Abstract
Community-based organizations (CBOs) and schools are often key initial institutions encountered by immigrants. Yet little research compares immigrant perceptions of CBOs and schools. The authors use interviews with green card–status Filipina and undocumented Latina mothers at a nonprofit, low-income-serving CBO in San Francisco, California. The authors identify intersecting burdens, or emotional dilemmas associated with school and CBO participation on the basis of interlocking oppressions and marginalized racial, gender, class, and legal statuses. Intensive mothering responsibilities and immigrant backgrounds influenced these mothers’ shared feelings of gratitude for services and opportunities in CBOs and schools. Undocumented Latina mothers felt uniquely obligated to “give back” to display entitlement and maintain children’s opportunities in schools and CBOs but were vulnerable in doing so, indicating unique burdens based on their intersecting statuses. Green card–status Filipina mothers did not widely share the same pressures of obligation to “give back” to schools and CBOs. The authors connect these intersecting burdens to a moral entitlement system wherein Latinas felt uniquely compelled to demonstrate deservingness through involvement in schools and CBOs, despite their formal entitlement to school and CBO support in a sanctuary city. The authors push future research to consider emotional dilemmas and burdens shaping immigrant local participation in schools and CBOs.
Keywords
Immigrants from Asia and Latin America are among the fastest growing populations in the United States (Pew Research Center 2015). When low-income immigrant families enter the United States, they often encounter both public schools and community-based organizations (CBOs); however, researchers typically separate these local institutions in studies of immigrants. Some research focuses on the advocacy nature of CBOs, highlighting how CBOs play unique contemporary roles for immigrants and marginalized populations (Bloemraad and Terriquez 2016; de Graauw 2016). Indeed, nonprofit CBOs, as alternative local sites, can be welcoming contrasts to bureaucratic public schools more limited in immigrant-focused programming (Cordero-Guzmán 2005; Gast, Okamoto, and Nguyen 2021).
Yet CBOs and schools share many similarities in the lives of low-income, immigrant families. Public schools and CBOs are local settings for civic engagement, networking, information sharing, and collective mobilization for immigrants (Bruhn 2023; Jasis and Ordoñez-Jasis 2012; Terriquez 2011). With the devolution of welfare and policies limiting access to government programs, public schools and CBOs are often responsible for direct-service provision, while playing other roles for low-income and immigrant families (Marwell 2004; Oliveira and Segel 2022). Both public schools and CBOs provide food pantries, social work and service referrals, afterschool programs, educational resources and opportunities, and other direct services. However, we know little about how low-income immigrants perceive direct-service components of schools and nonprofit CBOs and the prevailing ideologies and pressures shaping immigrant participation in schools and CBOs. Additionally, past work on immigrant parents tends to focus on one immigrant group, such as Latina/os, rather than comparing across groups to unpack differential, but intersecting, roles of race, gender, class, and legality in these processes (Bruhn 2023; Mendez and Deeb-Sossa 2020; Terriquez 2011). We investigate how low-income Filipina and Latina immigrant mothers interpret participation in schools and CBOs while raising school-aged children in San Francisco, California, where they have formal access regardless of documentation status.
We use two in-depth interview waves conducted from 2011 to 2014 with 11 green card–status Filipina and 28 mainly undocumented Latina participants of Families Moving Forward (FMF), a nonprofit CBO (all names are pseudonyms). FMF serves mainly Filipina/o and Latina/o families because of its neighborhood location and proximity to other Filipina/o- and Latina/o-serving organizations and school programs. We examine these questions: How do low-income Filipina and Latina immigrant mothers perceive the roles schools and CBOs play for their families? How do they comparatively perceive benefits and constraints tied to school and CBO involvement? How do gender, racial, class, and legal statuses intersect in shaping perceptions of pressures and obligation in CBO and school involvement, despite each group’s formal access in San Francisco? We identify intersecting burdens, or emotional pressures, dilemmas, and stresses associated with school and CBO participation on the basis of specific interlocking oppressions tied to historically marginalized gender, racial, class, and legal statuses. Filipina and Latina mothers managed different intersecting burdens to volunteer and participate in schools and CBOs. Latina mothers felt uniquely obligated to “give back” to display entitlement and maintain children’s opportunities in schools and CBOs but were vulnerable in doing so, on the basis of their intersecting statuses.
San Francisco is a self-designated “sanctuary” city with formal protections offered to immigrants, as well as inclusive programs and policies, including language translation services and ethnicity-focused programs (de Graauw 2016). Although largely symbolic, San Francisco’s sanctuary designation prohibits officials from aiding federal immigration agencies unless required for criminal violations (Ridgley 2008). San Francisco provides an important context for study because of its history of immigrant community activists, bilingual education and other programs, and robust services and advocacy-focused organizations focused on low-income, immigrant communities (de Graauw 2016). During our study, eligible low-income immigrants had formal access to city health care, municipal IDs, and college financial aid, regardless of immigration status, as well as food, cash, and other assistance programs for families with U.S.-born children (see, e.g., de Graauw 2016).
We contribute to past literature by comparing CBO and school perceptions of low-income Filipina and Latina immigrant mothers with similar class backgrounds but different racial and legal statuses. Using an intersectional framework with gender theory on “intensive mothering,” we show how Filipina and Latina mothers felt responsible for managing their children’s support in CBOs and schools, which translated to a deep sense of gratitude and, mainly for Latina mothers, emotional pressures to “give back” to maintain children’s support and opportunities. These “giving-back” pressures experienced primarily by undocumented Latina mothers indicate a moral entitlement system where socially constructed distinctions of moral worth “inform access to public entitlements” in schools and, in our study, also in nonprofit CBOs (Kibria and Becerra 2020:604). Latinas felt compelled to demonstrate deservingness through involvement in schools and CBOs, despite formal access to school and CBO support and protections regardless of legal status in a sanctuary city. Latina mothers confronted distinct emotional pressures to display moral worth as part of systems of “racialized illegality” where markers of racial status become linked to legal and nativity statuses, constructing “deserving” versus “undeserving” immigrants (García 2017). Thus, green card–status Filipina and undocumented Latina mothers did not share the same emotional pressures of obligation in schools and CBOs. They faced distinct intersecting burdens on the basis of how their gender, racial, and legal statuses intersected within this moral entitlement system.
Literature Review
Theoretical Frameworks
Our work builds on a foundation of intersectionality, feminist, and racialization of immigrants theories. Following Few-Demo (2014), we use intersectionality theory to “guide methodological considerations and data interpretation,” paying close attention to how Filipina and Latina mothers’ dilemmas are influenced by and situated within gendered, classed, nativist, and racialized ideologies and experiences (p. 170). Latina and Filipina mothers, enmeshed in families, immigrant communities, and social institutions, must navigate the ways ideologies or “structures of domination ‘interact and intertwine’ to influence identity-specific experiences” (Harris and Patton 2019:362). Mothers’ negotiations with positionalities and family, school, and CBO pressures reveal the “ideologies and norms of justification” influencing their actions (Winker and Degele 2011:54). Gendered, racialized, nativist, and classed ideologies and interactions intersect in these processes and shape immigrant mothers’ responses.
