The Do Good Team Podcast

Episode 9 - Creating Spaces for Undocumented Professionals to Thrive with Undocuprofessionals

• David & Nora as The Do Good Team LLC

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Discover the untold stories of resilience and ambition as we sit down with Sharet Garcia, the trailblazing founder of Undocuprofessionals. This season, we're not just bringing narratives to the table; we’re bringing solutions, mentorships, and a community that uplifts every undocumented professional striving to make their mark. Sharet joins us to shed light on the immense barriers that these individuals face and the transformative power of recognition and support.

Navigating the complexities of DACA is no small ordeal, and this episode peels back the layers of this crucial program, revealing the real-life implications for those who live in the balance. You'll hear the emotional journey of a DACA recipient who fought through academia's challenges, the crushing weight of 'hustle culture,' and the soaring heights of creating spaces that foster growth and reflection. For allies ready to stand with the undocumented community, we lay out actionable steps to engage and advocate effectively.

Wrapping up our talk, we celebrate the strides made by Undocuprofessionals in connecting talent with opportunity. We go behind the scenes of strategic decisions that fuel the organization's mission, like their annual conference and virtual national mentorship program that now boasts over 700 mentors. So, for a dose of inspiration and a call to action, subscribe to our newsletter and join the ranks of those championing an inclusive professional landscape.

Nora:

You're listening to episode 9 of the Do Good Team podcast, a discussion on supporting the undocumented community with undocumented professionals.

David:

Hello Do Gooders out there and thank you so much for listening to another episode of the Do Good Team podcast, a podcast where we highlight nonprofits and charitable causes for the goal of improving your life and those around you through inspiration and creating meaningful connections. I am one of your hosts, david.

Nora:

Hello everybody. I am your other host, nora.

David:

And it's really exciting to be back with season two. Season one was fantastic and season two is promises to be even better. What do you think, Nora?

Nora:

It is definitely going to be better. We are super excited about how we're planning and organizing this upcoming season. We are excited about the guests that we are having. We're excited about working on expanding the podcast in different ways. One way in particular that we're doing that is through. We have an update for you all that we finally have a website.

Nora:

So we invite you to check it out. It is a wonderful website. The link to it is wwwTheDoGoodTeamcom. It is something that David has been working a lot on and spending, you know, some really good quality time developing a website where you can access all the information about the podcast. You have an opportunity to access the podcast episodes themselves. A little bit of an autobiography, a little further information about who we are, what our passions are. David, do you have any other details or special surprises about the website? What people can find on the website?

David:

Yeah, so a couple of different surprises. You'll get to see a picture of a cat, grace, who is our honorary director of NAPS, so everyone will get to see a picture of her on there. I have her listed as the director of NAPS, backslash destroyer of mice. The mice are terrified of her around here. And the other thing is we have a section for contacting us where you can send us a message, but I'm totally going to admit to everybody I do not know where those messages go yet. They're going to go into a black hole. Oh no, so at this point you could always reach us at wwwTheDoGoodTeamgmailcom, but that's something that I'm going to be working on. We're in the world. Where those messages go, we'll find out soon. So, other than that, the website is up. It's ready. A great way to learn a little bit more about us and actually see our faces.

Nora:

Yes, please check it out. We will be including the link to the website in this episode's notes.

David:

Yes, and all of our social media has been updated as well with the link to that website. But without any further belaboring of that point, we are going to rock and roll into our very first episode of season two. So Nora and I had the honor of sitting down with Shadek Garcia, who is the founder of Undocu Professionals, and Undocu Professionals is a really wonderful organization that focuses on finding professional opportunities for the undocumented individuals that live in this country, with a strong emphasis on education and helping college students their undocumented transition out of academia into the workforce. So I'm going to read a little bit from their mission statement that you can find on their website, and this is what it says Our mission is to create a brave platform for the undocumented communities to highlight their experiences from students as a transition to professionals. A documented professional should have a clear pathway to achieving their career goals. We aim to do this by creating an environment of mentorship and community, with a sustainability that allows for the next generations to have the possibility of choosing. So a really, really cool mission statement. You know, another piece to this conversation that we had with Shadek was really getting into DACA, and DACA stands for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, and I figured this is a perfect opportunity for me to kind of create a baseline understanding of DACA, because we jumped into it.

David:

So, as stated before, daca stands for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. It is a US immigration policy established in 2012 under the Obama administration. Daca allows certain undocumented individuals who entered the United States as minors to receive a renewable two year period of deferred action from deportation and eligibility for a work permit. To qualify for DACA, individuals must meet specific criteria, including arriving in the US before the age of 16, residing continuously in the country since June 15, 2007, and meeting educational or military service requirements. Daca does not provide a path to citizenship, but it offers temporary relief from deportation for eligible individuals.

