Hello Family and Friends,

Today our topic was immigration where we learned about how immigrants live and how they are treated in the Dominican Republic as well as the similarities and differences of how immigrants are treated in the United States. We started off the day early by presenting our CAP projects to the representatives of the community of La Culata. Then we explored the public market that only takes place once a month and learned about Haitian business in the Dominican Republic. Today, we also watched a documentary about Haitians on the border and their lives working in the Dominican Republic. To finish off the day, we visited a Haitian community with families that were very welcoming and open to sharing their life stories about how it’s like to live in the Dominican Republic as a Haitian, how they’re treated, and their goals after immigrating.
Highlights of today was visiting the Haitian community and talking to the families about their life and hardships they had experienced along the way. It was really insightful to learn about the things they went through and the sacrifices they have made to get to where they are today. We learned that Haiti has a very good education system, but they do not have good wages or many job opportunities whereas the Dominican Republic does not have a strong education system, but has easier access to jobs and higher pay.
The takeaway of today was how immigrants are treated in the Dominican Republic as a Haitian and the similarities and differences of how immigrants are treated in the United States also. Here, the relationship of Dominicans and Haitians are rough because of their history and policies that are put into place concerning citizenship. Haitians that are born in the Dominican Republic are still not able to obtain citizenship here in the Dominican Republic compared to America where if we’re born on U.S. soil, we are automatically granted citizenship. Similarities are that both the U.S. and DR require passports, visas, or green cards to cross the border. By the end of today, we have really learned a lot about the immigration and how it is compared to the United States. Today was a really good day; we had a lot of fun and it was very nice to interact with the people in the community!

P.S. We really wished you could have come and experienced this amazing and inspiring day today with all of us Ms. Sorensen!