In our review, we highlight extant literature on how these ideologies intertwine to shape pressures and stereotypes affecting immigrant mothers in schools and public programs. Feminist scholars have highlighted how “intensive mothering” ideologies in the United States, combined with high parental educational engagement expectations and an individualistic society, create unique emotional pressures and stigmas affecting mothers (Hays 1996; Posey-Maddox and Haley-Lock 2020). Immigrant mothers of color confront these expectations along with racialized, classed, and gendered stereotypes about how they and their children are “burdens” or “undeserving” in schools and public programs (Gast and Okamoto 2016; Kibria and Becerra 2020). Research on how immigrant and class statuses intersect shows that low-income immigrant parents often experience multiple challenges and heavy responsibilities for their children’s education and for accessing public programs after U.S. migration to expand family opportunities (Oliveira and Segel 2022). Thus, three strands frame our analysis of intersecting gendered, racialized, nativist, and classed ideologies and immigrant mothers’ emotional negotiations within schools and CBOs: (1) gendered “intensive-mothering” responsibilities; (2) “parental-involvement” expectations in schools and CBOs; and (3) gendered, racialized, and classed immigrant constraints and pressures to exhibit worth and entitlement in education and public programs.
“Intensive Mothering” and Immigrant Mothering Pressures
U.S. childrearing norms are rooted in patriarchal assumptions about the “proper” roles and responsibilities of men and women. These assumptions include rigid, binary ideals of gender roles privileging men and assigning women to devalued “caretaking” roles. Such gender norms define a “good mother” as one who devotes active, primary attention to a child’s development (Schmidt et al. 2023). A “good mom” gives “intense time and emotional commitment to children, whose needs must trump all other responsibilities” (Hennessy 2015:1109). Such “intensive mothering” (Hays 1996) becomes more complicated when assessing how classed and racialized conditions influence mothers’ fulfillment of gendered childrearing responsibilities (Dow 2015; Kibria and Becerra 2020). Hennessy (2015) argued, “motherhood . . . emerges as central to poor women’s identities,” because they have fewer “alternative roles and statuses to draw from” compared with wealthier mothers (p. 1110).
Immigrant mothers face unique gendered family expectations given education is typically a central reason for migration (Durand 2011; Oliveira and Segel 2022). Latina immigrant mothers face pressures related to familismo (familism) or responsibilities for prioritizing family and educational needs above all else (Durand 2011). Familism, as a concept in educational research, has mainly been used in studies of Latina/o immigrants and their descendants (Desmond and López Turley 2009). However, researchers have also found that pressures to prioritize family are shared broadly among groups with recent immigration experiences and that familistic expectations are gendered (Ovink and Kalogrides 2015). For fathers, simply providing income may fulfill familistic obligations, whereas mothers often feel pressured to additionally contribute emotional and other unpaid labor (Valdez 2016).
Contradicting responsibilities and pressures for immigrants of color can lead to stressful role conflicts (Rojas et al. 2016). The cumulative result is that intersecting pressures stemming from gender-, class-based, and racialized oppression form troubling and contradictory expectation structures looming over immigrant mothers navigating CBOs and schools. Yet little previous research investigates how immigrant mothers who are similarly positioned, yet differently racialized, may face distinct burdens shaped by gendered familistic “intensive-mothering” pressures when approaching CBOs and schools.
School and CBO Involvement Expectations and Constraints
Expectations that parents/guardians will be “involved” in children’s schooling have increased and become normalized over time (Jezierski and Wall 2019; Lareau 2000). Recent policies and programs seek to increase “parental involvement” in schooling to enhance student success and integration; meanwhile, much research underscores the benefits of parental involvement, such as through parent-teacher organizations or regular communication (Baquedano-Lopez, Alexander, and Hernandez 2013). Yet low–socioeconomic status (SES) and immigrant parents of color face intersecting barriers to meeting dominant notions of parental involvement (Baquedano-Lopez et al. 2013; Posey-Maddox and Haley-Lock 2020). Lo (2016:695) demonstrated how Mexican immigrant mothers’ “motherhood capital” “signal[s] to institutional gatekeepers” their credibility when communicating with teachers; however, their “credibility” in schools is constrained by language barriers, undocumented status, and feeling powerless and unfamiliar within U.S. institutions. Thus, immigrant mothers experience unique constraints when interacting with schools (see also Kibria and Becerra 2020; Pérez Carreón, Drake, and Calabrese Barton 2005).
U.S. schools are White institutional spaces, constituting a field in which “race and class are historically entangled” (Richards et al. 2023:282). Whiteness remains an unmarked asset, hiding its enduring power behind culture- and class-based deficit frameworks, allowing school officials and staff to avoid acknowledging racialized minorities’ assets and engagement (Ishimaru et al. 2016; Richards et al. 2023). Educators often measure low-SES parents of color against White- and middle-class-oriented institutional standards of interaction with school personnel (Pérez Carreón et al. 2005). Even within school spaces focused on integration, such as bilingual immersion programs, prevailing ideologies and discourse relegate Latina/o parents and families to lower-status “beneficiaries,” rather than to autonomous, entitled positions in schools (Muro 2016; Oliveira, Lima Becker, and Jeon 2021).
Additionally, focusing only on “school involvement” assumes that schools are the primary arena for parents to share resources and advocate for children. Extant research cautions against a school-centric focus, in which involvement is measured by interactions and participation dictated by teachers and staff (Pérez Carreón et al. 2005; Posey-Maddox and Haley-Lock 2020). Immigrant involvement in local organizations and schools can also be complementary, indicating the need to further examine involvement in schools and CBOs. In Terriquez’s (2011) study, active Latino union members were involved in “critical” school engagement where they voiced family interests and exercised leadership to fight for children’s resources. However, few studies examine how immigrant parents perceive schools and CBOs providing direct-service and educational-resource components.
Nonprofit CBOs are diverse organizations as part of local “civic infrastructures” that can “provide physical space to meet, reasons to get together . . . and resources,” and which often advocate on behalf of marginalized communities (Bloemraad and Terriquez 2016:215). In low-income and immigrant communities, CBOs often balance direct assistance and advocacy. To maintain public funding and organizational vitality, nonprofit CBOs must maintain direct-service contracts and pools of constituents (Marwell 2004). Organizational constraints may shape how CBOs subtly impose reciprocity expectations for volunteering and other involvement (Gast and Okamoto 2016; Marwell 2004). Marwell (2004:272) found that service provision affects the CBO, which “communicates to the local resident that some form of return to the organization is expected from him or her” to increase commitment to the organization. CBOs often depend upon a strong and active participant base to receive funding and to broaden the impact of collective action efforts.
However, little research examines how immigrants perceive and negotiate CBO- and school-involvement pressures. Reciprocity expectations for volunteering and meeting dominant CBO- and school-involvement expectations may be uniquely internalized by immigrants who rely heavily on CBO and school services. Past work suggests that immigrant groups experiencing hardships and power inequities may be influenced by a sense of indebtedness toward public programs, especially those with inclusive and supportive practices (Oliveira et al. 2021). A sense of gratitude can be a deeply felt emotion in immigrant families on the basis of awareness of migration sacrifices and hardships (Kang and Larson 2014; Turjanmaa and Jasinskaja-Lahti 2020). Next, we discuss how gendered, racialized, and class-based ideologies might create intersectional pressures felt by immigrant mothers in CBOs and schools.