David:

Now there's a lot of discussion right now in regards to the legality of DACA because there's some issues with DACA going on in the court. We can have a whole episode on that and I think I'll put a little information about that, some links where you can get an update on where DACA is in the court system, and Sharet also mentions it in the episode as well, but I don't want to get too long into it because it's actually kind of complex, so we'll put it in the episode notes. But besides that, now you know who Undocu Professionals is, you have a baseline understanding of DACA. I think we might be ready for our interview. What do you think, noda?

Nora:

I am very excited for everybody to have an opportunity to meet Sharet virtually and hear about all the wonderful work that they are doing within all of our communities. This isn't just one specific location, it's something that is impactful nationally. So thank you so much, s. Everybody enjoy the episode.

David:

As you heard at the top of the episode, we're very excited to be sitting down with Sharet Garcia, the founder of Undocu Professionals, an organization that connects undocumented professionals with clear pathways to achieving career goals. Sharet, thank you so much for sitting down with us today.

Nora:

Thank you so much, David and L. So, if we can go ahead and get started by having you Sharet, share a little bit about yourself and your journey, well, thank you again and a little bit about myself is that my background comes from being raised and born in Oaxaca, Mexico.

Sharet Garcia:

Hopefully you have heard about Oaxaca. Yeah, everybody always tells me when I say I'm from Oaxaca, oh, I love your mole. You know that you guys have there, so. So one of the things that I'm very proud of being from Oaxaca is that we are we have a very high population of indigenous people that still speak indigenous language, have indigenous cultures, so very happy to be able to continue to. You know, hold on to that culture.

Sharet Garcia:

I'm also currently a educator and counselor, and also I am currently a DACA recipient. So one of the things that I talk about right now is my experiences as a DACA recipient. But there was a time where there was no DACA, when DACA didn't exist. I started my educational journey in the United States in a time where DACA didn't exist. I came here when I was only nine years old and I've been here since then. But my journey being an undocumented student started when I was in elementary school and since then I, you know, continue my education, graduated, was the first in my family to continue my education and the first in my family to continue higher ed education, and I was able to finish my associate's degree, my bachelor's degree and master's program as the first generation undocumented student in my family, and this work that I'm doing now is really aligns with not only my personal experience but hopefully to give back to our communities as well.

Nora:

Thank you so much for a little bit of information about your background. Sharet, would you mind sharing a little bit with us about what DACA and being a DACA recipient means, for those in the audience that are unfamiliar with what DACA means?

Sharet Garcia:

Thank you, yes, Nora, I know that is definitely something that is needed to provide more information. But a little bit about DACA. Daca is an acronym name and it means deferred action for childhood arrivals. And what does that mean? To be eligible for the DACA program, there needs to be a set of requirements, and some of those requirements is to go through a background check to make sure that you meet the year requirement of where you came to the United States and also if you are pursuing your education, whether you're in the process of or maybe completed already an education, and a little bit more of those requirements. But what's very important to be mindful about when you think about DACA recipients is that not a lot of undocumented students or individuals were able to apply to the DACA program. So we really made those requirements are very specific and if you don't qualify, one of them is being, let's say, you arrived by the date that the DACA program or the DACA requirement mentioned, even if you left the country even for one day, you are unqualified for the DACA program. So it is very specific and not a lot in the community were able to apply the DACA program.

Sharet Garcia:

Just turned 11 years just recently and just knowing that DACA has been around for that long, it has gone through so many uncertainties, just because it has constantly been attacked throughout this years. Right now, we are waiting for the judge to decide whether DACA will be able to continue or if it's going to be revoked, unfortunately. And then one more thing about DACA is that I wanted to mention. The DACA program provides us with the privileges, as a DACA recipient, to be able to work and to be able to be protected from deportation. Those are one of the two things that, for me, really changed a lot and gave me this privilege that I never had in this country before. And thanks to DACA and the advocacy of many in the undocumented community and undocumented allies, we were able to bring DACA to the undocumented community.

Nora:

We had an opportunity to check out Undocu Professional's website and it's so rich with information, so this is a really good resource for our audience to check out any updates, including what's happening with DACA, information on how to get connected and be an ally for DACA as well.

Sharet Garcia:

Yes, yeah, I would highly recommend to check out our website, check out our social media platforms, which is where we provide more up-to-date information.

Nora:

Thank you and I wanted to definitely commend you Sharet , for just your hard work. I mean, being the first in a family to graduate from high school to pursue higher education is not easy, and when you add the layer of the fear that comes, the challenges that come with being undocumented, the accomplishment that you've had is just tremendous and is such a great example for those other students that might be in similar circumstances, with the fear and uncertainty of where their future is going, even after investing this time in their education. Can you maybe share a little bit with us what your experience was as a student, navigating the uncertainty, the fear, how you motivated and encouraged yourself to just keep pushing forward, and how that influenced you into becoming the founder for Undocu Professionals?

