A true story of young immigrants who get detained by U.S. Border Patrol—on purpose—and put in a shadowy for-profit detention center. Marco and Viri are members of a group of radical Dreamers on a mission to stop deportations, and they believe the best place to do that is in detention. In this lesson, students are asked to consider the practices and processes of US immigration policy; including detainment and deportation; treatment of people within detention centers; and issues of privacy and protection.

A Note from Curriculum Creator, Stacia Cedillo

This lesson plan invites us to consider the following questions that are crucial for critically engaged students and citizens: What visions can we create, what hopes can we possess? How do we work with others to communicate the revolutionary urgencies of our time? How can we transform our concepts of citizen and country?

A Note to Teachers

Discussing immigration—and more specifically, deportation—can trigger fear, anxiety, and discomfort for students who are directly impacted by the U.S. immigration and deportation complex. Individual stories and experiences can be a powerful teaching tool, but teachers should be careful to avoid inadvertently singling out or encroaching on the confidential citizenship status of immigrant students and their family members. Teachers should also take steps to avoid re-traumatization around the subject of immigrant detention that is the main focus of this film. This may require having conversations with students impacted by immigrant detention in advance, during, or after the lesson. Laying ground rules for discussion requiring respectful conversation, for instance, explicitly prohibiting bigoted language, is another key responsibility teachers should take to avoid enacting trauma in the classroom.

Subject Areas:

• Civics and Government
• Social Studies
• Language Arts
• U.S. History
• Global Studies

Grade Levels:9-12

Objectives:

In this lesson, students will:

• Interrogate systems and conditions of detainment, incarceration, and deportation in the US
• Identify hurdles, contradictions, and shortcomings within the legal framework for non-citizen immigrants seeking protection in the U.S.
• Understand structural similarities and differences between public and private prisons
• Examine differing approaches to activism and intervention, considering strategy and impact
• Articulate opportunities for social change outside the legal framework

Materials:

• The Infiltrators film clips and equipment on which to show them
• Paper and writing utensils

Time Needed:

Two 45-minute class periods with optional homework in between.

Clip 1: Bringing Down Broward(7:11-8:48; length: 1:37)
Activists from the National Immigrant Youth Alliance describe the misleading political rhetoric under President Obama that framed immigration detention as an issue of public safety focused on the deportation of violent criminals. In reality, the detention center located in Broward County, Florida, detained hundreds of low-level, non-violent offenders, as well as many who committed no crime at all.

Clip 2: Who is Being Detained in Broward County? (8:51 - 11:04, length: 2:13)
Marco, a young activist with the National Immigrant Youth Alliance (NIYA), makes contact with Claudio, a father originally from Venezuela, whose son contacts NIYA for help getting his father released. Claudio shares knowledge about the many different people who have been detained at the facility, sometimes for years, without ever having a trial.

Clip 3: Organizing Against Fear (14:04-16:03; length: 1:59)
Mohammad is a DREAMer who came to the United States from Iran at age twelve. This clip shows the variety of tactics and strategies Mohammad and other DREAMer youth used to loudly and visibly protest deportation policies, in spite of the fear of being deported by ICE.

Clip 4: An Impossible Choice (24:20-26:11, length: 1:51)
Marco and Claudio cut up phone numbers to distribute to detainees in the Broward detention center. Emiliano, Claudio’s son, recalls what happened the night he drove through a police checkpoint and his father was detained as a result. Emiliano explains the judge’s ruling, which stated that Claudio could be released from detention under the condition that he voluntarily leave the country within three months. Under this deferred action arrangement, Emiliano would be permitted to stay in the United States. Claudio explains why he stayed.

After learning about the existence of a women’s detention facility at Broward, Viri volunteers to try and get detained on purpose in order to infiltrate the jail. After an unsuccessful first attempt, Viri realizes that infiltration requires “playing a role.”