Gendered, Classed, and Racialized Immigrant Burdens and Vulnerabilities
When approaching schools and CBOs for resources and support, women of color struggle to be seen as “good mothers” in the presence of cultural tropes that label their mothering as inferior (Dow 2015; Kibria and Becerra 2020). Low-income mothers of color labor at the intersections of these social pressures, and are often stereotyped as “problematic” by a society that has “stripped [away] a number of child and family support systems” (Elliott, Powell, and Brenton 2015:365). The current “gendered welfare state” encodes deservingness for public services into whether and how low-income mothers uphold dominant motherhood expectations while also showing labor market potential and moral virtue (Kibria and Becerra 2020; Kissane 2012). We draw on this work to identify a moral entitlement system in which low-income immigrant mothers must demonstrate deservingness of public services and support according to prevailing gendered, classed, racialized, and nativist ideologies. These ideologies involve notions that low-income mothers are at risk for “moral corruption” and “draining” public programs, as well as ideas about Latina immigrants’ “immorality” based on stereotypes of their hypersexuality, fertility, and “illegality” (Abrego and Menjívar 2011; Chavez 2013; Gast and Okamoto 2016).
Federally, in the context of Plyer v. Doe, and locally, in a city like San Francisco with inclusive policies, all immigrants should have access to public schools and community programs regardless of documentation status (Gast, Okamoto, and Nguyen 2021). Yet even with formal access or citizenship, Latina mothers and families are uniquely racialized as “undeserving” and “morally corrupt” through the process of “racialized illegality,” or systems of ideas conflating racial, legal, and nativity statuses (García 2017). Frontline staff members, including teachers and nonprofit or public employees, can implicitly convey messages to immigrants on the basis of racialized stereotypes about who is (un)worthy of services (Marrow 2011). With Spanish surnames, darker phenotypes, and often nonmainstream accented English, Filipina/o immigrants can share similarities with Latina/o immigrants in racialization processes (Ocampo 2016). However, when racialized as Asian Americans, Filipinas may be assumed to be legal or “law-abiding” mothers, compared with Latina/os often stereotyped as “illegal” and “criminal” (García 2017; Gast et al. 2021).
Abrego and Menjívar (2011) demonstrated the gendered legal violence faced by Latina mothers, which involves physical, emotional, and economic suffering caused by laws and enforcement targeting and negatively affecting Latinas in their mothering practices, such as when seeking out health and social services for children. Thus, Latina mothers face unique pressures to signal “deservingness” within U.S. entitlement systems; they are burdened with displaying entitlement or risk repercussions in public programs and schools, including negative judgments, exclusion, and fears of family separation (Abrego and Menjívar 2011; García 2017; Kibria and Becerra 2020). For undocumented Latina mothers, this can result in unique emotional burdens, which intersect with mothering pressures, when approaching schools and CBOs for their children.
Data and Methods
Our data come from an institutional review board–approved, multiyear project on immigrants and CBOs in low-income neighborhoods in San Francisco. Here, we use interviews with 11 Filipina and 28 Latina low-income mothers (including a grandmother) who participated in a nonprofit CBO, FMF. FMF was chosen because of its prominence as a CBO providing both direct services and advocacy for low-income communities in a neighborhood targeted by the larger project because of its growing immigrant populations. About half participated in other CBOs and, as we later note, most were active in their children’s schools. Two waves of interviews, including initial and follow-ups with most respondents, were collected between 2011 and 2014, with at least one year between interview waves. FMF is a nonprofit CBO focused on advocacy for local low-income communities, which broadened its direct services in the aftermath of the 2008 recession. At monthly meetings in Spanish and Tagalog with low-income residents, FMF staff provide direct services and information, including bus passes and school supplies for low-income children and public-program information, while also raising awareness about gentrification, San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD), and city decision making and recruiting participants for community campaigns. For example, FMF provides workshops with other CBOs and labor unions to inform constituents about rights and local collective action efforts.
Low-wage employment in hotels and offices encouraged influxes of immigrants near FMF, and Filipina/os and Latina/os made up the largest share of FMF participants. Because of FMF’s low-income family services, most FMF participants were mothers. Filipina/o and Latina/o staff, most being bilingual (Spanish or Tagalog) and/or residing in the low-income surrounding neighborhoods, work directly with constituents. Other staff and volunteers are White or biracial. Prior to interviews, the initial research team, including the first author, volunteered and conducted months of fieldwork at FMF. Bilingual research assistants distributed sign-up sheets (in Spanish and Tagalog) and explained our study in FMF monthly meetings. Spanish- and Tagalog-speaking Latina and Filipina research assistants conducted parent interviews alone or as translators with the first author (a Filipina/Asian American faculty member) or another (Asian American) faculty member, and we paid small cash amounts per interview. The first author and an Asian American research assistant also conducted interviews with the few English-speaking respondents. Each interview lasted between 30 minutes to three hours and took place in private rooms at FMF or the interviewee’s residence. Staff members were not present during interviews. One mother did not want to be recorded but allowed interview notes. Other interviews were recorded, translated by a bilingual speaker if needed, and transcribed. We asked about migration and adaptation experiences in the United States, children’s education and extracurricular activities, school choice and involvement, nature of and reasons for CBO and school involvement, and perceptions of U.S. and local institutions and programs. In-depth, open-ended interview protocols allowed respondents to reflect on experiences; most mothers were generous in providing recollections. A few interviewees grew emotional in relating histories of hardship and violence. Most interviewees were new to participating in community campaigns, having initially come to FMF to receive direct services.
All Filipinas had entered the United States as adults with green cards or U.S. documentation, and their children were U.S. born or held family reunification visas. Among the Latinas, 71 percent came from Mexico and 89 percent did not have documentation at the interview time (see Table 1). All but two Latinas entered the United States as adults. The two groups’ SES was comparable; most had used public assistance, such as city health insurance or food stamps for U.S.-born children, at some point, indicating they were living at or near the federal poverty level. English-language transcripts were uploaded to Dedoose, a cloud-based mixed-methods software package, for coding and analysis. Transcripts were broadly coded by a team that included the first author, another faculty, and two graduate students, using Dedoose’s tools to identify and “tag” preliminary themes. Second and third rounds of more focused coding, conducted by the authors, drew our attention to themes analyzed here, including: childrearing responsibilities, gratitude for services/programs, school and CBO engagement reasons, school and CBO (perceived) expectations, and school and CBO feelings of obligation and vulnerabilities. Coders also logged notes documenting analytic directions and patterns. The three authors regularly discussed themes uncovered by focused coding and created tables to systematically compare Filipina and Latina responses, identify patterns, and reveal any disconfirming evidence.
Demographic Characteristics of Latina and Filipina Mothers.
Note: NA = not applicable.
Results
“They Help a Lot”: Gendered Intensive Mothering Responsibilities and Mothers’ Gratitude
Filipina and Latina mothers similarly felt gendered intensive-mothering responsibilities, which included accessing direct services, support, or “help” in CBOs and schools on behalf of families. Similarities in how Filipinas and Latinas grappled with gendered pressures stood out because of their different legal and racial/ethnic statuses. As stated previously, Filipina interviewees all held green cards, while nearly all Latina interviewees were without current U.S. documentation. Their differing documentation statuses meant Latinas faced legal precarities that Filipinas did not experience, including risks for deportation and family separation. As we have noted, past research demonstrates Latinas’ unique experiences with “racialized illegality” in their approaches to and reception when seeking social support (Abrego and Menjívar 2011; García 2017; Gast et al. 2021). Nevertheless, interviews revealed that the two groups’ sense of gendered responsibilities did not vary substantially. Gendered intensive-mothering expectations powerfully shaped why Filipina and Latina mothers sought support from CBOs and schools, cutting across potential differences their divergent racial/ethnic and legal statuses might suggest. That is, the mothers similarly felt compelled to engage in schools and CBOs on the basis of (1) gendered responsibility pressures to participate in schools and CBOs and (2) deep gratitude for school and CBO support for their children in San Francisco.
