Houston Independent School District’s recent flood of unaccompanied minors is going to leave taxpayers in the district paying the price.
In a progress report we obtained, HISD’s Government Relations Director, Ashlea Graves released the shocking numbers that show a dramatic increase in enrollment of unaccompanied Central American minors over this past summer.
Just last week at an HISD board meeting, board members touted the fact that enrollment numbers in the district were at an all-time high, but they failed to mention that 3,000 of these students were illegal minors.
Last year Breitbart Texas reported that unaccompanied minors would cost the Texas taxpayer roughly $45 million, which they based off of information obtained from the Texas Education Agency.
The average cost per student for unaccompanied minors is about $9,500, $1,600 more than it costs for legal students. The elevated cost for just 3,000 recently enrolled illegal minors will leave HISD taxpayers with a roughly $28 million bill.
A chart included in the report shows that most of the newly enrolled students are coming from El Salvador, with Mexican immigrants being the second highest.
Six HISD schools had over 100 enrolled unaccompanied minors this year, two of those schools having over 200 new enrollees. Graves notes that most of the enrollment is taking place in the Southwest area of the school district.
While the cost of educating these children is cumbersome, the $28 million doesn’t include the costs of medical expenses, and the impact that low-paid workers have on the salaries of legal residents.