Sharet Garcia:

You bring such an important question that I don't think I had the opportunity to really reflect and think about it until now that I'm older. So, looking back at you know, when I go and speak a little bit about my story to others and share a little bit more, you know, one of the questions that I usually get asked is how did you even manage to pay for your education from your associate's degree all the way to your master's program, completely undocumented, without a lot of resources? And one of the things that comes back to me when I have the opportunity to finally reflect on it is that, wow, like I think back and I'm like wow, I really did overwork myself. You know, having to do that, I had to work two, three jobs, but I never really had the opportunity to pause and think about. I never really had the opportunity to pause and think about what I was doing in the past, where moving, trying to survive the educational systems being undocumented, that you don't even get a chance to breathe and stop and reflect on what you are doing to survive the educational systems and just other systems in general. And the reason why I say that is because now that I think back and say like how did I get dollars out of my pocket when I was undocumented, didn't have a work authorization, didn't have a social security number when I was going to school? So now, thinking back, you know I have to say that before maybe I was just moving too fast, that I didn't get a chance to do that, and now that I'm older I wouldn't want others that are undocumented having to go through the same thing I went, or really not having a chance to breathe and think about their experience being a current undocumented student.

Sharet Garcia:

So for anyone listening that is an undocumented student or if you work with the undocumented community, I would highly suggest to provide spaces for students to really have the opportunity to just reflect on this feelings that we have, and sometimes we don't share those feelings. We hide the reality that we're going through because we don't really have a space for it. So that's one of the things that I'm learning to try my best to take things a little bit slower and not continue the hustle culture, because when you're undocumented, you're in the hustle 24, seven. There's no time to stop. You are working, you are trying to finish your education and now if I try to do that to myself, I see that it is definitely harmful for my mental health and for my physical health and everything else. So I really am trying to learn the hustle culture and I didn't even realize it. Now trying to learn that it's a little bit challenging.

Nora:

I love how, when you answered the question, you added not just your message to the students that might be undocumented at the time, but also for those of us that are working in the educational system, whether it's like K through 12 or higher ed, being mindful of what students are going through, and I'm glad that you highlighted the aspect of mental health in the situation.

Nora:

There's definitely a lot of things that are kept within. In our initial meeting, you shared a lot that when you were going through it, there was a lot of feelings of, like, isolation and feeling lonely and feeling disconnected and feeling fearful to share your story and your experiences, and I think that that's continued to be a prevalent experience for students and anybody that's undocumented. But what I was very surprising to learn from you from our initial meeting was that when you create these spaces so I'd love for you to kind of like share with us a little bit about your first like you shared with us, like the first workshop you did at UCLA, your social media how we have this idea that those individuals that are undocumented are too scared to connect and to speak, but when provided a safe space, when provided with an environment and supports, they come out and they really work to get the support and to build community, share information, share resources.

Sharet Garcia:

So if maybe you could share a little bit about that, yes, I think one of the things that DACA did not just for me but for many DACA recipients is that I think it gave us a little bit more of an opportunity to breathe for the first time, because we had finally a work authorization and social security number and we were finally able to apply to more opportunities that we've never had before, such as jobs. So my transition from being an undocumented student that just recently graduated from a master's program here in California to now transition into a professional for the first time For me it came DACA came in for me right when I graduated from my master's program and when I finally got DACA I had already finished that program and I was ready to start applying to jobs. So it almost came kind of a perfect time for me to make that transition. It was a great opportunity, but it was also a new opportunity that I've never had and I didn't know how to navigate the professional world and, as a new counselor going in education in this higher ed educational institutions, everything was new to me. So I of course, took advantage because, as a undocumented person having for the first time this privilege, I'm like let me try to take advantage of this as much as I can and squeeze as much juice as I can from this car that is giving me opportunity to work for two years and that's when I got my first job as a counselor, got into my first office as a counselor and starting to see students, and all of it was new to me. All of it was exciting, All of it was nerve-wracking, but at the same time reminding myself that I was occupying a space that I deserved and I think that was very hard to do to be able to manage all of that so fast, so without getting any support.

Sharet Garcia:

And I think once I started being in that field, in counseling, for the first two years, that's when I really started to feel very lonely that other counselors and others in academia were not undocumented like myself. They didn't even look like me. I remember the first few, two, two, three years. One of mine co-workers that was someone that I felt very comfortable talking to was the what is this? She would clean the offices. So she was like oh, like that janitor, maybe Janitor, yes, thank you. She was the first person that I felt comfortable talking at my job and she would ask me a lot of different questions and we kind of became friends and had very nice combos and the other. Another thing that happened to me that almost immediately is that many because I'm very I'm a very petite person. I'm very short, from Oaxaca, A lot of us are very short. People would confuse me as a student. They didn't see me as a counselor.

Nora:

I'm also quite petite, so definitely get it. But you also have a very fresh and young face, so I definitely see why they would confuse you as a student.

Sharet Garcia:

Yeah. So all these different things, all these new experiences that I've never had before that kind of was an eye opener. But at the same time I was learning so much and it just was so. One of the things that I remember a lot is that I felt that my other counselors I couldn't really relate too much to them and I almost felt like I had to hide my undocumented status with them. And that's when I started to feel more alone in my particular field, in education and I really wanted to meet others that were DACA recipients, that were also in education. That's how it started and then later was interested to just get.