Latina and Filipina mothers carried the weight of their children’s migration outcomes on their shoulders. They saw children’s educational attainment as interchangeable with economic mobility in the United States and intrinsic reasons for migration. As Marcela (a Latina mother) stated, “We are working for a better future for our children.” All but three mothers in our sample had school-aged children in San Francisco public schools. Among public school mothers, almost all had children attending schools in neighborhoods with large proportions of Filipina/os or Latina/os and other immigrant populations. These schools had established Filipina/o- or Latina/o-focused programs, including bilingual programs and staff, which led mothers to view the roles CBOs and schools played as comparable in terms of immigrant family support.
Mothers repeatedly mentioned feeling implicit pressures to facilitate children’s educational and support opportunities, which included accessing CBO and school-based services. In contrast, mothers indicated that fathers and other male relatives seldom took on these responsibilities. Though we only have data from mothers, we searched through all interview notes and transcripts and found just two mentions of fathers’ school or CBO involvement: one father sometimes accompanied a Latina mother to school meetings as her interpreter and another Latino father attended parent-teacher meetings along with his wife. These were outliers; far more common were comments like Jacinta’s, a Latina mother, who told interviewers, “I would like for my husband to also maybe participate.” Jacinta, whose husband worked as a cook, occasionally cleaned houses while managing care for three (undocumented) children—attending three different schools—while taking shifts as a FMF volunteer. Jacinta’s experience is emblematic of the way mothers undertook heavy responsibilities for childrearing, monitoring academics, and finding and managing children’s education and support opportunities, such as by connecting with nonprofit and school staff for children’s benefits.
Some mothers justified gendered childrearing patterns through “work” divisions. Jacinta described a teacher commending her childrearing: Like the teacher says, “I am happy with you [Jacinta] because you do a good job.” I owe it to my husband, because he works. I . . . am going to [be the one to] pick up my youngest child. . . . Then I’ll go to pick up the other one.
Jacinta made a distinction between her husband’s steady “work” and her part-time cleaning and childrearing responsibilities—a distinction that was rationalized through her heavy focus on her children’s educational futures: “[I want] that the three of them, even if it is a short career [associate’s/certificate degree], but I want them to study.” Jacinta believed that her husband’s “work” allowed her to focus on and do a “good job” with childrearing and supporting children’s education—a primary reason for family U.S. migration.
Inés shared that her husband was displeased with how many FMF meetings she attended, but that she felt compelled to attend FMF meetings because of her focus on childrearing and education: Yes, he would get mad, but [I would say,] “I’m not going to pay attention to you. Why? Because I’m focused on my little one, and if you aren’t going to move one foot not even to take him to school, I will.” And I am the one who moves.
To Inés, participating in FMF was connected to her “focus” on her son and her “move[ment]” in improving his opportunities. Her willingness to anger her husband to maintain FMF participation indicates her association between childrearing and educational responsibilities and FMF participation as a mother.
Gendered mothering responsibilities shaped mothers’ deep gratitude for educational opportunities and CBO support and their higher levels of participation compared with male partners. Both Filipina and Latina mothers used words like “they give,” “help [ayudar],” or “helpful” to describe how they and their children benefited from CBOs and schools, indicating they viewed CBOs and schools as similarly offering “helpful” support. Madrona, a Latina mother of three, appreciated her children’s school staff: “The teachers, it’s a good school. . . . They help a lot, and they support them [children].” Aida, a Latina mother with two children, choked up when describing her gratitude and relief for “help” and services from FMF: “They helped me a lot, to inform myself. They helped me a lot to get over this problem [in housing or the apartment].” Teresa, a Filipina mother of four children, similarly stated: “FMF is a lot of help for us.” As another example of CBO and school connections, Melinda, a Filipina mother of two, expressed deep gratitude for FMF staff for advocating for her son’s academic progress in school and for providing other “help.” Melinda said, When I have a problem with my son . . . I talk to [FMF staff]. They give me advice and what people I could go to. Like you know, they give me uh, what do you call that, moral support. . . . Yeah, they help a lot.
Coupled with fathers’ lack of involvement, mothers’ responsibilities and gratitude for “help” from schools and CBOs reflects the gendered nature of familistic obligations to prioritize family and educational needs and to fulfill their mothering role (Durand 2011). Moreover, these immigrant mothers’ similar expressions of the familistic responsibilities—and the gratitude they felt—cut across their different legal and racialized circumstances.
Mothers’ feelings of gratitude also demonstrate how they interpret school and nonprofit programs through their understandings of immigrant benefits in San Francisco and of limited access to support elsewhere. Alonsa, a Latina mother of three, conveyed gratitude for “help” from school staff, including “talking” sessions where they discussed her “problems in . . . personal life” and her son’s disability needs. Alonsa said, “The counselor [consejera, a woman giving advice] helps me with that aspect of him” and “the way she treats me is very helpful.” Comparably, Leona, a Filipina mother of two, explained how social workers in SFUSD were “helping” her family after “com[ing] here in the United States.” Victoria (a Latina mother of two) also shared appreciation, stating that her child’s school programs “help the children so that they move up.” Victoria felt connected to her child’s school and the “PTA” (Parent-Teacher Association), because they involve “Hispanic families”: “[The PTA] does sales, does events, celebrates things, recruits funds for school . . . is family [oriented].” Although five Filipina and Latina mothers also shared criticisms of CBOs and schools or staff, the rest underscored gratitude for inclusive programming for immigrants in CBOs and SFUSD. Immigrant families had access to these programs regardless of documentation status in this sanctuary city, leading to similar interpretations of gratitude.
Similarly, mothers were grateful for bilingual staff members, which they noted were features of San Francisco schools and CBOs. Madrona appreciated that her daughter’s “adviser” called her in Spanish when her daughter had school problems or was struggling. Likewise, Amihan, a Filipina mother of three, described regular meetings with her child’s teacher during drop-offs: “Every morning, we meet with the teacher, they tell us [about our child].” She also regularly talked to the Filipina/o staff: “At the office, because there are Filipinos there also.” Gloria, a Filipina mother of two, participated in a Filipina/o school program and appreciated that “teachers there is also a Filipino. . . . So, they know our spoken language.” Gloria attended parent-teacher conferences four times a year and felt she could easily communicate and interact with teachers: “They will tell a lot [of] everything about your kid, and [ask] what is your questions.”
Moreover, the undocumented Latina mothers noted the welcoming aspects of schools and programs within this sanctuary city. Petrona, an undocumented mother of three U.S.-born children, described how FMF and community legal advisers taught her that public workers could not ask about documentation status “because people here who don’t have documents and are illegal still have rights. And [their] kids have rights.” Likewise, Ilana, an undocumented mother of three mixed-status children, said “San Francisco has a lot of help for all of us,” referring to undocumented immigrants’ access to educational and public services in the city.
Even when facing monolingual teachers or staff, for the most part, mothers conveyed appreciation for school and CBO assistance. Aida said, If I have any question, I inform myself there at the school. For example, if my son isn’t doing well in school or something like that, I inform myself and I ask for information, and there [at the school] they tell me about the programs [that can help him] and such and such.
Aida went on to state that, although the teacher “talked purely [in] English,” she has “learn[ed] to cope a bit more” and become “more involved with my son in school.” Aida also participated in FMF and other community organizations, including her child’s afterschool program to “speak to his teacher from the program to see how he was doing and how [she] could help [with homework].”
