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Student Financial Support Interview | Otter.ai

Student Financial Support Interview

Valeria Cruz25min

Speaker 1

00:01

Alright, there we go. Okay, so can I get to spelling your very first name, your pronouns and your role with rooted?

Speaker 2

00:09

Yes, name spelled V, I, C, T, O, R, I, a, I guess she her pronouns and one of the colleagues with rooted perfect.

Speaker 1

00:22

And are you a UT student? I recently graduated alumni. Okay, perfect. And then, for readers who might not know, can you briefly explain what rooted is and how the like fun began? Yeah.

Speaker 2

00:38

Rooted was formed in 2019 as a collective of students, alumni, staff and community members to help meet the gap in services for immigrant students at UT and yeah, We started the fun because one of, like, the highest requests we received from students who reached out for support was of financial need. And so it's something we've been working on to have the resources to be able to do

Speaker 1

01:17

and talk to me about when the repeal of the Texas DREAM Act happened. How rooted kind of took action with the GoFundMe.

Speaker 2

01:28

Yeah, the repeal of the Dream Act exacerbated already that financial need for students. Sorry, can you word the question one more time?

Speaker 1

01:41

Yeah, so talk to me about like when the DREAM Act got repealed and you guys decided to start this fund. Yeah.

Speaker 2

01:51

We had to quickly finish sort of the program, how the application was designed, and the processes, kind of that summer the news hit so to be ready for the fall, because we were expecting changes in tuition, and we had already seen kind of what it would mean with the with what International Students are charged, so we knew it was going to be a very expensive tuition bill. And yeah, I mean, it impacted several students. And we quick, yeah, we once the review happened and students began to see changes in tuition bill. We received many emails. And so, like I was Yeah, because I was mentioning we were trying to hurry up to make sure that we that our financial assistance program would be ready before the fall. And yeah, kind of just receiving the applications and saying all the tuition bills and how much students scholarships were lost because of losing state financial aid. That's another part that's not talked about enough students not only lost in state tuition rates, but also access to state financial aid, which just make which is, yeah, makes it worse.

Speaker 1

03:37

But yeah, yeah, and so you say they lost state financial aid, like, like, the FAFSA and stuff, or like, or

Speaker 2

03:46

just task for us, Texas, state financial

Unknown Speaker

03:50

aid, okay? And that was a big help beforehand,

Speaker 2

03:54

yeah, it was one form of it was one of the only forms of access to financial aid. And now kind of the landscape is owning private scholarships or what we are able to offer, so it's very limited, and yeah, the bills are now higher, so that makes the situation a lot worse.

Speaker 1

04:20

And how has the fund I am looking at now, I feel it has $12,000 as of today. How have you been able to help students with it?

Speaker 2

04:28

Specifically? Yeah, some of the way students have used the tuition relief funds that we've released is to cover basic needs such as rent and groceries. So has kind of curved the Yeah, the basic needs aspect of it, because the students like education is important, and so sometimes they're putting up in a position to. Way between like, eating that day that week, or yeah or the living situation. And so receiving some support from rooted has they've Yeah, shared with us that it has allowed them to cover those expenses while they figure out yeah, just how to Yeah, to figure out ways to finance their their education. Yeah.

Speaker 1

05:31

And how do you determine, like, how does, is there an application process? Or, how do you know which students to help and which ones?

Speaker 2

05:40

Yes, there is an application process that we opened in before the school started.

Speaker 1

05:51

And how much money would I know? The GoFundMe says 150k is the goal. Is that how much you would need to help everybody who applied.

Speaker 2

06:03

Yeah, so that goal was set to try to the goal was set based on sort of this, like, there's like, average amount of seniors and taking all their tuition for one year. So that's why our goal is at least graduate these seniors, because they don't have any other alternatives since they completed most of their education at UT. So that's where that goal is coming from. But, but it's very hard to raise that kind of money. So what we kind of do as an alternative is that relief assistance where, like students, get to choose what they where, yeah, where, what bills they need to pay most urgently.

Speaker 1

07:02

And I think you talked about the seniors who I also saw on the latest the last story we did that like seniors were like the priority because they were about to graduate. Have you been able to help some of those seniors with, like, the difference of in state and out of state tuition,

Speaker 2

07:21

with who, with tuition, at least some seniors, I would say that are graduating this semester and who have received some support. I think that's where the impact goes a long way. But I think I mean, our students have always been very resourceful and figure out ways to manage and conversations we've had. We're confident that some of our seniors will be graduating this fall, mostly due to their own efforts, rather than us. I think we just try to support as we can, where we can. But yeah, I think for us, meeting that goal would help us fully cover tuition, which would be essentially life changing after this, like very heartbreaking event that was kind of imposed on them.

