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University Chronicle: Professors organize to collect immigrant research

Dec 3, 2009 Journalism, News, University Chronicle

Disclaimer: Originally published on the St. Cloud State University campus paper, the University Chronicle on the Nov. 30 2009 issue. Written by Jun-Kai Teoh, Managing Online Editor.

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A group of professors from the various departments have grouped together to form the Research Group on Immigrant Workers in Minnesota (RGIWM).

Directed by Stephen Philion, a SCSU Sociology professor, the academic research group is currently being sponsored by the College of Social Sciences.

Philion said the research group also aims to have some of the research done to be in response to the needs of the community.

“Because I think that’s what we have to offer to the community,” Philion said.

“On the one hand we’re producing is knowledge about immigrant workers’ situation and conditions to the faculty,” Philion said. “We’re also producing knowledge or data that’s useful for them.”

Philion said the group does not narrow the definition of immigrant workers to a specific group, but encompasses all immigrants that are seeking employment in the United States with a broad definition.

“If you want to understand the situation of immigrants,” Philion said “one of the best ways is to talk to them about their work experiences.”

Instead of focusing mainly on the cultural realm of immigrant workers and what they face there, Philion said the group will go beyond it to look at how their citizenship/immigrant status and their struggles to achieve citizenship shape their experience in the U.S.

The faculty research group aims to have itself established as an official Center for Research on Immigrant Workers in Minnestoa (CRIWM), to be funded by SCSU.

Currently they are working to achieve that status in the span of about two years, in order to be a center or hub that can both collect and provide information to the academic world and the community.

Some of the long term goals of the group includes organizing conferences to further discuss and share collected data on immigrant workers, the ability to financially encourage SCSU faculty field projects and also to develop an internship program that would give students the opportunity to be involved.

“The very possibility that immigrants might be the source of what could potentially be the second civil rights movement in this country should be very much of interest,” Philion said.

Currently, Professors Ajay Panicker and Paul Greider are both collaborating with Catholic Charities to do interviews with new immigrants in the St. Cloud area.

They’re trying to find out why immigrants left, what they are experiencing now and to try to compare the experiences of earlier immigrants and new immigrants.

Students can seek more information or to get involved with this research by contacting either Panicker or Greider.

The research group plans on organizing a presentation by Nelly Ortiz on immigration on Dec. 4 at 2 p.m. in the Atwood Theatre.

Following that, they plan to organize a public conference as well as another speaker presentation in the following Spring semester.

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