Mothers’ gratitude for San Francisco educational and nonprofit programs was coupled with an understanding of limited opportunities elsewhere, including in home countries. For example, Madrona compared her daughter’s educational opportunities in the United States with her “very different” experiences growing up in Nicaragua: Here in the United States . . . there are more . . . programs. . . . When I lived in my country, and I was a little girl there was none of that, it was very difficult. . . . What I do is support her, what I didn’t have [in my country], [I hope] that they give her.
Madrona came to the United States for greater educational and support opportunities for her daughter, and she sought out those opportunities.
Similarly, Leona emphasized her daughter’s educational opportunities in the United States compared with her “miss[ing]” of “high school” in the Philippines: Right now, my daughter is already [in] college. I said my kids, uh, they’re going to school, because they need that. . . . You have [here], [the opportunity of] going to college. . . . Not me. Kind of missed [out on] my high school. . . . If you have a degree in the college, you get your like, [opportunities] to work.
Leona appreciated her daughter’s access to a college pathway and understood her mothering responsibilities to involve supporting her children’s opportunities that she “missed.”
Thus, despite these groups’ differences in racial/ethnic and legal statuses, Latina and Filipina mothers similarly interpreted school and CBO “help” through the lens of gendered intensive-mothering responsibilities, expressed through a deep sense of gratitude. The strength of familistic gendered expectations that immigrant mothers should perform these responsibilities to support children’s mobility overpowered differences in terms of racial/ethnic and legal statuses. Next, we describe how gratitude for their children’s opportunities and understandings of the benefits of volunteering in CBOs and schools intersected with emotional pressures to “give back.” We find that Filipina and Latina mothers negotiated different intersecting burdens when considering participation and volunteering in CBOs and schools.
“Giving Back”: Parental Involvement Expectations in Schools and CBOs
As noted, almost all mothers had children in schools with programs catered to Filipina/o or Latina/o families, including bilingual programs, administrators, and staff. Almost all mothers regularly participated and interacted with CBO and school staff. They described frequent conversations with Filipina or Latina parents, teachers, and staff, indicating developing social connections and resources through CBO and school participation. Among other activities, mothers attended CBO and school meetings and parent-teacher conferences, read translated school information and report cards, and communicated with bilingual staff and teachers. A majority volunteered through CBO staff-directed activities like helping with CBO fundraisers, meetings, or park clean-ups. Those same mothers also volunteered at schools to staple papers or watch children during fieldtrips. These mothers similarly understood how they and their children benefited and how schools and CBOs benefited from parent volunteering. Yet the two groups differed in terms of expressing a sense of obligation or emotional pressures to “give back” to CBOs and schools through involvement and volunteering.
Public schools and nonprofits may increasingly lean on the support of volunteers given ongoing divestment in public resources. Both Filipina and Latina mothers understood that families and CBO and school programs benefited from parental volunteering. Victoria (the Latina mother introduced earlier) volunteered at a SFUSD program for Latina/o students and her child: We have to glue posters from something [that] has to be promoted, or handing out flyers, or any activity, uh-huh [yes]. Or field trips, because they also make field trips, uh, to go to the universities, so that the families and kids see the universities, and then say, “Wow! I want to come here one day.”
Victoria appreciated learning about universities through the program, and she volunteered to gain such information and opportunities and to help others to do so. Leona (the Filipina mother introduced earlier) greatly appreciated FMF’s free backpacks and other school items for her children, summarizing how the material assistance facilitated her engagement and “happ[iness]” in FMF: “Because . . . if you have somebody give to you, you happy.” After discussing the free backpacks, Leona went on to say, “They help [us], [so] I [am] going to help them. So, they [FMF] need helping . . . too.” Leona felt “happy” after receiving FMF support, and she felt reciprocity was expected; FMF staff members “need” her help in return for “help” provided to her family. At other interview points, Leona conflated volunteering with “helping” FMF, which she understood to be important for receiving FMF “help.”
When considering why they volunteered in CBOs and schools, almost all the Filipina and Latina active volunteers discussed appreciation for benefits and opportunities; however, they differentially connected volunteering to “giving back” or fulfilling a debt for services and support obtained in CBOs and schools. Although Leona understood that FMF “need[ed] help,” she and only one other Filipina highlighted an obligation to “help” CBOs. Meanwhile, almost all active Latina mothers constructed their participation in CBOs and schools through this “giving back” lens, highlighting their need to “help.” Aida (the Latina mother introduced earlier) felt compelled to “give back” at FMF through volunteering, in exchange for FMF’s support: They offer a lot, they help us a lot. Which [is] why we come to the meetings, to be volunteers. During the [in English] “summer” time, when they are going to give things out, I volunteer here. I help them prepare dispensing [the things they give out], or a meal. I help serve. I do anything. In other words, they give to us; we return [the favor; devolvemos].
Latina mothers active in children’s schools described needing to “give back” or “help” in schools, like “giving back” in CBOs. Neiva, a Latina part-time cleaner and mother of four, attended parent-teacher meetings and volunteered in her daughter’s classroom to obtain information on her daughter’s academic progress: “The one who can give me more information is the teacher, because she is the one who spends more time with her.” Neiva also understood that “the teacher needs help.” She went on, “We go to help sharpen the pencils, or dust her books, or when there are fieldtrips, and she needs parent volunteer, and if we have time, we accompany her.” Throughout Neiva’s discussion of school volunteering activities, she frequently stated, “we help the teacher,” and described activities where she and other mothers “helped”: “the teacher makes copies, we make some booklets for the children, we staple them and all.” Neiva connected her (and other mothers’) “help[ing]” in school to her recognition of teachers “need[ing]” mothers’ “help.”
Susana, an unemployed Latina mother of two, volunteered and provided “help” at FMF in exchange for FMF “help” (“They help me with information”): “Because, I feel good when I come. And if they call me [to help] and I have time, why not go and help?” Ilana (the unemployed Latina mother introduced earlier) sometimes babysat for work and described time and language constraints associated with FMF volunteering: “Sometimes the schedule is a little bit hard. I told them that I can come in the morning, but sometimes [volunteering] does not coincide with the schedule . . . because of my children.” Despite FMF Spanish-speaking staff, Ilana also experienced language constraints: “[Speaking English] is not necessary, but you feel bad because it is embarrassing not to speak English.” However, Ilana felt compelled to volunteer at FMF: “Since they help us, I think we have to bring one or two hours. This will be as a gratitude to the program they are offering us.” Volunteering was an action to show gratitude for “the help” from FMF: “I think that with what we receive . . . I think that we have to thank them for what they give you, and that’s what I do, thank for the help I receive.”
Filipina mothers understood how schools and CBOs benefited from parental “help,” but most Filipinas did not share feelings of obligation to “give back” and “help” like Latina mothers. Arianna, a part-time caregiver and Filipina mother of two, said that she “want[s] to give actions to the petitions [FMF campaigns]” and that she knows they want her “help.” Even though she struggles with time, she said, “I have two kids, I’m a single parent, but if I can, I can volunteer any time.” Arianna understood that, as a nonprofit advocacy organization, FMF needed her “help.” She regularly volunteered at FMF and attended monthly school meetings for parents/caretakers, while indicating her appreciation for and confidence in these interactions. However, like most other Filipina mothers, Arianna did not indicate needing to volunteer to “give back” in CBOs or schools as part of indebtedness associated with receiving benefits and support. Mary, a full-time cleaner and Filipina mother of two, described her volunteering efforts in FMF and a local after-school program directly after discussing her appreciation for CBO support for her children: I get free monthly [bus passes] for my son. And because I’m not working, [staff] call me to volunteer. . . . I really love to volunteer. I want to do more, more, what is called, “active community,” and I love to do that.