Speaker 1

08:20

And how has it seen being the community raised so much money for you guys, because $12,000 is a lot of money, and so how has it like felt seeing all that? And also, how have you been like doing community outreach to get those donations?

Speaker 2

08:38

That's a good question that I've not been asked, I think we don't take it lightly. We definitely want to honor everyone who does ship in because we know the gravity of time and like it almost seems like every day there's like a fire to put out and think that people are placing whatever they can in our fund is very meaningful, especially for our students who get to see because obviously the GoFundMe is public, we get to see, yeah, how much money is being poured into supporting them. And I think I wouldn't want any like donor to worry necessarily about the goal, but really understanding that, that the tuition, that the relief we are able to support this go a long way, and making sure student is fed and it has a home at the very minimum, like I said, our students are very resourceful. Because, I mean, it's never been an even painful like it's they've always, like I said, even before the repeal, like, struggle for scholarships, because struggled for. For work authorization. So I think whatever help can be brought and can be alleviated is definitely deeply appreciated by us and by the students.

Speaker 1

10:17

And to best of your knowledge, is ut providing any for any sort of help for these students, or are you guys kind of like the only like line of support for these students

Speaker 2

10:32

right now? Unfortunately, during my time, I think I saw sort of the UT, kind of going back. Instead of instead of forward, right, they removed the monarch program, really because of Senate Bill 17, which doesn't cover organizations like ours support students of various legal status, so that of compliance was unnecessary and and did hurt students morale and the way they see the students support and kind of since Then, since then, there hasn't been, because we don't necessarily work with the University where our organization and also just Yeah, we honestly it hasn't been as supportive as I you know, our students initially envision by choosing UT and so definitely has been disappointing to kind of have all this financial burden on students shoulders and for Students to figure out how to support each other

Speaker 1

12:08

and for the students that have been able to help with these these funds. Do you like? Have any sorry, let me word this correctly, like for the students that you have helped, what has been, like, the overall reaction from them with your help? Like, have they said anything about how they has helped them, or about, like, if they're grateful for it, or just anything like that?

Speaker 2

12:35

Yeah, we did evaluate and got feedback from students just to know how we were running the program, and how and what the impact was. And yeah, the majority, when I read, the majority, all students across the board, yeah, really appreciated the once rooted, stepping up and doing something. And also, as I mentioned, most students did contribute to contribute to the financial assistance, to their tuition or to the rent or groceries, and so yeah, across the board, I think it was first I was a worry, like, are the assistance we were able to give? Was it going to make a difference? And student or students that applied and received were did very much appreciate and what we were to give. Because I think I mean to this, yeah, to this date, we're the only organization that is addressing the the impacts of the repeal. And so, yeah, it's important for us, and yeah, for the students to see that. You know, we do care, and we're trying our best, and they really do see that as we were trying to make sure the financial assistance program ran well as best we could. And I think, yeah, they're very gracious and patient with us as we figured out all decisions we had to support the big requests that they had. And so we, yeah, we were definitely, yeah, just it was definitely a huge type of relief that all the hard work we had put into it, students did find it impactful. And yeah, I mean, without it, it'd be much worse to student morale and to the needs students have.

Speaker 1

14:48

Yeah, and what are your do you plan on continuing this fund for future semesters? And yeah, that's my question.

Unknown Speaker

14:58

I. We, yeah, we want to distribute in spring, in the spring,

Speaker 2

15:08

after the spring will, yeah. I mean, I think in a perfect world, we would want to continue, especially because that there's a, there's a right now, there's no other mutual aid fund for UT students, but it's, yeah, it's a lot of work that students are doing. So I think for now, we can safely say that we're going to operate for the spring, and our hope, with capacity and resources, is to see until, until, yeah, if we could do this again.

Speaker 1

15:54

I also think the interesting is that most of you guys are either students or recent students who are helping other students. So how do you guys balance, like, your workload and life when you're not, like, getting paid to do this, or even maybe, like when Monarch was a thing, maybe. But how do you guys balance that you yourself being younger dozen students, while maybe also, maybe even needing as well as some help and sorry about my cat.

Unknown Speaker

16:21

Yeah, good. That's also a good question.