Sharet Garcia:

When I couldn't find anybody in education. I would like just anybody that is undocumented or a DACA recipient that is going through some. Maybe something that I'm going through is more than enough for me, and then I just started to start having this idea that maybe I can find someone out there. And at the same time I also was in a doctoral program.

Sharet Garcia:

At that time I decided to continue my education because I had the privilege to be a DACA recipient. For the first time I could get a loan I've never had the opportunity to do that before in my educational journey and I decided to go into my doctoral program, and in my doctoral program I started to also think about my dissertation, which is also about undocumented professionals. How I just wanted really to know why is it that someone that is a professional that happens to be undocumented is able to move on with their education, with their career aspirations, career goals, but maybe others that may have more difficulty doing it? What's the difference between that Right and kind of trying to figure that out myself for me as well. And that's when I started to think about undocumented professionals as possibly a platform.

Nora:

So how were those initial beginnings Sharet ? What was it like? What were you expecting? What were the results of those initial beginnings, of making that connection, of bringing the community together?

Sharet Garcia:

When I started, I started looking for other professionals and I remember looking for some of those DACA undocumented groups on Facebook and I remember finding one that had was a huge Facebook page, that where I saw a lot of undocumented DACA recipients, and I remember posing the question I'm interested to meet others that are professionals and also undocumented. It was a huge page and I think only one person came and she shared yeah, I'm an undocumented professional and I didn't see anybody else saying anything else. So then I started to reach out to them because they wouldn't reach out to me. So I would reach out to them and ask hey, I'm thinking about creating this page called Undocumented Professionals because I think it's something that I need, so hopefully maybe somebody else will need it out there.

Sharet Garcia:

And I remember the first few people that I reached out to me. I'm never going to forget. They were doing amazing things. Some of them were in law, some of them were in business, created their own businesses, others were in health, so many in education as well. And I reached out to them. I said, hey, I want to invite you to this possibly conversation about undocumented professionals, and most of them, if not all, would come back and tell me, I am not a professional. Yes, I'm undocumented, yes, I just started my job, but I'm not a professional. I think that is what pushed me to just continue this work with undocumented professionals, because if I saw highly motivated, highly like all these achievers, you know, doing amazing things, not feeling that they were professionals, you know, then I want to know more about that.

Nora:

So is that kind of like what originated? Because I see the connection definitely with undocumented professionals. But also the focus of what you mentioned is your dissertation for your doctoral program Trying to understand the piece of professionalism and why, seeing these very accomplished individuals like you saw, you saw their experience, their skills and are like how can you not see that you're this amazing professional and that you're doing wonderful? So that is also in part what has inspired your work to try and understand what is behind those feelings.

Sharet Garcia:

Correct. Yes, exactly, you got it, Nora, because I also felt the same way. I felt like sometimes maybe I'm not a good counselor, Maybe I would doubt my ability, saw so many times and I felt what they were sharing with me resonated with me. So, yeah, it was kind of a lot of things coming together my dissertation, my personal experiences meeting others, other professionals that were undocumented, and we were just starting to have these conversations. And I remember the first time I ever felt, you know, this might be the opportunity to start having these conversations was because I was.

Sharet Garcia:

I saw somewhere on social media that UCLA was going to have a workshop I'm sorry, a conference and they were taking workshop proposals. So I submitted my proposal about undocumented professionals and it was such an amazing experience. It was something, I think, that I needed to be able to push myself to move forward with undocumented professionals. And the first time I ever started talking about undocumented professionals mind you that I did not have a mission, didn't have a goal, didn't have anything about what I wanted to do with undocumented professionals.

Sharet Garcia:

I was not on social media, didn't have anything, and I just went in there and wanted to have, you know, a conversation about it, and that room was completely packed, A lot of people. People were standing in that particular workshop that I was having and I got to see that the need for this platform and everyone was interested. I like, yeah, let me know once you have you have the website, let me know when you have a the social media, and that's right there. After that workshop, I created the Instagram that is now that you can find on an Instagram which is undocumented professionals and immediately after that workshop I had, I had over a hundred people signed up to it.

Nora:

You started with those 100 followers on just day one and right now, where are you, more or less, with your following?

Sharet Garcia:

On Instagram we are now over 20K followers, but we are we expanded to other social media platforms and in the other social media platforms we're also like in 10, 11,000.

Nora:

You said that you doubted yourself at points as well, like how your story has inspired many to connect and work on supporting one another, sharing the resources, helping each other, like just continue to be successful and realize, no, we're an amazing community. We're just as skilled, as experienced and as professional even if not sometimes even more than those that have the privilege of being documented. I had an opportunity to really check out your website and it is full of resources and supports, information about the services. What are some of the types of supports and services that are offered through undocumented professionals?