Mary did not convey a sense of debt, even while she understood CBO benefits. Mary also expressed her agency by leaving her volunteer after-school program board position after conflicts with the director.
Leona and another Filipina who volunteered in CBOs and felt the need to “help” in CBOs did not offer this “giving back” narrative when discussing their participation in school-based activities, and they framed volunteering through a greater sense of agency. Belinda, an employed Filipina mother of one, highlighted a reciprocal relationship where FMF “need[s] us” for campaigns and other work: “You cannot just, it’s not just one way. . . . So it’s not always getting something from them, sometimes you have to give back.” However, when describing her volunteering and participation in schools and afterschool programs, she focused on her child. When discussing her school volunteering through homework tutoring or passing out morning snacks, she reasoned: “I did it for my son.” She volunteered in school programs for her son. Melinda (the Filipina mother introduced earlier) also described how she “volunteer[ed] there [at the school] so could watch Manuel [her child].”
Leona (the Filipina mother introduced earlier), at another interview point, talked about volunteering in the San Francisco Food Bank for another direct-services CBO: “I need to [be] going there, because, uh, if they . . . help, I going to help them.” The interviewer then clarified, “So, it’s about give and take?” Leona replied, “Yeah. . . . Everything they need to me, because uh, here in the San Francisco I, um, going to helping to volunteer.” Leona understood that FMF and the other CBO were helpful for immigrant families and needed regular volunteers. She further discussed that the CBO needed parent involvement in city campaigns: “Because [if] the bus pass[es] get cut, we might not get any more for the kids,” but that she struggled with time for volunteering: “I have no . . . time, I’m [also responsible to be] there for my kids.” However, despite Leona’s understanding that CBOs such as FMF relied on parents to ensure the funding of programs, like Belinda and other Filipinas, Leona did not apply a sense of obligation to her PTA and school involvement and volunteering, including in her child’s afterschool program.
Given that CBOs and public schools face limited funding because of systematic U.S. divestment in public resources, it makes sense that these organizations may lean on parents to be engaged in community and school programs. Filipina and Latina mothers similarly understood the benefits of volunteering for schools and CBOs; even so, we have outlined key differences in the extent to which Filipina and Latina mothers felt obligated to “give back” as a form of reciprocity for the “help” and opportunities received from CBOs and schools. Most Latina mothers constructed participation in CBOs and schools through this “giving back” lens. Meanwhile, though Filipinas felt compelled to volunteer, few expressed an obligation to “give back” in CBOs and none expressed this lens when considering volunteering in schools. In the next section, we demonstrate how Latina and Filipina mothers’ positionalities with respect to shared gendered childrearing responsibilities, but different racial and documentation statuses, intersect to shape different emotional burdens of participation in CBOs and schools.
Intersecting Burdens: Gendered, Racialized, and Classed Immigrant Dilemmas in CBO and School Participation
In our study, green card–status Filipina and undocumented Latina mothers held different marginalized racial and legal statuses. Though both sets of respondents were low-income immigrant mothers, undocumented Latina mothers carry a uniquely racialized status in U.S. public institutions. As a result, Filipinas and Latinas experienced different intersecting burdens: emotional pressures, dilemmas, and stresses associated with school and CBO participation. Undocumented Latinas experienced greater precarity and vulnerability to racialized exclusion; what Oliveira et al. (2021) identified as a “vulnerable position as beneficiaries” (p. 47). That is, Latina immigrants mothers feel grateful for educational and family opportunities and understand they benefit from these opportunities but are vulnerable to losing them. Oliveira et al. (2021) found that Brazilian immigrant mothers highlight their gratitude and “abundant compliments” to teachers in a bilingual education program because they “face[d] accentuated pressures from social institutions to perform docility in order to be accepted and considered model . . . citizens” (p. 54). Undocumented Latina mothers in our study faced unique burdens of feeling obligated to “give back” to schools and CBOs to maintain benefits and mitigate potential negative judgments; these mothers were aware of the conditional nature of opportunities as they negotiated a “vulnerable position as beneficiaries.” Filipina mothers did not indicate such dilemmas involving the conditional nature of resources and support and potential judgments and repercussions tied to intersections of racialized and legal statuses.
Thus, Filipinas and Latinas carried qualitatively different burdens associated with CBO and school participation. Latina mothers discussed fears for themselves and their children, particularly those with undocumented children, while anticipating problems amplified by public and institutional interactions, including in CBOs and schools. Selena, a Latina mother of undocumented and U.S.-born children, became emotional when describing her hopes and fears while raising her undocumented son and supporting his education: “I continue thinking the best for him. And I, [I hope that] I overcome all my fears.” As an undocumented mother, she carried fears for herself and her mixed-status children with her everywhere.
As an unemployed mother of three, Marcela (Latina mother mentioned previously) was also active in school-based parent groups and conveyed her gratitude for CBO and school programs: [At] the schools, sometimes you need supplies to work with the children. . . . So, they give you notebooks. . . . They give you pencils, they give you erasers . . . or a pencil sharpener. And that helps you a lot, it helps you economically. [So,] you do not spend more.
Through her involvement in CBOs, Marcela also gained legal support for citizenship and other family support. She felt grateful for these various forms of support, and like Filipina mothers, Marcela believed CBOs and school-based groups needed involved parents/caretakers to survive. To Marcela, volunteering was consistent with her own moral code “to [get] involved” in exchange for “help” or benefits. Her focus on CBO and school direct aid and services perhaps influenced her to stigmatize nonvolunteers at FMF: “They think that life is [easy] like that. . . . But, how are they [staff] going to help you if you never got involved?” Marcela highlighted the economic and educational benefits gained from direct services in CBOs and schools and emphasized her need to volunteer and be involved to indicate a moral code of not receiving handouts and support without showing reciprocity.
Meanwhile, Marcela negotiated a precarious status based on her racialized legal position. She was grateful for CBO and school support, but also that “one feels that sometimes you are in the shadows.” She went on, “Those of us that do not have papers, well, no. . . . You do not have as much rights, you cannot demand [further rights].” Marcela, while being involved in CBOs and schools, was constantly aware of her undocumented status, such as when learning about Arizona’s policing of immigrants in a CBO meeting: That day we relied on [learned from] an immigration lawyer, and she, uh, she was telling us about everything that . . . [changes topic]. She is from Arizona. And she was telling us how the situation is over there . . . about various cases that are truly, really sad.
Marcela’s description references a workshop at FMF on Arizona’s SB1070 bill and racial profiling practices. Such awareness translated to fears as an undocumented Latina mother, despite learning about her rights and having positive feelings toward San Francisco schools and CBOs. When asked about using public-assistance programs in San Francisco, Marcela also showed her awareness of racial stereotypes against Latina/os: There are many comments against us, the Latinos. Maybe that is why they do not like us, the Anglo-Americans. Because many families that do not need [food stamps] get it. They also get the, the money that the government gives them for the children born here.
Marcela was aware of racial stereotypes toward Latina/os using public programs and anti-immigrant policies outside of San Francisco. Through these discussions, Marcela indicates intersections of low-income, racial, and undocumented statuses and the unique stigmas constraining her sense of agency.
