Immigration Enforcement and Student Performance Decline Link
NBER Report Shows Immigration Enforcement and Student Performance Are More Connected Than We Think
In classrooms across the United States, the effects of immigration policy are being felt in unexpected and troubling ways. According to a new working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), frequent immigration arrests and heightened enforcement measures are not only disrupting communities — they are also hurting student performance, including among U.S. citizens from Spanish-speaking households.
Immigration Enforcement: Linking Policy to Performance
The study, led by economists David Figlio and Umut Özek, explores the relationship between immigration enforcement and student performance by examining data from a large, anonymized school district in Florida. By connecting local arrest records to standardized test results, the researchers uncovered a clear pattern: after spikes in immigration arrests, student test scores dipped noticeably in the following months.
While the researchers expected that foreign-born students would be affected, the decline extended to U.S.-born children living in Spanish-speaking households — especially those in high-poverty schools or who were already struggling academically.
“This suggests that the psychological and social effects of enforcement policies go far beyond the individuals directly targeted,” the authors noted. “They impact entire communities living under fear and uncertainty.”
Quantifying the Academic Impact
Florida’s education system provides an ideal environment for tracking trends, as students there take state tests three times a year. This allowed the researchers to measure learning outcomes before and after enforcement surges with unusual precision.
The study revealed that each 1% increase in immigration enforcement intensity led to a decline in test performance equivalent to 10–15 points on the SAT scale. That drop accounts for about 10% of the existing achievement gap between English- and Spanish-speaking students.
Interestingly, higher-achieving Spanish-speaking students appeared resilient, while lower-performing peers suffered the steepest declines — a finding that points to how enforcement disproportionately affects students already facing systemic disadvantages.
Immigration Enforcement: Beyond the Classroom: The Broader Consequences
The findings align with a growing body of research that ties aggressive immigration enforcement to wider social costs. Past studies have associated these policies with increased anxiety, absenteeism, and even school dropouts. This NBER report extends that narrative, offering compelling evidence that immigration enforcement and student performance are deeply linked.
Curiously, the study also noted a drop in disciplinary incidents among Latino and Spanish-speaking students. Researchers speculate that this could be due to students avoiding attention or educators showing more leniency toward families under visible distress. However, attendance rates remained relatively stable throughout the period of study.
A Nationwide Pattern of Fear and Fallout
The Florida findings mirror similar trends observed elsewhere. In California’s Central Valley, Stanford University professor Thomas Dee found a 22% increase in student absences in the two months following a major immigration raid. The rise was particularly noticeable among younger children — many of whose parents feared deportation.
Likewise, research by Kirsten Slungaard Mumma at Columbia University’s Teachers College reported similar patterns in Connecticut and Rhode Island, where English learners missed more school days after enforcement actions intensified.
These studies collectively indicate that the academic consequences of immigration policy are neither localized nor short-lived. Instead, they ripple across classrooms, neighborhoods, and entire school districts.
Communities Living Under Watch
What makes the recent years stand out is how enforcement has become embedded in daily life. Federal immigration agents have conducted operations in residential complexes, workplaces, and even near schools and childcare centers — locations once seen as safe havens.
While officials claim to target violent offenders, investigations by media outlets like ProPublica have revealed that many detainees had minor or no criminal records. In some cases, even U.S. citizens have been mistakenly detained, compounding the sense of insecurity among Hispanic and immigrant families.
In such an environment, fear permeates everyday routines. Families keep children indoors, students struggle to focus, and teachers are left managing classrooms filled with invisible emotional burdens. “You can feel the tension,” one Florida teacher reportedly said. “Even the kids who were always outgoing became quieter.”
Policy Beyond Punishment
The authors of the NBER study stress that their findings are not an argument against immigration enforcement per se — rather, they call for educational systems to adapt to the unintended fallout. Schools serving large immigrant or Spanish-speaking populations may need extra mental health support, community outreach, and cultural sensitivity training to help students cope with ongoing anxiety.
As Figlio and Özek point out, “Education does not exist in isolation from the broader social and political environment.” When enforcement intensifies, its effects echo far beyond border checkpoints — reaching into classrooms, households, and test scores.