Sharet Garcia:

Yeah, definitely. There's a few pillars with the undocumented professionals mission and vision of the platform. Which is really one of the pillars is mentorship. We highly believe that mentorship has transformed and changed and be able to be something that can really be a resource for the undocumented community that we have never had the opportunity to utilize because we have never had mentors before including myself. I'm still learning to have mentors and because of that pillar we created the first mentorship program, which I'm going to talk about in a little bit later.

Sharet Garcia:

The other pillar is creating and also learning about how to change policy and be able to support inclusive, paid opportunities for the undocumented community. There has been a history, long history, of the undocumented community being underpaid and sometimes not even paid and overqualified for opportunities. We know that because many of us have had that same experience and even now, with those that did not qualify for DACA, for example, a lot of those individuals that don't have DACA. I mean, every year we have more and more undocumented students graduating from high school that are moving on to get higher education. They are ready for paid opportunities but unfortunately we don't have those opportunities available to them because they're excluding the undocumented community. So we're really talking about how to be able to change policies and how to really create some kind of change, to create more of those paid opportunities for the undocumented community.

Nora:

You shared with us Sharet , that that's definitely a very focused goal of Undocu professionals helping the Undocu professional community get connected to paid opportunities and that that's been driving the decision of where to take the organization whether it'll work best as a nonprofit or not. Can you maybe share a little bit with us about that and how it is complex when deciding where to like, how to take the organization, which direction, because really the focus is that providing the community with more paid opportunities.

Sharet Garcia:

Thank, you for bringing that up, because it's always for me it's so important to always be, be transparent and have these real conversations, as I'm sharing a lot of these resources with the undocumented community. I'm also learning on my end to be a business owner and to run this one person show which is the Undocu professionals. I do bring a team in my different initiatives but at the end of the day, it is a one person show which is myself, because everything is pretty much directed and led by myself and because of, again, the lack of funding for a lot of the business ventures. Right, and one of the things that I want to be honest with everyone is that I never thought I would be a entrepreneur. I never even thought of myself at that, because all my educational experience has been around education and just being a counselor and how to hold, being in the same positions, and I think that has really put my situation even in a more difficult in making a decision how I want to move forward with undocu professionals and, on top of that, because of the vision and mission of undocu professionals.

Sharet Garcia:

You know I've talked to a few business lawyers already and many of them are suggesting that because of the work that I do and where we want some of the goals that we have with undocu professional community, which is to create more paid opportunities, is that it might be better to be in the meantime a for-profit for being an LLC and then later move on to being a non-profit once we have more of that capacity. So that's one of the things. The other thing that I want to share for context is that because I'm a docker recipient, I have the privilege to work as an employee, which I am doing with my. I am currently working as a counselor in different institutions, higher ed institutions, and undocu professionals is my other half of the work that I do. And I think, if I have, if, let's say, for example, I decide to just focus just on undocu professional, maybe I'll think about going the non-profit route, maybe faster.

Nora:

And I definitely wanted to highlight that the previous interview that we had, with the episode that's going to come right before this one, is that there is this really interesting conversation that both you and that organization have in common, and it's businesses like for-profit businesses, running differently, running in a focus that is not quite the traditional thing of what we think of when we think for-profit, because for-profit unfortunately has this reputation of like focusing on profit, focusing on sales, and the work that you and this organization are doing is really focused on the community. It's focused on the community, and even this choice to go for-profit is with keeping the community and supporting the community at the center of it. So it's just a very interesting conversation that both you and that organization are bringing to everyone. And so now, if you would like to share with us a little bit about the programs that you're doing, we'd love to hear about the mentorship program conference. So there's an annual conference that you guys put on as well. What are some of the events that the organization is currently working on?

Sharet Garcia:

Yeah, there's a few things that we're working on, but one of the ones that we have been having for the last three years now is an annual conference, which is the one you mentioned. We have it every year towards the end of the year, around September, october, and we had been very successful with that conference. Last year we had the first conference being sponsored and we were able to get everyone paid the speakers, the team and one of the things that we do in that conference is to make it accessible to as many as possible. At this time it is free for students to join and we talk about career information, career related workshops, but within that, we also do provide opportunities to network and just really a very brave space for the undocumented community to know more about or even get inspired about, possibly career opportunities out there for them.

Sharet Garcia:

The other thing we created was the first virtual national mentorship program which connects an undocumented with an undocumented mentor, and we've never had that before. Because the undocumented community, we have to be reminded that they have specific challenges that other mentorship programs may not have, and that's what makes this particular mentorship program very unique. We have had the privilege to have over six cohorts now doing this mentorship program. It started in the middle of the pandemic and because it reached out to pretty much everywhere in the United States, we decided to keep it virtual. Even now it is available to anyone in the United States that may find or may need this mentorship program. But as of today we have over 700 mentors in the mentorship program pool of mentors and now I'm very excited that we're going to be sharing much more because we're going to be leveling up that mentorship program, which I can talk a little bit more than we are trying to create more of those paid opportunities through the mentorship program.

