In the days after President Donald Trump's inauguration, as rumors of immigration raids in Chicago started to spread, Roy, a second grade public school teacher, says he noticed a shift. "Our attendance was pretty bad across the city. There was like 50 to 80 percent attendance."
A lot of parents wrote to tell him their child was not feeling well. He acknowledged that children do get colds and flu at this time of year but felt something else was going on under the surface. About half of Roy's students are immigrants or children of immigrants. Many have recently arrived. Some do not have legal status in the U.S. Roy suspected the families were scared of exposing themselves to potential deportation and he asked NPR to withhold his last name and the name of his school to protect his students
Schools have historically been off limits for immigration enforcement. That all changed when, almost as soon as he took office, President Trump got rid of a decades-old policy that prevented agents from arresting migrants without legal status in sensitive places such as schools, hospitals and churches.
Now, those locations are fair game for ICE agents to make arrests.
NPR spoke to educators and parents in several school districts who told us the order has sent them scrambling. One teacher in San Diego, who requested anonymity because she was afraid there'd be repercussions with her supervisors, told us their school is seeing a rise in absenteeism.
She said she knew of three mental health crises involving students who were afraid their parents might get deported.
Other states also report visible drops in attendance among immigrant students.
Back in Chicago, Roy the second grade teacher, says he sent an email to parents reminding them that the city has sanctuary status - meaning local law enforcement are barred from cooperating with federal immigration enforcement.
The next day, he says, most of the kids were back in class. He was able to speak to parents who told him they had hesitated to send their students to school because of what they've been hearing and seeing on social media. "Parents are afraid," he said. One parent even asked if the school could assign remote work for kids whose families are too worried to send them in every day, Roy said.
His students are scared too. The day after the inauguration, he says one 7-year-old boy from Honduras, told the class " Trump won. You know what that means? If you're from Venezuela, you're going back to Venezuela. If you're from Honduras, you're going to go back to Honduras."
Roy sighs. He himself is from an immigrant family, from Mexico. "You know, my grandma worked at a factory in West Chicago, and you would hear about raids and how they would have to hide in certain places in the factory. You'd be afraid to come home and not see Grandma. And those are the fears that our students have."
Roy says he tries to reassure his students. "I say, 'hey, we're not going to let them take you.' I talked to them about our security guard at our school. I tell them he's going to help keep us safe. He's always watching the cameras. He's watching the hallways. He's not going to let anybody into our building."
But, he asks, how do you explain the technicalities of immigration law to a 6 year old? Schools don't have the power to stop federal immigration agents who present a warrant, regardless of local sanctuary laws.
School districts across the country have been educating teachers about the law.
"We know that they need a certain warrant to come in," says Evelyn Gonzalez, a teacher at Roosevelt High School in Chicago. "They [ICE agents] are not allowed in until unless they have that warrant. And even if they have that warrant, we still need to follow protocol, calling CPS [Child Protective Services] legal."
Gonzalez says she's hoping for the best, but is prepared to take a stand. "We're a sanctuary city. Maybe in these four years, there's going to be a time where I have to make a decision that I have to break a law. But if it's to protect my students, I'm going to do that."
The Trump administration has given mixed messages about enforcing immigration laws in schools. During a televised immigration raid in Chicago, border czar Tom Homan told TV personality Dr. Phil that ICE isn't operating in schools. He referred to the new mandate, which says immigration enforcement will focus on immigrants with a criminal record who entered the country illegally.
But the administration has also repeatedly said that it considers all immigrants without legal status to be criminals. There are multiple local media reports about ICE agents arresting illegal immigrants without a warrant since Trump took office
While school districts in Chicago and San Diego have drawn a line in the sand and said they stand with immigrant communities, some states have indicated they will do all they can to support President Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration- even in schools.
Tennessee passed a series of anti-immigration measures, including a bill that would make it a felony for any local elected official to adopt sanctuary policies.
Recently the Oklahoma State Board of Education unanimously advanced a rule to request proof of citizenship or immigration status from families when they enroll their children in public schools. "We've got to know where the illegal immigrants are," said Oklahoma superintendent Ryan Walters on ABC affiliate KOCO. "What schools, what districts, and again we have to make decisions on allocating resources, we have to make decisions as a state on how to deal with those problems."
The rule is awaiting approval by the state legislature and the governor.
The American Federation of Teachers (AFT), one of the largest unions of educators, says schools should be completely off limits for immigration enforcement. At a recent town hall, AFT President Randi Weingarten said she has personally written to President Trump. "I said Mr. President. I don't mind begging. I said please. You are actually creating trauma and cruelty for every family in America."
She also told teachers to remember 1982 Supreme Court case Plyler v. Doe.
The court ruled that states cannot deny public school access to children based on their immigration status.
Immigrant families with children are having difficult conversations
Everyday life for immigrant parents has been turned upside down.
A mom who works in hospitality in Chicago, asked that we only use her first initial: Y. She says she worries about getting detained: she has temporary protection from deportation, after alleging employer exploitation.
Her children are U.S. citizens, but she still worries. Just in case, her family now has a plan. "We check in every five hours. If someone doesn't check in within that window, we start calling friends and family," she says.
If all that fails, she says, the plan is to start looking in the detainee locator on the Immigration and Customs Enforcement website.
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