DAY 1: Transparency in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement

Activity I: Infiltration.Discuss these prompts as a class to establish common definitions and to get a sense of their familiarity with the concepts:

• Write the word “Infiltrate” on the board. Ask students what this word conjures up for them. Possible answers may include: Spy operations, secret forces, enemy lines/combat.
  • What motivates people to want to infiltrate something? What conditions must be in place for “infiltration” to be necessary? What might someone infiltrating a space seek to access or discover?
  • What is a place that you would want to infiltrate? Why would it be necessary to infiltrate? What conditions require you to infiltrate rather than just access or explore or enter?
• Introduce the film using the following framing questions:
  • What is a detention center? What is the alleged mission of detention centers?
    Note to teachers:See our Discussion Guide for background information on Detention Centers.
  • Why infiltrate the detention center rather than go about other ways of activism?
  • What might a detention center not want revealed about its practices and processes of detainment? Why? What does secrecy suggest about the ways a detention center treats human beings?
  • How does infiltration allow the activists to support those people who are currently detained in ways they could not if they did not infiltrate the system?
  • What are the activists risking by infiltrating the detention center? What does this suggest about their motivations and belief in the necessity of activism?

Discuss with your students how a lack of transparency makes possible the following practices in privately run detention centers. Ask them how these institutions can be held accountable if their practices are not exposed to the public. Consider the following possibilities as entry points for discussing malpractice in detention centers:

• Abuse (sexual; physical; mental) by prison officials, nurses, and others in positions of power
• Unsupervised health protocol (especially during COVID-19), including unsanitary spaces, food, temperatures, and living conditions
• Unsafe conditions for individuals with disabilities and diseases
• Family separation, child detention (unaccompanied children) and the inability to communicate with others outside centers
• Restricted access to legal help
• Lack of reporting on abuse, violence, and other violations
• Violations of basic human rights
  
  

Activity II: Transparency in Detention Centers.Locations of ICE detention facilities: https://www.ice.gov/detention-facilities

Research 2-3 detention facilities closest to you using the above link. Read about their visitation policies, detainee protocol, and process for contacting detainees. Further research GEO Group - “work rehabilitation”/”job” programs; CoreCivic; Corrections Corporation of America; and differences between public versus private systems.

• What do you notice about the rhetoric applied to incarcerated peoples? Are they referred to as detainees? Do they carry an “alien registration number”? What does the language imply about the treatment of those in centers?
• Beyond physical barriers, what communication barriers are imposed in detention facilities? How do internal barriers reinforce isolation and further separate those within the detention center from those outside?
• What are private prisons? How are individuals treated differently in private versus public prisons? For incarcerated people who perform labor in private centers, how are they compensated in private centers?
• What information is missing within these specific detention centers (e.g., number of people, demographics, size, conditions)? Are the facilities remote?
  • Why might this information be intentionally obscured?
  • Who does the lack of transparency protect? How does it allow detention centers to avoid investigation and accountability?
• Read the following excerpt from a series of letters collected from the Glades County detention center in response to poor health conditions during COVID-19. (The article can be accessed here):

“This shows a total disregard for our safety and well being, and should not be the way human beings act especially not during this COVID-19 pandemic…. No one should be forgotten or left to die at any facility in the United States of America, especially now…. we were served spoiled food, we’re starving, bathrooms are bad, violations of rights…. beds are two feet apart and not six feet apart.”

• • Do individual facilities outline COVID-19 protocols? Do they offer information on the number of people tested and those who tested positive?
  • In what ways has the detention center’s treatment of those incarcerated made them become “forgotten or left to die”? How is this exacerbated by a lack of transparency? How can these attitudes instill feelings of trauma?

Day 2 Lesson: Undocumented and Unafraid

Activity I: Acts of Resistance.After watching the film, lead a discussion about the acts of resistance, big and small, seen in the film. List the acts of resistance on the board. (Some examples can include: refusal to board the airplane; distribution of phone numbers; conversations with detainees; etc.)

After the class has created a list of specific types of resistance, assign one or two methods of resistance to groups. Have them analyze these modes of resistance in search of the following:

Strategy -

Tactics -

Reasoning -

Have students cite moments from the film to support their explanations.

Before having students complete these assignments on their own, complete this sample assignment as a full group:

ASK: Why would these youth *volunteer* to get arrested? What is the strategy here? What tactics did they use?

Strategy -

Tactics -

Reasoning -

Activity II: Undocumented and Unafraid.While the year of the release of The Infiltratorssaw historic mass protest and resistance action, mobilization against criminalization and incarceration has been ongoing for years. Have students break off into small groups and assign them 1-2 of the following acts of protest/sources listed below to research. Afterwards, reconvene to respond to the activity discussion questions.

