The Sidewalk School is a rapid-response organization that started in 2019, at the U.S.-Mexico border with one single mission: education for asylum seekers’ children. It has grown into becoming one of the most active NGOs assisting refugees in Reynosa’s encampment areas where it provides food, housing, medical care, and education to them.

On April 05, 2022, the Protect Our Planet (POP) Movement’s mentors and activists had a vivid conversation with their founder, Ms. Felicia Rangel-Samporano, about the ongoing situation of migration, racism, neglect, and climate change on the US-Mexico border, highlighting the importance of working together in equality to reach their goals.

POP Senior Mentor, Dr. Ash Pachauri, started the conversation by asking Rangel-Samporano what is the meaning of leadership within the context of The Sidewalk School to which she responded: “Reynosa is one of the most dangerous cities in the world. When we first started crossing the border, no other American NGO would step foot inside that city. That is why we started with food, medical care, and shelter (…). Now, we’re actually funding two shelters in the city. Education came in later—unfortunately—because we had to focus on feeding people and making sure that they were safe as that encampment grew from 20 families to over 2,000 people”.

“As far as leadership goes in this whole thing (…), let me say this is not just an American effort. This is a group effort on both sides of the border and that’s how it should be. We are the foreigners in that country, we are the guests in that city. So, of course, you should include people who live there”.

“Being a leader is to keep everyone together and focused on the same goal. Sometimes people do not want to go down the path that you want them to go down, they’ll go to the left and that’s fine too. Go to the left as long as the end game is still the same. The only thing that needs to be the same is the goal. How you get there is how you get there, but we all need to get there together”.

“The main thing is to keep moving forward (…). That’s the message I want to give to anyone who thinks about leading something. No matter what’s going on in your personal life or in your professional life, you have to keep going (…). It’s the drive, it’s the endurance. We have gone through so many things in Reynosa that you probably can’t even imagine, and yet—after it’s over—we work”.

Ms. Felicia exemplified this by sharing her personal and professional experiences: “We don’t get any financial help from the U.S. government (…) because we work on the Mexico side. It has been four years without any funding from our own government and these are U.S. asylum seekers, future U.S. citizens, that refuse to help”.

“Let’s separate the fact that we’ve built three schools in Reynosa, a school going to each new shelter as well. We have a three-story building in Reynosa used as the flagship school across the street from the encampment that we keep going to. We were, at one point, the main providers of Covid tests and we have a form used for asylum seekers that says “The Sidewalks” full on it, and the U.S. government does accept it. The Sidewalk School has branched out in so many different areas because we had to”.

“You have your personal life going at the same time, but you have to keep all of these pieces moving (…). And then you do have your teammates that you may have some issues with. All of that deals with leadership, what you have to accept and what you’re willing to take on: the fact that you’re willing to endure all of that and keep going”.

I am the only black person on this committee of NGOs which is hard at times. I have faced a lot of racism on both sides of the border. I have been called names. It is what it is, and I keep moving (…). There will be many things thrown your way, and you need to get over them, get out of your feelings, move on, and get to work. That’s what I do on both sides of the border.

I had a little girl who’s actually an American citizen but her mom is not. So they got deported to the Reynosa encampment. She’s 10. Yesterday, she told me she wanted to die. This little girl’s been out in Reynosa encampment for 6-8 months. It’s hard. No one talks about the suicide rates and the fact that kids do try to kill themselves.

Then, Michelle proceeded to ask Ms. Felicia about how the climate refugees situation has been reflected at the US-Mexico border. Ms. Rangel-Sampanaro said: “It was during that time (managing the pre-screening of WISHA cases) when I started seeing pictures of people with water up to their necks with whatever little belongings they could put on top of their heads and their kids floating next to them”.

Reynosa is where I started really becoming aware of how climate change has literally destroyed countries. The pictures were very surprising to me. Some people actually waited for the water to go down and went back to whatever was left of their homes trying to salvage stuff. There was nothing to salvage. Everything was destroyed. So, when they came to a border city, they literally came with the clothes they have on. That’s it.

I don’t think people really understand how much climate change really factors into asylum seekers’ lives while they’re coming to our country. They come to our country for a better life, to have a chance at something whereas in their country everything’s destroyed.