David:

That's amazing growth.

Nora:

That is definitely like wonderful, and I mean six cohorts, and I love how these experiences and these opportunities you're keeping in mind accessibility and how do we make sure that as many individuals that want to participate as mentors or mentees or want to attend the conferences can by keeping it virtual. Lizzie, I also saw that you on the website that you have a newsletter that individuals can sign up to receive. What some of the information that's available on the newsletter like? What kind of information comes out on the newsletter?

Sharet Garcia:

Yeah, the newsletter is available for anyone to, to get more information on the different events that we have available A lot of. For example, when we're ready to open up the mentorship program, we make sure that we send a few reminders of that to give everyone an opportunity to, to share it and to apply if that is something that they want to utilize. And then also in regards to the conference, it's also an opportunity to highlight some of the up-to-date information that is going on. So I would suggest, if you're interested in any of these resources that we have, it is open to the community, so please go ahead and sign up, because that's one way to stay in up-to-date with some of the things we have available for a lot.

Nora:

Thank you, and then another really awesome thing that I'd love for you to share with us a little bit about is your Undocu Professionals podcast.

Sharet Garcia:

Yes, we are. You know, I've just been extremely busy again trying to not to get out away from the whole, you know, hustle culture. I'm trying to just take smaller steps and I was taking a break from that. But we're very excited to bring it again because it's definitely going to come back again. So hopefully by the month of August we're going to be back with continuing that because there's so much to share, so many amazing, because we, which is so big, you know, undocu Professionals has a lot of people that have joined. There's so many that would like to share a lot of information. So I'm very excited about possibly, you know, having guests that are going to be sharing a lot of information, you know, on their particular journey. But also I think we want to be more intentional on some of the things that just being more having of those conversations about like how much are you making right Things that we don't really talk about a lot, or how did you land your first job as someone undocumented?

Nora:

That's wonderful and we are excited to, once you are back and running in August, to check that out and also share, because definitely, like the information, the stories, like hearing. I agree with you when you said previously, like the relationships, the mentorships, hearing the stories are the things that keep us inspired and keep us motivated that, hey, we can keep moving forward. And these individuals that are sharing their stories, sharing their resources, just remind us that we're not alone in navigating the challenges that come with the journey and that we can be successful and that the journey doesn't have to be as difficult as when we try to manage it alone. I am wondering if you could share it now with us a little bit about how the audience can get involved in supporting undocumented professionals.

Sharet Garcia:

Yeah, there's definitely there's a need to of, I guess, allies and partners with the work that we're doing, but there's so many ways. I want everybody to know that undocumented professionals is community-led, which means a lot of the things that we do is directly being created and co-created by the undocumented community, and that brings a great opportunity to see things in the undocumented lens. Right with the undocumented lens, what is it that the undocumented community need? What is it that you know that we can help them with? So I think that's what makes our initiatives very, very particular and very. We really have, I guess, dedicated this work to really focus on the undocumented community. But one of the things that I would highly suggest for everyone to help us out with and to support is one is we do have a job board, and it's a community job board where we share jobs, whether they're through independent contracting opportunities, whether it's a scholarship, whether it's an internship, that is available for the undocumented community and there's a you know it's free to use. It's free to post an opportunity. You can post as many as you may need. We review it and once it goes through the review, we post it for the community. It's shared on social media, so it's also another opportunity for the community that wants to support us to be intentional about finding ways, how we can support the.

Sharet Garcia:

How can you create or support the undocumented communities by creating paid opportunities. We also can we're also happy to chat with anybody that is interested to know. How can I want to. I want to be intentional about hiring someone undocumented. How can I do that? We provide one-to-one coaching. We also can provide a workshop. So bring us, bring undocumented professionals to your business, to your organization, to your school, so we can continue having those conversations. Also, we do have an online community that is available only for the undocumented community, but we are going to bring the online community for allies as well.

Nora:

And we will be sharing with the audience your website, because it is rich with information to like, with even like, information on how to donate, etc. All these different ways to collaborate. I have one last question before I turn it over to David. So Sharet, going back and putting yourself in the years as you were navigating school, what would you advise, how would you encourage? What words do you have for those students that are maybe right now feeling isolated, alone, frustrated, like left behind, uncertain of their future, and are feeling like just overwhelmed with you know being?

Sharet Garcia:

undocumented. First, I want everyone that can hear me or listens to this podcast to know that it is something very challenging, you know, to really give yourself time to feel everything that you're feeling. Sometimes we're going to be angry. Sometimes we're just going to need time because we are sad we are. It can be overwhelming and it's frustrating, with everything going on, whether you're a DACA recipient or non-DACA which means that you weren't eligible for DACA and I think it's just no matter what way we see it. It is definitely much more different.

Sharet Garcia:

Our experience is being undocumented and I think a lot of things especially I did this a lot when and I continue to do it even today is I blame myself a lot.

