Key Takeaways
- The Trump administration is challenging in-state tuition policies across the country.
- Access to in-state tuition can make higher education more affordable and accessible for undocumented students.
- NEA weighs in through amicus briefs in Minnesota and Kentucky.
Higher education has long been one of the clearest pathways to opportunity—giving students the chance to build a career, support their families, and contribute to their communities. For Louisa Santos, that opportunity changed the course of her life.
In June 2026, Santos, a Miami-Dade County school board member, told Florida’s State Board of Education that she came to the U.S. from Colombia at age eight as an undocumented child. Florida’s public education system, she said, helped her eventually become an entrepreneur, attend Miami-Dade College, and transfer to Georgetown University before becoming a U.S. citizen.
“None of that would have been possible if today’s rules that you are considering would have existed,” Santos told the board. She urged board members to “preserve the educational opportunities that have helped generations of Floridians build better lives, strengthen our state, contribute to our economy, and continue to live the American Dream.”
Her testimony came as some Florida lawmakers were moving in the opposite direction.
Educators make the case for college access
Marianna López, who told the board she had worked for years in the school system, called public colleges and adult education programs “lifelines” for immigrant families. She recalled attending an honors ceremony at Miami-Dade College where many award recipients were immigrant students whose work benefited their families and communities.
Angela Mann, a professor in Florida’s State University System, offered another perspective from inside the classroom. She told the board that her husband had been a Dreamer who attended college using the GI Bill after serving in the military. Mann then spoke about the students she teaches:
“My Dreamer students are some of the hardest working students in my classroom,” she said. “They contribute to our society and limiting them from accessing this education is not only going to limit their own futures, but it’s going to limit the future of Florida.”
Despite testimony from more than 50 community members, including López and Mann, the board moved forward with their policy, effectively shutting undocumented students out of Florida’s public colleges.
Florida closes a path to higher education
In 2014, Florida enacted a law allowing qualifying undocumented students who attended Florida high schools to receive in-state tuition. But lawmakers repealed that policy in 2025—leaving affected students facing out-of-state rates. Then, in July 2026, the state education board took it a step further and voted to bar undocumented students from 28 state and community colleges in the Florida College System. That decision didn’t cover the state’s 12 public universities, which are governed separately.
Two months later, in September, the State University System Board of Governors closed that remaining avenue by approving a policy that, beginning in the 2027-28 academic year, will prohibit undocumented students from initially enrolling at public universities with selective admissions. Together, the policies leave undocumented students with no pathway to enroll in higher education systems.
A larger fight over tuition equity
After President Donald Trump returned to office, his administration directed federal agencies to enforce federal laws restricting public benefits for undocumented immigrants.
Take Kentucky, for example. For more than two decades, a state regulation allowed undocumented students who graduated from Kentucky high schools to pay in-state tuition at public colleges and universities. After the Justice Department challenged the policy, some state officials agreed to end it. The policy was invalidated in March 2026.
Kentucky Students for Affordable Tuition appealed on behalf of undocumented students who had qualified for in-state tuition.
Minnesota faces a similar legal challenge. In June 2025, the Justice Department sued Minnesota over the state’s Prosperity Act and North Star Promise, which make qualifying high school graduates—including some undocumented students—eligible for in-state tuition and financial assistance.
The Minnesota Attorney General’s Office defended the state’s tuition-equity laws in court, winning, in March 2026, dismissal of the Trump administration’s lawsuit. The Justice Department appealed.
As it stands, every state that extended in-state tuition to undocumented students now faces a legal challenge.
What’s next?
Stepping in to lend their support for in-state tuition policies were NEA and its state affiliates, Kentucky Education Association and Education Minnesota, which filed respective friend-of-the-court briefs. The briefs argue that in-state tuition helps undocumented students become more independent and determines whether college is realistically available to all.
The legal fight in Texas shows what’s at stake. After a federal district court blocked the Texas Dream Act, which had allowed eligible undocumented students to pay in-state-tuition, Austin Community College and other advocacy groups sought to intervene and defend the law. The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected their effort and later denied their request for a rehearing before the full court.
Supporters are now considering their remaining legal options, which could include asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case.
What happens in the courts will determine whether access to in-state tuition remains a pathway to college for thousands of undocumented students or becomes increasingly out of reach. As legal battles continue, NEA and its state affiliates are making the case that investing in these students is also an investment in schools, the workforce, and the communities they call home.