Alejandra expanded the issue by questioning how organizations that work with climate refugees can advocate for better immigration policies to ensure basic human rights. Ms. Felicia shared: “This is the difficult part because if you’re talking about climate change then you have to be out in Reynosa gathering data. (…). It would be very easy to find someone who fled their home country because of climate change. It’d probably take you speaking to one to three people and you’ll find someone. The number has risen but I don’t know if there’s an organization out there collecting that type of data. That’s the problem”.

Humanitarian parole and climate change do not factor into that legally. If you ever say “because my home was destroyed by this hurricane”, our U.S. government will say “Okay, you’ll live in Mexico now”. That doesn’t count.

“Climate change should be added. People have no place to go back to (…), but—as I told you—our U.S. government doesn’t fund NGOs on the Mexican side. So, any organization that is willing to go out to a border city to collect that data would have to fund itself”.

“I’ve had this conversation with someone else and she has been at it for seven years trying to get climate change added in. She has never been funded and—when I heard that—it broke my heart. That’s awful. Seven years and no one’s willing to fund you. It just shows you what our government’s concentrating on”.

Consequently, Ana Hanhaussen acknowledged: “It is known that developed countries are responsible for the biggest percentage of historical emissions. However, the developing nations are suffering most of the consequences including having to flee their homes. How can we (the people) raise awareness about how this is happening because there’s a lot of bias still in the U.S. about Mexican refugees and they don’t realize that there are more causes to why they’re being displaced?”

To which Ms. Rangel-Sampanaro explained: “First of all, most people don’t know about the encampment. That’s the main problem (…). People are there for different reasons and if you get to dive into it just a little bit deeper, you see why so many Hondurans are there. That doesn’t take a lot of research. You can just google it and see the devastation to the country. Same thing for Haitians”.

“We’ve been screaming at the top of our lungs for four years now. I don’t think most people have heard of The Sidewalk School. We’re building shelters at this point. You have probably never heard of our little NGO because it does take a lot of money and power behind it to get the message out (…). It needs to be built so that more people say “this is an issue that needs to be looked at” and then fix it”.

“Climate change is just the beginning of what’s to come but that goes for many other issues as well (…). The U.S. government blocks climate change at every turn (…). We still work with the lawyers to get people across. That has never stopped. That continues to this day. So I know which cases qualify and which cases don’t and climate change doesn’t. What qualifies for humanitarian parole is a physical illness that can be seen. And that’s it. If it’s not that, you’re not getting into the U.S. if you’re a minority (…). The disparity is mind-blowing to me”.

Finally, the POP mentor and researcher Philo Magdalene asked: How can the youth across the world advocate effectively for climate justice? What are the best tools and arguments that can be used to promote high-level action?

Ms. Felicia answered: “I wish there was funding for what you got for climate change (…). I had to use my life savings to make The Sidewalk School work and survive. And even in the second year, I put in some of my own money. I don’t know if any climate change NGO has that type of money to support itself for like a year or two, and do that type of work”.

“Our country isn’t set up to let minorities succeed. It’s just not. Our country is set up to push us down and as a minority, me personally, I have to do everything I can to go up. I’m already at the lowest level. So now I’m just going to fight to go this way (to go up) as things continue on (…). I have seen my colleagues who are white get hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding. No degree, no certification, no past experience”.

“My hope is that one day a person or NGO that deals with climate change and has its own funding somehow or its own money can do it—can go out there to a border city and collect the data and then show it to a foundation and say “fund me”. If that ever happens, you will get into meetings with the U.S. government. That’s your chance to say “this is what’s going on, this is the data I’ve collected, this is what I think about climate change and how you need to change it”.

“At The Sidewalk School, we help almost all the NGOs in Reynosa because that’s just something Victor (the other director) and I decided to do (…) If anybody came and said “hey I’m collecting data about the asylum seekers who’ve led their home countries because they were destroyed”, Victor and I would say “well, how can we help you?” (…). This is a team effort and we want you to feel part of the team because we have the same goal. And the goal is to bring more attention to minority asylum seekers stuck in border cities unfairly and whose lives are in danger every second of the day and how can we get that to stop”.

On May 3rd, 2022, according to Reuters, Mexico’s migration institute (INM) informed that authorities cleared the encampment of migrants in the northern border city of Reynosa leading people to displacement again.