Walking for a Dream in NE

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Walking for a dream
By Paul Hammel
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
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SEWARD, Neb. — The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. led peaceful protest marches for civil rights in the 1950s and 1960s.
Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a city bus and was arrested and fined for the same cause.
Dan Dominguez, 17, figured the least he could do was walk and jog the 196 miles from his home in O'Neill, Neb., to the State Capitol in support of Hispanic students like himself.
As semitrailer trucks and other traffic whooshed by Tuesday on Nebraska Highway 15, the state champion wrestler loped down the pavement as he neared the last 30 miles of his trek.
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Trailing in a pickup truck was his high-school wrestling coach, Brian Corkle, and 17-year-old teammate Sergio Luzania.
“I'm proud of him,” said Luzania. “I'm not legal, and he's doing this for all of us.”
Step by step, Dominguez is trying to send a message to Congress to adopt the federal DREAM Act, which would open a pathway to citizenship for young people in the country illegally if they successfully complete college or serve at least two years in the U.S. military.
Dominguez wore a mortarboard to show that he was walking for students.
“A lot of kids dream about an opportunity when they were brought here by their parents here illegally,” Dominguez said during a break. “To get the American dream. That's why everyone comes here.”
But even if they lived most of their lives in America, graduated from a U.S. high school and U.S. college, they couldn't legally get a job.
That bothers Corkle, who said he eventually discovered that several of his students were undocumented immigrants.
“It's hard enough to motivate any high school student that they have a future,” he said.
The DREAM Act — or Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act — was first introduced in 2001 but has failed to advance.
Sen. Ben Nelson and Reps. Jeff Fortenberry and Adrian Smith said Tuesday they oppose the act, and Sen. Mike Johanns has previously indicated his opposition. Rep. Lee Terry's office said he "does not support the bill."
A spokesman for Smith, who represents O'Neill, said Congress must adopt immigration reform policies that secure the border and don't promote amnesty.
“The DREAM Act as written falls short of meeting those benchmarks,” said the spokesman, Charles Isom.
Opponents generally maintain that the proposal amounts to granting amnesty to illegal immigrants and would take away spots in college and the military for legal residents.
Four students' “Dream Walk” this spring from Florida to Washington, D.C., sparked some publicity for the bill.
Dominguez said that got him thinking about his own walk for the bill.
He doesn't need it — he was born in Fresno, Calif.
But it isn't fair, he said, to penalize youths brought here by their parents. Some of the kids have no memory of their homeland and don't even speak Spanish.
“Everyone deserves an equal chance,” he said. “Everyone who came here was an immigrant.”
Corkle, a native of Atkinson, Neb., formed a group this spring to push for the DREAM Act. A bedsheet bearing the words, “Nebraska Students for the DREAM Act,” was attached to the back of Corkle's pickup as he followed Dominguez on his trek, which began Friday in O'Neill.
Corkle said adopting the act would encourage kids to stay in school. An estimated 65,000 undocumented students graduate from U.S. high schools every year, but many drop out, he said, because of the perceived lack of value of a diploma.
Corkle said he has an appointment Wednesday to speak with Gov. Dave Heineman.
He said he knows that Heineman opposes illegal immigration and tried to block passage of the state's Dream Act, which permits in-state college tuition rates for illegal immigrants who graduate from Nebraska high schools.
Corkle said the in-state tuition bill recognizes that families who pay taxes in Nebraska deserve tuition rates as residents. But, he said, the 46 kids who have taken advantage of the tuition rates face a dead-end at graduation if they cannot become citizens.
The teacher said most people he talks with see the benefit of the federal proposal.
“What we'd like to see is a toning down of the rhetoric,” Corkle said. “Let us educate people. We're out here to start a dialogue that will lead to a solution.”
Dominguez knows about long shots. He played point guard in basketball as a freshman and had limited wrestling experience before taking up the grueling sport as a sophomore.
He qualified for state in his first season as a wrestler. Last winter, he became the first state title winner from O'Neill in 19 years, claiming the Class B championship at 103 pounds.
Dominguez hopes to win a wrestling scholarship or to enlist in the Army to help him get a teaching degree.
His mother, who works at a potato plant near O'Neill, is on the path to citizenship. His friend Sergio dreams of getting a college soccer scholarship and playing as a pro, which is probably out of the question if the DREAM Act isn't adopted.
So Dominguez walked and, at times, jogged, covering more than 40 miles each day. He has worn out one pair of shoes and said his shoe size has stretched from 8 to 9½. He has risen every day at 5 a.m. to resume the trek.
Dominguez said he hopes people will join him at 2 p.m. Wednesday to walk from the Lincoln Ice Box coliseum, in the former State Fair Park, to the State Capitol, where a rally will be held at 3 p.m.
“In terms of immigration, we have a mess. We're so polarized,” said Corkle, the teacher. “There's a saying, ‘People aren't motivated by problems, they're motivated by solutions.' And the DREAM Act is part of the solution.”
Contact the writer:
402-473-9584, [email protected]


http://www.omaha.com/article/20100609/NEWS01/706099935