“It’s surprising to see them on TV … arrested. It’s disappointing,” Art Teacher Alberto Ramirez said of the students arrested on smuggling charges.
Teachers at La Joya’s alternative schools face challenges unique to the region.
Students from La Joya Independent School District have been involved in several deadly human smuggling attempts. Every teenager detained on human-smuggling charges in Hidalgo County since 2012 was a student in La Joya.
LJISD Spokesman Eden Ramirez said the numbers would be much higher if the district didn’t have alternative schools.
“Unfortunately, we can’t measure how many students there would have been. We can only measure what has happened,” he said.
Art Teacher Alberto Ramirez said it’s a challenge to keep some students in school. He said many come from broken or impoverished homes.
He has been a teacher in LJISD’s alternative program for eight years. The program has approximately 300 students.
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