Sharet Garcia:

But when we understand how the systems work, we then start to realize that, you know, it's not me, I'm not the problem here. It's the systems that make me feel that I don't belong here. It's the systems that are excluding me from the opportunities. It's the system that doesn't allow me to be able to get a loan or to be able to apply for a scholarship, because it's only available for you as citizens. So, you know, acknowledging that, you know to not be hard on yourself and to remind yourself that in many of these particular experiences that you're going to have, it's probably not going to be you and not to be hard on yourself and to give, to really focus on those things that make you smile and to that makes you happy. You know that means you go to a walk, you know at the park to feel better. Go and do that, because I think we need that, our hearts need that, our souls need that, and just focus more on your joy and your health.

Nora:

Thank you so much Sharet . That was beautiful the way you worded it, and I think I'll just end with, I think, what I took from. I took a lot from what you just said, but one thing that really stood out to me is that we're not defined by our status. You know so that it's very hard to not feel that way when you're living life, defined in some way or those there's boundaries and limitations based on it, but there's so much more to our lives than that. So thank you for for for your words, okay, david.

David:

Un docu professionals is clearly a high impact organization. It's growing very quickly, so congratulations on that, and you're touching a lot of lives, and I think that's where the next question is on touching lives in a positive way. Is there any success story in particular that jumps out to your mind as being the leader and founder of this organization, that you would like to share with the audience?

Sharet Garcia:

I get a lot of messages through social media and a lot of those messages are not just, you know, sad stories. Some of those messages are positive things and I think that really always brightens my day where I hear someone tell me you know what? I looked at the job board that you have on the Undocu professionals and I never knew that I could work as someone undocumented, as an independent contractor. I never even heard of that before and you just gave me something to have hope for that I thought I didn't have. I also hear other people in regards to, like, let's say, our mentorship program. We we had 250 mentees over trying to get into the, into this program, into this cohort, this year, and there's a few that missed the deadline of the mentorship program and just like five days ago I got a message from someone that said I really need this mentorship program. I think it's going to help me to figure out a few things that I'm still unsure about. I think it will really just help me to have some hope that I do have some some choices out there as someone undocumented, and I think learning from someone else is really going to help me. So is there any way you can consider my application, even though it has been closed, and that's something that I feel like wow, like that's, that's great to know that there's people out there that remind me that, why we do this work. And also, yes, very thankful that they trust me, very, very thankful that everyone has been very supportive of this work.

Sharet Garcia:

And I think the other one that I want to mention there's somebody else that that reached out to me and she actually she has worked with undocumented professionals and she has been doing amazing things. She just recently graduated, received her bachelor's, but she was actually part of the mentorship program. That's how she connected with me. She reached out after the mentorship program and she, she reached out to me and she emailed me and she said I'm sure I'm very interested in being part of undocumented professionals. I can volunteer for free if you need me to. And I was very hesitant because I'm, you know, obviously the mission and vision of undocumented professionals is to get everyone paid. And I said you know what I can. Maybe you can help me in some some, some of these things, but I don't want you to do a lot right, because I really can't pay you right now.

Sharet Garcia:

And she came in and, to make story short, we have worked now in three other different initiatives and as soon as, you know, I had a grant to be able to pay some of our, some of our team. I was able to bring her in because we had already built a very nice relationship and I only do hire independent contractors for a lot of these initiatives and she just reached out again, like a week ago, and she said I'm ready for whatever else is needed. You know, I want to continue doing this work with you and we're going to bring her back because now we're developing something new with the mentorship program. You know it's like a full circle moment that she just came in as a mentee and now she's officially going to.

Sharet Garcia:

She has been working in, actively working and being part of all these initiatives and now she she's going to come back and be part of this next thing we're going to do with undocumented professionals. So just knowing that there's some, a lot, that have been following undocumented professionals from the beginning and she's one of them, that's all undocumented professionals like having only a hundred followers to what they see now. And then she tells me you know she's like you have really grown so much and you really have inspired me to also start something in my end.

Nora:

What a beautiful and inspiring story. Thank you so much for sharing with us. Thank you.

David:

The work that you do with undocumented professionals is clearly a labor of love, so we always ask this question to end our interviews. Charlotte, what is your definition of love?

Sharet Garcia:

Love just reminds me of being of freedom. She resonates with me with freedom, like we really want to just have the freedom to do the things that we like to do. I would love to be a full time employee of undocumented professionals. I'm going to be very honest, like I would love to. I love my job as a counselor, but it aligns so well with the work that I'm doing with undocumented professionals that that I know that that this is where I want to continue doing undocumented professionals is not going anywhere, because I'm going to continue this work for many more years.

Sharet Garcia:

There's so many other goals that I have and I think that's what we want love. We want to be able to have the love to a career of our choice, to do the work that we want to do, to have the freedom to be able to just be happy. You know I'm I don't even care so much about money. I just want to be able to make enough to be able to do the things that I really bring a lot of joy to me, which, you know, some of it is traveling. So I think that's what is love.

