Canadian Resources: 
USA/International Resources on Education and Immigration Precarity: 
Resources, Secondary Schools (Grade 7-12):
Fiction: 
  • While You Were Dreaming by Alisha Rai 
This Young Adult debut from powerhouse romance author Alisha Rai tackles undocumented immigration against the backdrop of viral online fame, fake dating, and a love triangle. 
Grade: 8-11   
  • The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri
This unforgettable novel puts human faces on the Syrian war with the immigrant story of a beekeeper, his wife, and the triumph of spirit when the world becomes unrecognizable.
Grade: 10-12
  • We are all we have by Marina Budhos
When a teenage girl’s single mom is taken by ICE, everything changes—all of her hopes and dreams for the future have turned into survival. Along with her younger brother, Kamal, and a new friend, Carlos, Rania must figure out how to survive. A road trip leads to searching for answers to questions she didn’t even think to ask. 
Grade: 7-11
  • Star in the Forest by Laura Resau
Zitlally's family is undocumented, and her father has just been arrested for speeding and deported back to Mexico. As her family waits for him to return—Zitlally and a new friend find a dog in the forest near their trailer park. They name it Star for the star-shaped patch over its eye. As time goes on, Zitlally starts to realize that Star is her father’s “spirit animal,” and that as long as Star is safe, her father will be also. But what will happen to Zitlally’s dad when Star disappears?
 Grade: 7-11
  • Americanized: Rebel Without a Green Card by Sara Saedi
At thirteen, bright-eyed, straight-A student Sara Saedi uncovered a terrible family secret: she was breaking the law simply by living in the United States. Only two years old when her parents fled Iran, she didn't learn of her undocumented status until her older sister wanted to apply for an after school job.
 Grade: 9-12
  • The Sun is also a star by Nicola Yoon
Two teens--Daniel, the son of Korean shopkeepers, and Natasha, whose family is here undocumented from Jamaica--cross paths in New York City on an eventful day in their lives--Daniel is on his way to an interview with a Yale alum, Natasha is meeting with a lawyer to try and prevent her family's deportation to Jamaica--and fall in love.
Grade: 8-12
  • American Street by Ibi Zoboi
Ibi Zoboi draws on her own experience as a young Haitian immigrant, while infusing magical realism and vodou culture. Fabiola’s mother is detained by U.S. immigration, leaving Fabiola to navigate her loud American cousins, Chantal, Donna, and Princess; the grittiness of Detroit’s west side; a new school; and a surprising romance, all on her own..   
Grade 9-12           

Poetry: 
  • Citizen Illegal, by José Olivarez
Poet José Olivarez explores the stories, contradictions, joys, and sorrows that embody life in the spaces between Mexico and America. He paints vivid portraits of good kids, bad kids, families clinging to hope, life after the steel mills, gentrifying barrios, and everything in between. 
Grade:7-12
  • Ink knows no Border, by Samira Ahmed, Kaveh Akbar and more
This collection of sixty-four poems by poets who come from all over the world shares the experience of first- and second-generation young adult immigrants and refugees. Whether it’s cultural and language differences, homesickness, social exclusion, racism, stereotyping, or questions of identity, the Dreamers, immigrants, and refugee poets included here encourage readers to honor their roots as well as explore new paths, offering empathy and hope. Many of the struggles described are faced by young people everywhere: isolation, self-doubt, confusion, and emotional dislocation. But also joy, discovery, safety, and family. This is a hopeful, beautiful, and meaningful book for any reader.
Grade: 8-12

Graphic Novels: 
  • Hakim's Odyssey: Book 1: From Syria to Turkey
What does it mean to be a "refugee"? It is easy for those who live in relative freedom to ignore or even to villainize people who have been forced to flee their homes. This first leg of his odyssey follows Hakim as he travels from Syria to Lebanon, Lebanon to Jordan, and Jordan to Turkey, where he struggles to earn a living and dreams of one day returning to his home. This graphic novel is necessary reading for our time. Alternately hopeful and heartbreaking, Hakim's Odyssey is a story about what it means to be human in a world that sometimes fails to be humane.
Grade: 10-12
  •   Solito: Javier Zamora
A memoir as gripping as it is moving, Solito not only provides an immediate and intimate account of a treacherous and near-impossible journey, but also the miraculous kindness and love delivered at the most unexpected moments. Solito is Javier’s story, but it’s also the story of millions of others who had no choice but to leave home.
Grade: 9-12
  • LaGuardia by Nnedi Okorafor and Tana ford
In an alternate world where aliens have integrated with society, pregnant Nigerian-American doctor Future Nwafor Chukwuebuka has just smuggled an illegal alien plant named Letme Live through LaGuardia International and Interstellar Airport...and that's not the only thing she's hiding.
She and Letme become part of a community of human and alien immigrants; but as their crusade for equality continues and the birth of her child nears, Future—and her entire world—begins to change.
Grade: 9-11

Non-Fiction: 
  • Illegally Yours: A Memoir by Rafael Augustin
A funny and poignant memoir about how as a teenager, TV writer Rafael Agustin (Jane The Virgin) accidentally discovered he was undocumented and how that revelation turned everything he thought he knew about himself and his family upside down.
Grade 9-12
  • If Only You Knew by Emily Francis
From her childhood in Guatemala, where she worked in her mother’s fruit-selling business and helped raise her four younger siblings, through her journey into the United States as an undocumented, unaccompanied minor, and to her experience fulfilling her dream of becoming a teacher — through a series of letters she writes to eight immigrant students in whom she sees pieces of herself.
Grade 10-12

Short Films:
  • La Bestia by Pedro Ulteras (Animated Short Film)
 A young Mexican smuggler and a little girl travel illegally on top of a cargo train, called La Bestia, to get to the USA. An injury transforms his perception of the journey.
Recommended Age: 14A
  • Through the Wall by Tim Nakashi
A short documentary about a family divided by the US/Mexico border. Abril lives in the US with her 2 year-old son Julián. They are undocumented. Julián’s father was deported back to Mexico for a minor traffic violation. In order to see each other, every Sunday Uriel, Abril and Julián travel to the border to spend time together through the wall.
Recommended Age:14A

Full-length Films:
  • Problemista by Jose Antonio Vargas
Alejandro is an aspiring toy designer from El Salvador struggling to bring his unusual ideas to life in NY. As time runs out on his work visa, a job assisting an erratic art-world outcast becomes his only hope to stay in the country.
Recommended Age: 16A
  • The Visitor by Tom McCarthy
Offering a glimpse into the U.S. immigration detention system and the people it affects. When his college sends him to Manhattan to attend a conference, Walter is surprised to find a young undocumented couple has taken up residence in his apartment. Victims of a real estate scam, Tarek, a Syrian man, and Zainab, his Senegalese girlfriend, have nowhere else to go. In the first of a series of tests of the heart, Walter reluctantly allows the couple to stay with him. When Tarek is arrested as an undocumented immigrant and held for deportation, they grapple with the issues of the treatment of immigrants and the legal process post 9/11. 
 Recommended Age: 14+
  • Documented by Jose Antonio Vargas
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jose Antonio Vargas outed himself as an undocumented immigrant in the New York Times Magazine. 'Documented' chronicles his journey to America from the Philippines as a child; his journey through America as an immigration reform activist/provocateur; and his journey inward as he re-connects with his mother, whom he hasn't seen in 20 years.
Recommended Age: All
  • Limbo by Ben Sharrock
The film centres on four asylum seekers who are staying on a remote island in Scotland, and taking cultural awareness classes, while awaiting the processing of their refugee claims.
Recommended Age: All