Richmond School Board sets rules for ICE access to schools
Richmond’s School Board unanimously voted Tuesday to set new rules for how much access the division will give federal immigration agents to school buildings.
In revisions to Richmond Public Schools’ “Relations with Law Enforcement Authorities” policy, the board declared that the presence of immigration law enforcement agents on school campuses “substantially disrupts the learning environment” and said agents can only be admitted by the site administrator if the law requires that they be granted entry.
“It’s unfortunate that we even have to have this written,” said 6th District member Shonda Harris-Muhammed during a discussion of the proposal Monday night.
The changes follow heightened fears among immigrant communities after President Donald Trump rolled back policies last month that prohibited immigration-related arrests from occurring in schools.
While there have been no confirmed reports of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests being made at schools since the policy change, divisions nationwide have begun crafting plans for how to deal with the possibility.
The Richmond policy requires any division employee who is approached by immigration agents wanting to enter a school building to immediately notify the principal. The principal will then be required to obtain identification and a signed judicial warrant or subpoena from the agents, and must contact Superintendent Jason Kamras’ office and legal counsel, who will send a representative. Parents of the student in question must also be notified.
“Do not provide any information, including the student’s schedule or behavior, without legal counsel present,” the new policy states.
If the agents don’t have a valid, signed judicial warrant or subpoena, the policy calls for them to be asked to leave the school grounds.
A separate resolution passed by the board Tuesday orders the creation of a rapid response team to prepare for the possibility of an RPS student being left without a guardian due to immigration-related arrest and directs the division to review its recordkeeping practices “to ensure that no data is being collected with respect to students’ immigration status.”
RPS ombudsman Victoria Gochez said the division began preparing for the impacts of potential changes in federal immigration policy in November and has since increased its communications to families about protections for students as well as provided training to staff.
School divisions throughout the U.S. are required to educate all students regardless of immigration status under the Supreme Court’s landmark 1982 case of Plyler v. Doe. The ruling was divided, however, and efforts have been made to overturn it. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in 2022 said he was interested in challenging the ruling, while Tennessee lawmakers on Tuesday filed state legislation that would let public schools opt out of enrolling undocumented students, setting up a potential legal test of the decision.
Richmond’s Latino population has swelled in recent years. Roughly 25% of RPS students today are Hispanic, compared to 10% a decade ago, and about 4,000 of the division’s 21,000 students are classified as English learners.
While RPS saw significant school absences Monday as a result of a nationwide “Day Without Immigrants” that urged immigrants to stay home from work and school to show their broader impact in American society, Gochez said there’s little evidence that the new immigration policies have affected schools’ absenteeism rates.
Anne Forrester, president of the Richmond Education Association, said the union was supportive of the policy.
“I’m very proud that as a community we’ve all been on the same page and working together on this,” she said.
Sarah Vogelsong