Undocumented Latinas navigate racialized stereotypes homogenizing and positioning them as “illegal” and at risk for “bad” or morally “corrupt” behaviors, such as being “disengaged” mothers burdening schools or as “takers” of public services (Abrego and Menjívar 2011; Gast and Okamoto 2016; Kibria and Becerra 2020). Latina respondents did not always directly mention such stereotypes, but they mentioned pressures to show full investment in their children and to mitigate negative judgments toward them, even in schools and CBOs with welcoming staff. Thus, gendered “good mothering” and “school-centric” norms, coupled with awareness of racialized, nativist stereotypes, may have uniquely influenced the Latina mothers (Jamal Al-deen and Windle 2017; Kibria and Becerra 2020). For example, Jacinta (the Latina mother of undocumented children introduced earlier), had close contact and positive relations with her oldest son’s teachers, saying, “They let me know about any little thing.” However, Jacinta felt guilty for not being more involved on behalf of her youngest son: His grades have dropped, and . . . I know two teachers only and no more, and it is almost the end of the school year. I’m ashamed to say this, but I have concentrated on my oldest one because his grades have dropped.
She went on, “Sometimes I tell him, ‘Son, I know I am doing a poor job.’ [Even though] like the teacher says, ‘I am happy with you because you do a good job.’” Although Jacinta believed this teacher held positive views of her mothering “job,” Jacinta was not satisfied with her level of school involvement. Later, Jacinta said she “neglected with the oldest [child],” who had a learning disability, indicating she felt that school staff judged her and believed she needed to be more involved. Jacinta was aware of possible negative judgments and internalized pressures to increase her mothering responsibilities, including involvement in schools and CBOs on her children’s behalf.
Furthermore, Jacinta was aware of her and her family’s precarious status: “I know that there are people that do deserve being here. I tell my husband, ‘Not that we [are] examples’ [laughs]. But, it is what I teach my children. The two oldest ones also do not have any [papers].” Jacinta described how she taught her children to show “respect” and “there are things we do for this country . . . you have to behave well.” Jacinta understood she and her family were viewed by others as “undeserving,” and so they needed to “behave well” and show model-citizen behaviors. She further stated, “For this country. . . . You have to [follow] the rules.” For Jacinta, to follow the “rules,” she constantly monitored interactions in public institutions, was cautious toward public assistance and services (even if eligible in San Francisco), and wanted teachers and staff members in schools and nonprofits to hold positive views of her and her family. She understood that there were repercussions to inciting negative judgments and to drawing attention to undocumented (and racial) and low-income statuses.
Jacinta’s focus on model-citizen behaviors as an undocumented Latina intersected with her sense of obligation or view that Latina parents should “help” in exchange for “help” from CBOs and schools. When discussing volunteering in FMF, Jacinta reasoned, “There are many parents that work, maybe they do not have time. It is the same at the schools. . . . And I am a bit more involved in ExCEL [a predominantly Latina/o program], in the program of education for my son.” Jacinta further lamented that Latina/os should be more involved: And, [pauses] not many Latino parents go; there are three fathers, two women, and me that we always go. And, they also ask us for help of how to be able to bring the parents to the schools. . . . I know that they do not have help . . . if we could at least come and lift the chairs up, clean, or organize a little thing so that, so that they [staff] do not do that work.
Jacinta appeared to internalize pressures to show parental involvement, as a Latina parent, in schools and CBOs.
Aida, the Latina mother with mixed-status children introduced earlier, also indicated internalized pressures to volunteer and participate in FMF and schools. When asked if FMF expected her to volunteer, she said, they “do not obligate,” but that parents should volunteer to “give back”: Yes, [FMF staff] ask if we can, but they also don’t obligate you, because they know that you have children and are working. . . . But, we also set aside a time [to volunteer]. Because, if they need us, we need to give a little bit of what they give us.
Aida subtly invoked a moral understanding, suggesting she and other Latina mothers were morally obligated to volunteer at FMF because they received direct services: During the summertime when they are going to give things out, I volunteer here. I help them prepare the dispensing [distributing items], or a meal. I help serve. I do anything. Because if they give us something, then we give back also.
She further indicated that “giving back” in FMF was similar to “helping with children at school”: both were moral obligations of mothers, especially low-income Latina mothers like herself receiving economic and educational benefits for children. When asked what barriers Latina mothers face in volunteering at FMF, she said, Sometimes they have the time and they don’t want to help. They don’t want to come. Maybe they don’t help with their children at school. . . But . . . we have to make time sometimes to see how the children are doing at school. In the same way here, we have to make some time to come. Because sometimes, they do come, they have to come get the [free bus] pass because they need them.
By conflating mothers who “do not help . . . their children at school” with mothers who “come get [free bus] pass[es]” without volunteering, Aida highlighted moral judgments associated with low-income Latina mothers receiving benefits for children. Aida negotiated such judgments when considering her own school and CBO participation.
Intersections of racial, gender, class, and undocumented statuses affected Latinas’ emotional dilemmas associated with school and CBO participation, but also, for a few Latinas, their feelings of vulnerability when considering leadership and public-facing activities. Almost all Latinas and Filipinas participated in activities directed by FMF staff or school personnel, such as cooking, childcare, cleaning, or stapling papers. Some also participated in advocacy- or leadership-oriented activities in PTA or CBO committees. Advocacy-engaged Filipina mothers did not discuss needing to guard their organizing work on the basis of fears of disclosing names and other personal information in the city. However, a few Latinas mentioned fears associated with public-facing organizing work. Monica, a Latina mother of mixed-status children, when asked why she did not participate in advocacy campaigns, said, “Immigrants are powerless, so no point in participating in campaigns.” Marisol, another Latina mother of mixed-status children, noted, “Maybe if I have my papers, I would be more comfortable participating. . . . I don’t want to be arrested by the police. . . . When you are illegal you are afraid to get involved.” Thus, despite understanding sanctuary-city protections, a few Latinas highlighted their unique vulnerabilities in public-facing organizing in the city.
In contrast, Filipinas who participated in CBOs and schools, including PTAs or CBO boards and committees, mentioned constraints due to language barriers or lack of time and confidence, but not stigmas and vulnerabilities tied to racialized and legal statuses. For example, Arianna, a Filipina mother discussed earlier, attended monthly FMF meetings, but when asked about volunteering for City Hall campaigns said, “I’m not that confident to stand in front of the supervisors and telling about my comments.” Arianna also stated repeatedly, “I’m a single parent. Yeah, but if I can, I volunteer.” Arianna conveyed her agency in discussing when and how she volunteered and, like other Filipinas, did not discuss vulnerabilities because of racialized and documentation statuses. Thus, Filipina and Latina mothers negotiated different emotional dilemmas or burdens tied to intersecting gender, class, racialized, and legal statuses while participating in CBOs and schools.
Discussion and Conclusion
Using in-depth interviews with Filipina and Latina immigrant mothers who participated in FMF, a nonprofit CBO serving low-income immigrants in San Francisco, we compare how these two groups—similar in gender and SES, but different racialized and legal statuses—approach CBO and school involvement. As we examined what immigrant mothers told us about their participation and perceptions of these organizations, we identified the intersecting burdens they faced. These emotional dilemmas and pressures, which Latina and Filipina mothers associated with school and CBO participation, relate to the interlocking nature of mothers’ specific marginalized racial, gender, class, and legal statuses. Filipinas and Latinas navigated distinct intersecting burdens, which differentially affected approaches to school and CBO participation. We use intersectionality and gender theories to emphasize contemporary U.S. expectations for “intensive mothering” and educational and childrearing involvement, and we reveal how distinct racialized and legal statuses amplified the intensity of Latina mothers’ perceived obligation to “give back,” relative to Filipina mothers. Both Filipina and Latina mothers felt grateful for CBOs and schools and compelled to participate; however, Latinas felt unique dilemmas and pressures to signal entitlement in CBOs and schools while anticipating negative judgments, stigmas, and vulnerabilities during participation. Undocumented Latinas’ racialized and legal statuses, even in San Francisco’s sanctuary city, shaped how they were made aware of and negotiated pressures to indicate deservingness for receiving resources and opportunities. In contrast, green card–status Filipina mothers, while facing time and other constraints, shared a greater sense of agency when approaching volunteering and participation in CBOs and schools.
