Citizenship Day 2022: Another Beginning

A few months ago, I opened an email from KIND attorney Lauren Sullivan in which she proudly told us that one of her clients had just passed her citizenship test and would be sworn in the next day. Lauren’s joy and excitement was contagious— I admit to letting out a few whoops that brought my daughter and husband out of their rooms!

This was not only a huge accomplishment for her client, but it also marked an important step for KIND’s ongoing efforts to support our clients, and our former clients, succeed in their new country.  Lauren is among a small group of KIND staff who have had the chance to explore how providing naturalization and integration services to formerly unaccompanied children can be incorporated into our mission.  This work has ranged from pilot programs involving representing individual clients, to mentoring pro bono partners, to exploring citizenship clinics with groups like Project Citizenship.

It has also included experimenting with mentorship programs and civic engagement opportunities to support clients’ interests and strengthen their voices, as well as social services programming aimed at providing tools for living independently.  Even before we were actively thinking about naturalization and integration, however, KIND staff around the country seemed to intuitively understand that meeting the legal needs of clients was only part of the job.  The growth of KIND’s social services programs, the creation of artistic opportunities such as our partnership with Artolution, the storytelling skills clients learn through our Voices That Matter Most program, and our history of working with clients and former clients who want to speak out on the policies of immigration, all point to something at the core of KIND’s DNA: we can be part of the solution, giving unaccompanied children the support they need to determine their own future.

Supporting our clients as they prepare for and consider applying to become citizens is a natural evolution in this belief.  KIND has posted a beautiful interview with Lauren in recognition of Citizenship Day, an interview that showcases the many choices her client had to make in her young life and the challenges and excitement posed by taking the ultimate immigration step—becoming a citizen.

As Lauren notes, “Citizenship is truly the full legal completion of her [client’s] immigration journey.”  And yet it is also another beginning.  As Lauren describes her client today: strong, resilient, a small business owner and the mom of a “feisty” three-year-old, I get chills thinking about all the sacrifices and effort the client put into becoming a citizen.  And I’m excited for all the possibilities for her on the road ahead.

And, frankly, I’m excited for my colleagues and me.  Every time I hear about someone becoming a citizen I am, just for a moment, transported into a sliver of that experience.  I feel just a little prouder and more excited about this gift I was given at birth.

And that may be an apt description because I’ve always believed that holding a baby in your arms is like holding the future in your hands.  Hearing that someone just became a citizen—especially one of our clients—makes me feel like I’m holding the future in my hands all over again.