List of Protests:

• Trail of Dreams, 2010,https://beautifultrouble.org/case/trail-of-dreams/: On Jan. 1, 2010, four youths from Miami embarked on the "Trail of Dreams," a 1,500-mile march to Washington, D.C., demanding an end to the deportation of undocumented minors and passage of the Dream Act. Among the four was Ms. Pacheco. She had earned three degrees at Miami Dade College and co-founded the undocumented-immigrant student group there. After graduating, her undocumented status prevented her from getting a job and building a career. (source: WSJ - Anatomy of a Deferred-Action Dream)
• Washington D.C. Capitol Sit in:A sit-in at the Hart Senate Office Building in Washington. "I felt empowered," says Ms. Dominguez. Nine protestors, wearing caps and gowns, sat in the atrium in a circle around a banner that read "Undocumented and Unafraid." Thirteen others occupied senators' offices. Capitol Police arrested 21 people. None was placed in deportation proceedings. (WSJ)
• Hunger strike: Carlos Amador, the son of illegal-immigrant house cleaners from Mexico who was completing a master's degree at UCLA, started a 15-day hunger strike backing the Dream Act with eight others outside Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein's Los Angeles office.
• Harvard Medical School protest: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri4koB-cRC8
• Interruption of NC legislative session/hearing: https://www.latimes.com/nation/la-xpm-2012-mar-13-la-na-nn-north-carolina-dream-act-20120313-story.html
• List of actions 2010-2014:http://www.notonemoredeportation.com/the-history-of-the-not1more-campaign/
• Infiltration of Broward County: https://prospect.org/civil-rights/los-infiltradores/
• Progress Illinois: Activists Stop Bus At Broadview Detention Center:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5z3z8uLsenk

Activity discussion questions:

1. What shape did these forms of protests take? In what ways did the participants act? How did they act out specifically in front of the congress people across the political spectrum?
2. How did these politicians take their concerns seriously as a result? Why were they moved to act than through traditional tactics of enacting social change (e.g., lobbying, campaigning, writing/calling legislators, etc.)?
3. Who leads these protests? Who carries the burden of risk? What risks are associated with political action for undocumented immigrants?
4. Although these significant protests have resulted in the passage of DACA, a renewable act that delays deportation for a two-year period, and the continuation of the DREAM Act, which creates an opportunity for young undocumented youth in the U.S. to become citizens, are these acts sufficient for protecting the rights of undocumented immigrants? Why or why not?

Other tie-ins:

Aloe Blacc music video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_o6axAseak

Theater of the Oppressed Activity:http://www.mandalaforchange.com/site/applied-theatre/theatre-of-the-oppressed/“acting, rather than just talking”

• Teaching Immigration with the Immigrant Stories Project - A remarkable collection of lesson plans and activities that can be used in classrooms to teach about immigration. Created by The Immigrant Learning Center.
• Educating About Immigration: Lessons for Teachers - Constitutional Rights Foundation
• Lessons and activities from the Zinn Education Project:
  • Deportations on Trial: Mexican Americans During the Great Depression - In this role play, students analyze who is to blame for the illegal, mass deportations of Mexican Americans and immigrants during the Great Depression.
  • The Line Between Us: Teaching About the Border and Mexican Immigration - Features lessons and readings on the history of the U.S.-Mexico border.
• Library of Congress. Classroom Materials at the Library of Congress: Immigration and Ethnic Heritage. https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/?fa=subject_topic:immigration+%26+ethnic+heritage.