Speaker 2

16:31

I mean, speaking for myself, let's see. I mean, I just, I think for me, it was, there's a lot heart that goes behind this. Really, that kind of what keeps me going knowing the students I work with, the students I've gotten to know who were impacted by a financial assistance program about the resources, I think for me, I have the privilege and skills to be able to support, and that's what I've enjoyed doing when I was a student, working alongside rooted And and seeing sort of this, like, yeah, just grassroots collective, recent community, and we have,

Speaker 2

17:34

yeah, I mean, it's definitely hard work. They do talk to their students, but we do what we can at the end of the day, we know very well, like, kind of work capacity lands. Obviously, there's more we wish we could do, but since, yeah, there's not really good response to this or, like, yeah, we try to just rely on each other, and it's a small team, but we really just try to work well together and know our limits and just try to take care of care of ourselves and of each other and trust like There's so much more we were wanting to do, but we know that there's our capacity. What we do, what we still do, is still impactful. And I think at the day, what we can ask of anyone during these times is, you know, if you can show up and be present and just contribute the way you can. That's enough and and so that's kind of how we've been taking it.

Unknown Speaker

18:50

And my question is, how do you wish? Or let me think of how to word this.

Speaker 1

19:01

What do you wish? The, like, the UT administration. Or, sorry, I don't know how to write this, like, how do you wish? The How do you wish ut would help these students in these times?

Speaker 2

19:16

Yeah, I think definitely building the resource and capacity of advisors and financial aid and for students with different legal statuses and different work authorization, yeah, or just kind of invest in essentially everything. What monarch did was advocate for students who had different needs and. Um, face certain restrictions. Think our students are often, at this point, their own advocates trying to work with financial aid. What was, yeah, another campus resource who doesn't understand situation. So I would say, especially now, I mean, it really, before any other changes were made, would be having more of a conscious understanding of what it means to be a student and in their position, which takes kind of listening and inviting students. But I think that was one that has always been like the need and why Monarch was so important. I and give me like two seconds, because it I'm thinking about, but I don't want to.

Speaker 2

21:22

I yeah, there's so many changes that just have already happened that UT has done without, really the input or video or the understanding of what it will meet, avoid students how we've we knew students who applied to our fund, who were freshmen who just could not continue with UT. So all the decisions have serious impacts on very on students who, yeah, for example, dream of going to medical school, students who have a lot of promise, but they've made decisions so far that has just made it very hard to be at UT. So yeah, it's kind of hard to make an ask when there's just so many changes that have already drastically impacted immigrant students ability to be Yeah, to better be Yeah.

Speaker 1

22:27

So you said you've like, met some students who, like, are not continuing their studies or not starting them because of everything that's happened.

Speaker 2

22:38

Yeah, the rapport, just especially last minute. Students who you know were high school seniors, graduated already, and then they saw the change in tuition, and they've had to pivot. And that means student, that means ut lost that student who already earned their spot because of the city. Decisions made.

Speaker 1

23:09

And my last question is, what are your like? What is your message to these students who don't have the resources anymore, to or not? Maybe a message, but like, maybe your hope for them who don't have the resources that maybe they had, like a year or two ago with the DREAM Act. What is your hope for these students?

Speaker 2

23:32

My hope is that they find community, that all these things that have happened to them certain have happened and they shouldn't have to suffer in silence that rooted wants to be there and needs and needs them as like the collective can only be. So continue to find us and and reach out. I think one of the things we've heard from our students as we've gone to connect with them, is the importance of feeling connected to students who have who are experiencing the same situation. And yeah, our students are incredibly resilient, but I hope that you have the time to, yeah, be careful, and because I know a lot of us are definitely feeling on survival mode, but I think it makes A difference when you find a collective and a community that understands where you're coming from and can walk with, can walk together and learn from each other and help each other out. And, yeah, it's difficult, beautiful times, but you. Yeah, we shouldn't have to go through this alone, and we exist.

Speaker 1

25:05

And yeah, yeah, that was all my questions. But do you have anything else that you wanted to add or expand to what we talked about? Yeah,

Speaker 1

25:34

it's okay if you don't as well, we talked a lot of great things.

Speaker 2

25:38

Yeah, I feel like there's things I wanted to articulate. I said, I guess maybe too late for me. So like, find the right words, but no, like you said, I think this is a great interview.

Unknown Speaker

25:54

So yeah, appreciate it. Yeah, of course it was.

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