David:

Sharet Garcia. Thank you so much for doing some good and spreading some love into this world and joining us today for this interview.

Sharet Garcia:

Thank you, and thank you so much for both of you. It's been a pleasure and an honor to be sharing space with both of you, and thank you so much for everything you do as well, because I know there's a lot of labor that you do for to make this possible and to make this podcast possible. So, please, everyone, listen to this podcast and hopefully you can be able to get a lot from it, which I know you will, because it's a lot of resources that you're sharing as well. So thank you for that.

David:

Thank you brighter. What a great way to start off season two. Thank you so much, Sharet Garcia, for sitting down with us and especially being so vulnerable, talking about your experience as someone who has experience being undocumented and going through the education system and trying to find professional work. I'm sure there's somebody out there that's listening to this that can really relate to this on a personal level, but also somebody who is thinking to themselves yeah, I could use the help of Undocu professionals to find professional work and hopefully there's, like I said at the top, educators out there that are listening to this trying to understand how they could be more supportive of that population, but also individuals who run companies who are trying to figure out how they could be supportive, that they could connect directly with Undocu professionals and they can help you find ways to employ people who have undocumented status.

David:

So a couple of things that stood out to me. Really, to me it's I think it is that piece of undocu professionals that is going to help organizations find employment opportunities for undocumented individuals. I think that's such a really cool program because when somebody hears undocumented, they may think unemployable or somebody that I can't employ because you're gonna run up against something in the law and maybe expose yourself to some liability and then Undocu professionals. Garcia Sharet Kaseya can help guide you to find opportunities that are legal, sound and you're actually helping the community, which is such a neat program, and I'm so happy that we were able Sharet interview Shraddak and get that program and that resource out in the Nora community. Noda, what stood out to you?

Nora:

You know, I think there's several things that really stood out to me. But I think, going back to my experience as a career advisor and working in education in higher ed I've been working now doing academic advising and I feel that there is just so much lack of understanding of the resources, of the policies, of the opportunities that exist for students that are undocumented that I was very lucky that I saw on my own resources that existed for students that are undocumented and ran into undocu professionals as a resource. It took a lot of searching on my own to see like, well, what is available for my students. You know, working with undocumented students from an advising perspective can be very frustrating because it is hard to be working with a student and they're working on their education. You know, there they already run into multiple layers of barriers, including many are first generation, many are, you know, the first in their family to enter a professional world after graduation and then adding the layer of being undocumented just sometimes really creates a situation where they are ready to give up and where they're not finding anybody that has a similar experience to them, somebody that has made it and that has been able to find a way to make things work for them, all the hard work that they've put into their education like really pay off.

Nora:

And I have just been so impressed with Sharet and Undocu professionals and the work that has been done through the organization.

Nora:

There's so many different mentors and individuals that are connected and eager to be a part of Undocu professionals and provide support to those students that need to find somebody that looks like them, that has been able to find ways to navigate a system that is very frustrating and that appears to not create professional opportunities for them. But in these instances, you know, they're creating them for themselves in whichever way possible and through building a community that is working on finding any type of opportunity that they can for these students, as well as helping guide them through the process so that they don't fall into imposter syndrome and not realize how wonderfully skilled and qualified they are, you know, based on what they've learned academically but also the skills and the experience that they've had as students, as entrepreneurs, as individuals that were undocumented and had to find ways to sustain and live. So I have just, you know, been amazed with Sharet and with Undocu professionals, having had an opportunity to refer several students to Undocu professionals for support, seeing them be excited and their eyes light up with. Like you know, there's something that I can do with this education, so there's so much that I could keep talking about, but to me, like it just has a very personal connection.

Nora:

Yeah, it really is amazing, and you know.

David:

Again, sharad Garcia, thank you so much for sitting down with us, and if you want to learn how to help or get connected with undocu professionals, you could visit them at wwwundocuprofessionalsnet. It is "net net. We will put that link in the podcast description. So thank you so much again, and before we close out, we have a couple reminders for you. Don't forget that, if you do anything at all, please share this episode with one person, especially an episode like this, where there are some amazing resources, or I think there's a lot of people who think that the resources exist. So please share this, especially also if you work in academia.

David:

I think it's a great place to share this episode. Of course, if you want to do a little bit more, you can always contact us at the do good team at gmailcom, and you can find us on social media. We are on LinkedIn, facebook, twitter and Instagram. You will catch me posting a lot more. I try to post pictures of our little kitty cat on Friday no, excuse me, saturdays for hashtag catadase, so you always get a picture of gris Catadase, yeah, and also if you can leave a five star review.

David:

But again, if you do one thing, share this episode with one person, Don't forget to do some good and spread some love out there and remember juntos somos un buen equipo.

Nora:

Together we're a good team.

David:

See you later, everyone for episode two of season two coming shortly.