The Post-DACA Generation is Here
Nearly all this year’s 120,000 undocumented new high school graduates are ineligible for the policy

FWD.us estimates that nearly 120,000 undocumented young people will graduate from high school this spring.¹ Part of the larger 3.4 million-plus Dreamer population, these undocumented students came to the U.S. as children and have spent most of their lives in this country.² With well more than 600,000 K-12 undocumented students enrolled in U.S. schools, hundreds of thousands of future high school graduates will continue to face limited options for their futures without immigration relief. FWD.us estimates that at least 100,000 undocumented students will graduate from U.S. high schools each year for at least the next three years.

Estimates for the number of undocumented high school graduates, by selected states

As undocumented high school seniors across the country prepare to receive their diplomas, most will encounter greater challenges than previous classes of undocumented graduates. Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), a Department of Homeland Security policy offering work authorization and deportation protections for undocumented individuals who entered the U.S. as children, has been life-changing for hundreds of thousands of Dreamers since its inception in 2012. And, as it has for so many other undocumented high school graduates in recent years, such a policy holds transformative potential for future high school graduates.

But now, only a fifth of this year’s undocumented high school graduates would be eligible for immigration relief through DACA under current rules. This is because the class of 2023 is one of the first graduating classes where the overwhelming majority of undocumented graduates entered the U.S. after the DACA-required arrival date of June 15, 2007. Undocumented high school graduates who would be eligible for DACA would have entered the U.S. before they were 2 years old. By 2025, no undocumented high school graduates will be eligible for DACA under current rules.

However, even the small share of this year’s undocumented high school graduates who might be eligible for DACA are limited in accessing its protections. Attempts by the Trump Administration to end DACA, combined with court orders interrupting access to new prospective DACA applicants, left a short window of about six months in 2021 for most of these DACA-eligible graduates to have applied. In fact, recent United States Citizenship and Immigration Services data indicates that fewer than 7,000 of the 580,000 total active DACA recipients are around high school graduation age (ages 16-20). Unfortunately, even those graduates fortunate enough to have received DACA during the limited periods of access for new applicants cannot count on its benefits in the future, as the courts prepare to rule on a lawsuit that could jeopardize the entire DACA policy, leaving hundreds of thousands of Dreamer families without protections and the U.S. economy without hundreds of thousands of workers.

This FWD.us analysis shows that tens of thousands of undocumented graduates are barred from accessing postsecondary education or receiving work authorization, severely limiting their career and education prospects. These barriers unnecessarily and unfairly limit undocumented graduates’ ability to participate in the workforce, grow the economy, and contribute to their communities. Additionally, it is a huge waste of years of K-12 education that states have invested in every student to prevent them from going further if they want to, and another cruel roadblock they face in the country they call home.

At the federal level, Congress should immediately establish a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, including DACA recipients and Dreamers. This would help provide certainty and opportunity to people who have grown up in the United States and want to continue building a future here. In particular, citizenship would allow greater access to the labor market for students who may need to work while attending school, and for graduates finishing college and building a career.

Federal legislators have urgent work to do. The U.S. economy cannot afford to lose this graduating class of undocumented students, perhaps permanently. Congress and the Biden Administration must ensure that undocumented high school graduates this year can legally support themselves and continue their education in the U.S.