Helpful Sources

• Blitzker, J. (2013, Oct. 3). “Dreamers at the Border.” The New Yorker,Accessed online at https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/dreamers-at-the-border.
• Budiman, A. (2020, Aug. 20). “Key findings about U.S. immigrants.” Pew Research Center. Accessed online at https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/08/20/key-findings-about-u-s-immigrants.
• Carroll, R. and Ed Pilkington. (2013, Aug. 7) “Dream Nine immigration activists freed.” The Guardian. Accessed online at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/08/dream-nine-immigration-activists-freed.
• “The Dream 9.” Google Arts & Culture. Accessed online at https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/the-dream-9-latino-usa/agIi4BjHN3Z-Lg?hl=en.
• Escudero, K. (2020). Organizing While Undocumented: Immigrant Youth's Political Activism under the Law.New York: NYU Press.
• Gonzalez, S. (2017, Jan. 19). “No One Expected Obama Would Deport More People Than any Other U.S. President.” WNYC News.Accessed online at https://www.wnyc.org/story/no-one-thought-barack-obama-would-deport-more-people-any-other-us-president.
• Jordan, M. (2012, Oct. 14). “Anatomy of a Deferred-Action Dream.” The Wall Street Journal.Accessed online at https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10000872396390443982904578046951916986168
• May, M. (2013, June 21). “Los Infiltradores.” The American Prospect.Accessed online at https://prospect.org/civil-rights/los-infiltradores.
• New America Media. (2013, Aug 3). “Criticism, support for decision by 'Dream 9' to bring their case directly to immigration officials.” PRI.org.Accessed online at https://www.pri.org/stories/2013-08-03/criticism-support-decision-dream-9-bring-their-case-directly-immigration.
• Wong, K., Shadduck-Hernández, J., Inzunza, F., Monroe, J., Narro, V., and Valenzuela Jr., A. (2012). Undocumented and Unafraid: Tam Tran, Cinthya Felix, and the Immigrant Youth Movement. Los Angeles, CA: UCLA Center for Labor Research and Education. https://books.labor.ucla.edu/undocumentedunafraid.
• Truax, E. (2015). Dreamers: An Immigrant Generation’s Fight for the American Dream.Boston: Beacon Press.
• Truax, E. (2018). We Built The Wall: How the US Keeps Out Asylum Seekers from Mexico, Central America and Beyond(Trans. D. Stockwell). New York: Verso.
• Wolfe-Rocca, U. (2019, Oct. 2). “Downplaying Deportations: How Textbooks Hide the Mass Expulsion of Mexican Americans During the Great Depression.” Zinn Education Project.Accessed online at https://www.zinnedproject.org/if-we-knew-our-history/downplaying-deportations.

Resource List

• Dream Action Coalition: https://www.drmactioncoalition.org/
• National Immigrant Youth Alliance:https://theniya.org/
• National Immigration Law Center https://www.nilc.org/
• Not One More: http://www.notonemoredeportation.com/
• DREAM Activists: https://dreamactivist.org/
• Equal Justice Initiative: https://eji.org/
• Youth Rise: https://youthrise.org/
• The Immigrant Learning Center: https://www.ilctr.org/

Standards

Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science and Technical Subjects

RH.11-12.2 Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary that makes clear the relationships among the key details and ideas.

W.9--10.2d Use precise language and domain-specific vocabulary to manage the complexity of the topic.

W.11-12.2 Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas, concepts and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization and analysis of content.

SL.11--12.1 Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 11-12 topics, texts and issues, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.

SL.11--12.2 Integrate multiple sources of information presented in diverse formats and media (e.g., visually, quantitatively, orally) in order to make informed decisions and solve problems, evaluating the credibility and accuracy of each source and noting any discrepancies among the data.

SL.11--12.3 Evaluate a speaker's point of view, reasoning and use of evidence and rhetoric, assessing the stance, premises, links among ideas, word choice, points of emphasis and tone used.

Social-Emotional Learning: Core SEL Competencies

• Self-awareness: Accurately recognize one’s own emotions, thoughts, and values and how they influence behavior.
• Social awareness: Take the perspective of and empathize with others, including those from diverse backgrounds and cultures.
• Responsible Decision Making: Realistically evaluate consequences of various actions, and consider the wellbeing of oneself and others.

About The Author

Stacia Cedillo
Stacia Cedillo, M.A., is a former middle school science and social studies teacher. Stacia completed her master’s degree and doctoral coursework in cultural studies in education at the University of Texas at Austin, where she studied the role of race in education politics, policy, and ideology. She has worked as a community organizer, campaign volunteer, and policy intern in the Texas Legislature.

Lesson Plan Producer, POV

Courtney Cook, Education Manager

Thanks to those who reviewed this resource:

Rachel Friedland, POV Senior Associate, Programs & Engagement

Chrissy Greismer, POV Education Assistant

This resource was created, in part, with the generous support of the Open Society Foundation.