Wearing monarch butterfly wings as a symbol of “natural migration,” 24-year-old Arizbeth Sanchez watches as Atlanta Police arrest nine protesters. Sanchez was one of seventeen demonstrators protesting the policies the Georgia Board of Regents enforces on undocumented students in the state’s top universities.
“We keep fighting. Unfortunately, these bans are not going to be lifted today, and it has been nine years since these policies have been implemented,” Sanchez says. “As long as they’re here for the long run, we’re going to be here.”
Sanchez is one of the 22,000 undocumented students in Georgia who are beneficiaries of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA. Sanchez, was also a student Freedom University, a modern-day freedom school in Atlanta. Freedom schools have historically been an alternative way to educate African American youth dating back to the civil rights movement. Now they are helping a new generation, this time of undocumented students.
“I love seeing their eyes when they realize that education is a human right. That them being here is beyond them. To watch the criminalization just wash off their shoulders, it’s amazing,” says Sanchez who is now the community engagement and volunteer coordinator.
Freedom University was established in 2011, almost a year after the Georgia Board of Regents passed laws barring undocumented students from Georgia’s top public universities. Laura Emiko Soltis, the organization’s executive director, works to bring tuition-free, college-level courses to undocumented youth that range from the sciences to humanities while also advocating for their rights.
“I think the magic comes not necessarily through the teaching, but in bringing undocumented students together, many of whom have lived in isolation, who never talked about being undocumented with others,” Soltis says.
Laura Emiko Soltis practices a son jarocho performance with a student. Photo: Kevin Sanchez Farez 
Students recite and revise lyrics ahead of their performance. Photo: Kevin Sanchez Farez
After graduating from high school, Sanchez spent two years working before finding an advertisement for the organization in a copy of Mundo Hispánico, a Spanish-language weekly newspaper.
“I remember feeling like I hadn’t worked hard enough. Like I could have done better. Maybe if I had tried better, [the state of] Georgia would have wanted me,” Sanchez says. “It almost feels like it was like destiny. It was a very tiny clipping, and so it was hidden by a lot of other things, but for whatever reason, we found it there.”
Since joining the organization, Soltis has grown closer to Sanchez though standing by her at demonstrations and speaking to her mother after being arrested.
“She’s been my longest serving student at Freedom University, and she’s taught me a lot of what it means to be undocumented. What it means to be a trusted ally,” Soltis says. “What it means to be held accountable, and I think it’s a shared process of learning.”
Ten hours after watching officers escort Soltis to the Fulton County Jail, Sanchez along with other students greeted her upon release with flowers wrapped around their fingers and warm embraces. It is not the group’s first direct action at a Board of Regents meeting, so Sanchez is hopeful their faces, stories and orange wings remain a reminder to officials.
Note: This story was produced for PRN, the student-led news station at Georgia State University.
