Help Ana get her Law Degree

This Fall of 2021 I will be joining CUNY School of Law!

The pandemic impacted me and my family in that I lost my immigration status to work. Thus, we have no savings to start off this new cycle. More specifically to pay tuition, books, supplies (like a desk and bookcase since I will be studying remotely), childcare, and transport.

My journey to law school began in 2015. As the latin term for lawyer Ad Auxilluim Vocatus (the call to help) implies, lawyers are a human megaphone of sorts. A megaphone which translates the hardships of people into tangible solutions. I realized this during the surge of unaccompanied minors arriving in the U.S. in 2015, where I joined a small group of volunteers to interpret for the children in Federal Plaza Immigration Court. This event led me to start organizing in college for immigrant rights and soon I found myself completely immersed in the legal world working in individual cases as a paralegal, mostly with women and children in detention.

Since I became a mother, the vision has shifted a little. I now have realized that as opposed to working on individual cases as an immigration lawyer I want to involve myself in the defense of the environment. In the next few years, more lawyers will have to work on solutions that unweave and then weave back our balance with the land we stand on.

During the time when my understanding of my work shifted I was fully immersed in mothering. My daughter’s rhythms and changes have taught me to honor my capacity and boundaries. Something I am still working on. But as she does, I am learning how to ask for help when I am at capacity.

As a member of the immigrant community in NYC, I have relied on mutual-aid for most of the pandemic. I have gotten support from CSA shares, getting free organic produce to feed my family (Shout-out to the Ridgewood Grocery Club!)Mutual-Aid for Parents NYC has given me two strollers, clothes for my daughter since she was born, and even a car-seat! The women in my community have held me down in times where I feel like I can’t keep going.

All of this to say that the energy and labor I have poured out to the immigrant community has not gone unreciprocated. My community has held me down.

Nonetheless, we are not bottomless pits. We need help from other networks if we are going to navigate institutions that have been almost impossible for us to access. I have hope that my story will resonate with you and that you will support not only my goal, but my family’s and larger community’s win of having another lawyer on their team.

Tlazocamati, Thank You, Gracias!