UA
Students Head to Mexico/Guatemala Border to Study Migration
For nine days in May, a team of graduate students from the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health and the College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture School of Landscape Architecture and School of Planning will study the effects of migration on health in the border communities of Chiapas, Mexico and San Marcos, Guatemala.
TUCSON−On Saturday, six graduate
students from the University of Arizona will depart for the Mexico/Guatemala
border to study the effects of migration on health and explore the root causes
of northern migration.
The
students are participating in a unique nine-day Border Health Service Learning
course through the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health at the
University of Arizona.
Gall
served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Guatemala from 2006-2008. He first
proposed the idea of taking the college’s Border Health Service Learning course
further south after participating in a similar course on the U.S.-Mexico border
last fall.
Café Justo is one such model of a
sustainable business. Based in Chiapas, Mexico,
the fair
trade coffee grower cooperative roasts and sells coffee out of its Agua Prieta, Mexico, facility. The students will
visit farmers who grow the coffee in Chiapasand study the effects of the
business model on the community’s physical, social and economic well-being, the
culture of the farmers, and why or why not they would consider migrating.
“We believe that the major reason
people migrate out of their communities is to find work to feed their
families,” said Gall. “By paying farmers fair prices for their coffee, we
believe a business like Café Justo is enabling people to remain
working and living in their communities, keeping families together and
decreasing the need for people to make the life-threatening journey north.”
The program is also
designed to be an exchange of knowledge on border issues. As a service, the students
will present information to the Institute of Migration (IOM) about policy issues and the risks and dangers associated
with migration in the Arizona-Mexico border region. In turn, students will
learn about migration issues unique to the Mexico-Guatemala border.
During their stay,
students will visit migrant
shelters, conduct health interviews, and homestays
with coffee farmers while observing
the border
health and migration issues unique to
this area. By the end of the trip, students hope to identify the
relationships between economics, politics and health at each border; how
various systems (health care, governmental and non-governmental organizations
and agencies, and businesses) interplay to affect health; and how to advocate
for a stronger focus on public health through partnerships.
“The
Border Health Service Learning Program provides our students with the
real world opportunity to truly immerse themselves in the public health issues
of our day and begin to understand the complex relationships of migration,
economic development and health in our border communities,” said Jill Guernsey
de Zapien, associate dean for Community Programs. “Today, these students are
actively pursuing additional skills to participate in and reflect on the
realities of these issues in another border context. It is these kinds of
experiences and skills that are crucial to building public health leaders
within a global context.”
Faculty members de Zapien and Dr. Cecilia Rosales, associate professor and director of Phoenix Programs, are the course instructors and have been advising the students on how to approach international migration through a mixture of health advocacy, political, economic, and cultural viewpoints
During
the trip, the students will work with a variety of international and local
organizations, including the Institute of Migration (IOM), the Peace Corps,
Cafe Justo, The Regional Center for Public Health Research (CRISP), Grupo Beta
Sur, and many others.
The students will discuss their
findings in a public presentation at the Zuckerman
College of Public Health during the Fall 2012
semester.
Follow
the students online:
Facebook: GuateMexicoServiceLearning
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