathways to legal migration, as well as an upcoming election that will almost certainly include a famously anti-immigrant candidate.

As such, IP’s planning a new series that will map out some of the biggest philanthropic supporters of immigrant and refugee causes. According to data from Candid, between 2012 and 2024, funders in the U.S. awarded approximately $4.49 billion across the issue areas of immigrant rights, immigrant services, immigration and naturalization and immigration law. Top funders include Silicon Valley Community Foundation, NEO Philanthropy, the Ford Foundation, The California Endowment, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Four Freedoms Fund, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and Zellerbach Family Foundation, Seattle Foundation, and Unbound Philanthropy, among others. (Be sure to read IP’s State of American Philanthropy report on trends and major players in funding for immigrants and refugees.)

Since this is a fairly broad topic, we’ll be breaking things down into separate issue areas, starting with funding for students and education. According to a recent report from The Education Trust, there are more than 427,000 undocumented students enrolled in U.S. colleges and universities. Immigrant students face a number of obstacles to obtaining an education, including restrictions on their ability to enroll in these institutions, difficulty obtaining work permits, and limits on accessing driver's licenses, state healthcare, and food and housing assistance, per the report.

According to Immigrants Rising, a nonprofit that works to empower undocumented youth to achieve their educational and career goals, the main obstacle for college-bound undocumented students is money, given that these students do not qualify for federal and most state-based financial aid. (Immigrants Rising funders include College Futures Foundation, Crankstart, The Gonzalez Family Giving Fund, The Grove Foundation, Stupski Foundation, Truist Foundation, and Zellerback Family Foundation, among others.)

Funding for immigration remains a small sliver of overall philanthropy, with political urgency leading to periods of increased funding that typically wanes over time. For example, according to a report from the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy (NCRP), funding for the pro-immigrant and pro-refugee movement increased during the Trump administration, but overall, from 2011 to 2020, the share of U.S. foundation funding for the movement actually dropped 11%.

We’ve seen this dynamic when it comes to support for immigrant students, as well. For example, shortly after the Obama administration announced the DACA program, Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees (GCIR) launched its Delivering on the Dream (DOTD) initiative, which supported funder collaboratives to invest in and protect the rights of immigrants and refugees. According a report that evaluated the project over its 10-year run, DOTD supported 27 funder collaboratives in 21 states, regranted almost $17 million from national funders with local funders matching that amount to produce more than $86 million for a total of $103 million raised. Despite this success, the network sunset last year due to a decrease in national funding.

It's also worth mentioning that in May 2021, the Chicago-based Schuler Education Foundation pledged $500 million to increase the enrollment of undocumented and low-income students in liberal arts colleges. While the initiative had awarded $95 million in grants by the end of 2022, the foundation has since suspended the program. The foundation will shut down by the end of August, according to a report by Forbes.

Despite these setbacks, there are still funders working in this space. To that end, here are some of the funders supporting immigrant students and youth.

Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund

The California-based Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund is dedicated to advancing equity and justice. Among its main areas of focus are immigrant rights and college success. As such, it should come as no surprise that it is one of the big funders supporting immigrant students. The Haas, Jr. Fund works with partners both in California and across the nation to limit the separation of families and the deportation of Dreamers, as well as to create pathways to citizenship for these students. In addition, it seeks to increase access to opportunities for healthy development, educational attainment and workforce integration for immigrant youth in California.

As part of its work, the Haas, Jr. Fund has awarded grants to remove barriers to in-state tuition and financial aid for undocumented students, funding organizations that support the completion rates of California Dreamers Act Application (CADAA), and those that support narrative change strategies that create educational opportunities for undocumented students, among others.

The Haas, Jr. Fund has also supported the California Campus Catalyst Fund, which was a four-year grantmaking initiative that provided funding to support undocumented students, including resource centers, legal services and mental health services across the state's three public higher education systems: California Community Colleges, California State University, and University of California. Other supporters of the fund included the Chavez Family Foundation, Crankstart, Heising-Simons Foundation, Hellman Foundation, The James Irvine Foundation and Weingart Foundation.

Pershing Square Foundation

The New York City-based Pershing Square Foundation, which was established by increasingly controversial hedge fund investor Bill Ackman and his wife, Karen Ackman, supports a number of causes, including arts and urban development, economic opportunity and development, education, health and life sciences, social innovation and the environment.

In 2015, the foundation partnered with TheDream.US — the nation's largest college and career success program for undocumented immigrant youths, to provide college scholarships for Dreamers across the nation — pledging $10 million over three years. As of Fall 2023, TheDream.US has awarded more than $214 million in scholarships to more than 10,000 Dreamers.

Pershing Square appears to be the biggest backer of TheDream.US, having given a total of $17.5 million, according to Candid data. Other donors include cofounder Donald Graham, as well as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Bob and Renee Parsons Foundation, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Jeff Bezos, MacKenzie Scott, Omidyar Donor Advised Fund, Pritzker Traubert Foundation and Sheryl Sandberg.

The New York Community Trust

Founded in 1924, The New York Community Trust is a public charity that works to improve the lives of residents living in New York City, Long Island and Westchester. The trust provides a lot of support for the region's immigrant population, which is one of the largest in the U.S. This includes support for immigrant students. For example, it awarded a $90,000 grant to the New York State Youth Leadership Council to support its work to organize Dream Teams on local college campuses that would encourage administrators to adopt policies and provide services to support immigrant students.

Other examples include providing funding to prepare high schools to meet the needs of new immigrant students who are multilingual learners. Last year, it awarded a grant to the Coalition for Asian American Children and Families, which partners with families, students and other educational groups led by people of color to advance school integration efforts, culturally competent curricula and educational policy that can meet the needs of immigrant students and English language learners.

James Irvine Foundation

The California-based James Irvine Foundation focuses on supporting economic advancement in the state. This includes funding related to immigration, particularly to justice-focused organizations. On the students side, in addition to its support of the California College Catalyst Fund and Immigrants Rising, it was also awarded grants to the Campaign for College Education to support DACA and undocumented students, and to the Foundation for California Community Colleges to strengthen the capacity of community colleges to provide support for undocumented students.

Ford Family Foundation

The Ford Family Foundation (not to be confused with the Ford Foundation) is dedicated to supporting rural Oregon and Siskiyou County, California, through grants, scholarships and community-building in order to create the conditions necessary for children to have the family, education and community support that they need to succeed. Among its biggest priority areas is education. As part of its efforts to support immigrant students, FFF offers scholarships for qualified undocumented students.

As always, this is just a sampling of the funders backing this particular cause. Others that have been active in the space include the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, the San Francisco Foundation, the Boston Foundation, Zellerbach Family Foundation, Heising-Simons Foundation and the William T. Grant Foundation.

Featured