Both Filipinas and Latinas felt deep responsibilities for their children’s futures and participated in CBOs and schools, in part, as expressions of gendered childrearing expectations where mothers accessed support and services for children (Valdez 2016). With bilingual staff and ethnicity- and community-focused programs, FMF and local schools enabled social networks, information sharing, opportunities, and services, which empowered these mothers to feel supported and grateful. We draw on research on “gendered intensive-mothering responsibilities” (Hays 1996; Kibria and Becerra 2020). Respondents’ gratitude underlined their feelings of responsibility, as mothers, to access education and CBO opportunities in order to secure their children’s well-being (see also Oliveira et al. 2021). Although past research often focused on immigrant children’s gratitude, mainly toward parents, after family migration, we demonstrate how immigrant mothers’ feelings of gratitude for CBO and school support translated to obligation pressures to “give back” in exchange for support, particularly for Latina mothers, on the basis of their intersecting gender, racial, class, and legal statuses.
Both Filipina and Latina mothers felt compelled to “help” in schools and CBOs, such as through assisting CBO or school staff members, cleaning, helping with fundraisers, providing childcare, or distributing items to students or other families. Both groups also acknowledged expectations from CBOs, and to some extent schools, that participating was a shared community norm. Moreover, both groups’ interviews contained references to implicit pressures to engage in such actions to access CBO and school-based support and facilitate children’s opportunities. However, Latinas’ and Filipinas’ perceptions differed: most Latinas conveyed a sense of obligation as a reflection of an emotional burden to “give back” in schools and CBOs, indicating they felt responsible for showing entitlement or paying a perceived “moral debt” for support received (Oliveira et al. 2021). Latinas especially felt obligated to “return the favor” to receive aid and services and said so specifically. In contrast, only a couple of the Filipina mothers expressed similar feelings of indebtedness to CBOs. Many Latinas also expressed feeling obligated to “give back” to their children’s public schools, but no Filipinas viewed school participation through this lens. Instead, Filipina mothers more often expressed agency in their choices to volunteer, wherein participation was its own reward; as Mary put it, “I really love to volunteer.” The mainly undocumented Latinas felt unique intersecting burdens relative to the green card–status Filipinas when negotiating school and CBO participation.
Despite opportunities and protections for immigrant parents in public schools and community programs in San Francisco regardless of documentation, Latina mothers felt the weight of racialized and documentation statuses. Even Latinas active in campaign activities shared reluctance to take on leadership or public-facing roles because of feelings of precarity tied to their or family members’ undocumented status. Filipina mothers, by comparison, did not discuss similar problems at the intersections of racialized and documentation statuses. As demonstrated elsewhere, federal exclusionary forces and racialization of Latinas stereotyped as “illegal” and “undeserving” can produce stress and anticipation of negative repercussions from public institution interactions (Abrego and Menjívar 2011; García 2017; Gast et al. 2021; Menjívar and Abrego 2012). In our study, some Latina mothers spoke of stigmatization because of “looking Latino,” indicating unique constraints and dilemmas when approaching volunteering and taking on leadership in CBOs and schools.
We connect “giving-back” pressures felt by undocumented Latina mothers to a socially constructed moral entitlement system wherein these mothers felt compelled to demonstrate deservingness through their school and CBO involvement, despite having formal access to school and CBO support. We suggest that this moral entitlement system spills over between public programs, schools, and nonprofits and join others (Kibria and Becerra 2020; Oliveira et al. 2021) in pushing for greater attention to the emotional burdens and stresses influencing immigrant local participation. Within this moral entitlement system, immigrant mothers, especially undocumented Latinas aware of racialized and negative judgments, understand they are not automatically guaranteed deservingness. Implicit demands to show model-citizen behaviors and avoid “bad-mother” stigmas in public schools run parallel to both tacit and explicit expectations for demonstrating “deservingness” by low-income mothers in public programs; these stigmas are uniquely gendered and racialized for Latinas often targeted and assumed to be unentitled by “racialized illegality,” which conflates immorality with racial, legal, and nativity statuses (Abrego and Menjívar 2011; García 2017; Kibria and Becerra 2020).
Our study contributes a consideration of how low-income immigrant mothers similarly discuss CBOs and schools, whereas past research tends to analyze CBOs and schools separately. We show how school-centric approaches of parental “school involvement” (Baquedano-Lopez et al. 2013; Posey-Maddox and Haley-Lock 2020) mask the diverse ways low-income, immigrant parents perceive and “give back” to schools and CBOs. In many ways, mothers viewed CBOs and schools as providing similar, much-needed services, allowing access to key opportunities benefiting their children and families, and they similarly volunteered in CBOs and schools. CBOs and schools provide crucial public services in the aftermath of welfare changes affecting low-income, immigrant families (de Graauw 2016). Recent work reveals how school- and community-based parent groups, in collaboration with community leaders and organizations, can facilitate inclusion, empowerment, and collective action for marginalized groups (Bruhn 2023; Mendez and Deeb-Sossa 2020). Future research should consider how constituents connect CBOs and schools together and the implications for collaborations between these local institutions.
Carrying the weight of gendered childrearing responsibilities on their shoulders, undocumented Latina mothers felt that continued access to resources and opportunities for their children was, to some extent, contingent on their level of CBO involvement. Many shared similar sentiments with respect to public schools; however, because of many interview questions focusing on CBOs, mothers spent less time discussing perceptions of school involvement. Additionally, while mothers mentioned how CBO staff emphasized the necessities of maintaining active constituents for funding, organizational impact, and survival (see also Marwell 2004), we do not have data on school-staff expectations, other than mothers’ comments on school interactions. Thus, limitations of our study include the limited nature of questions about schools and our data’s focus on CBO participants in one community context (San Francisco). Future studies should investigate whether and how immigrants may monitor school involvement and how this plays out in other contexts as backlash has intensified against ongoing immigration flows from Latin America.
We demonstrate the intersecting burdens for mothers in a nativist national climate, which uniquely stereotypes Latinas as racially inferior and “morally corrupt” (Abrego and Menjívar 2011; Chavez 2013). San Francisco’s inclusive programming in CBOs and schools is important to note. Immigrants face more extensive barriers in other cities. Yet even in a sanctuary city, where immigrants have formal access and protections regardless of documentation status, and with bilingual and ethnicity-focused programs, we found meaningful dilemmas and constraints faced by immigrant mothers. Undocumented Latinas’ unique intersecting burdens indicate the long shadow of gendered, racialized, and exclusionary forces in the national climate. For the well-being of families, schools, and local organizations, future research should pay attention to entitlement expectations and emotional burdens carried by parents navigating multiply marginalized positions.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
We thank Dina G. Okamoto for her comments on an earlier draft and her leadership as a co–principal investigator for the project. We also thank Stephanie Quiles-Ramos, Emerald Nguyen, Valerie Feldman, Robin Savinar, and Willow Mata for their research assistance.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: We thank the Center for Poverty Research at University of California, Davis, University of Louisville Department of Sociology and Office of Research and Innovation, Virginia Tech’s College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences Niles Research Grant program, William T. Grant Foundation, and West Coast Poverty Center at University of Washington for their funding and support.
