The very first DACA recipient of the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship has revealed that he fears he won’t be able to return to the United States if he accepts the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to study at England’s Oxford University. In an interview with the Associated Press Friday, Jin Park, 22, who graduated from Harvard University last month, explained the real risks he faces by investing in his future.
“If I leave, there’s a very real possibility that I won’t be able to come back. That’s the biggest fear for sure,” said Park, whose family came to the U.S. from South Korea when he was 7 years old. “I haven’t really thought about what that’s going to mean if I’m not allowed back.”
In its 2017 attack on DACA, the Trump administration rescinded the Obama-era permissions that once allowed program recipients to travel abroad for reasons such as academic study. But since the program has been upheld by the courts, Park believes that his travel should be permitted.
The molecular and cell biology major is a longtime immigration activist: In 2015, he founded the nonprofit Higher Dreams, which helps young people with temporary immigration status navigate the college application process. Park, who grew up in Queens, was part of a campaign to push the Rhodes Scholarship within reach for DACA recipients for the first time.
With the backing of Harvard, Park applied for the Rhodes scholarship last year as part of a broader effort to underscore how DACA recipients didn’t qualify for the venerated award and others like it.
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Park’s application — like a number of others in recent years — was rejected, but the message was received. The Rhodes organization changed its policy effective this year. Park re-applied and was accepted.
The award, established in the last will and testament of known racist Cecil Rhodes in 1902, covers at least two years’ study at Oxford, the renowned British university. Park wants to study migration and political theory, and in a November interview shortly after the big announcement of his scholarship, he made his post-Oxford goals known.
"Now I want to give back," he says. "I want to come back to the United States, maybe work in a public health department to create policies for undocumented immigrants and for immigrant health."
Today, the risks of seizing this opportunity potentially outweigh the rewards. Park, who says he, and the 700,000 other DACA recipients out there, can only plan their lives “in two-year increments,” refuses to give up his Oxford dream, even if it does cost him the only home he’s ever known.
And what do Park’s parents—who cried with joy when they learned of their son’s big news—think of his decision to gamble it all?
He hasn’t told them yet. “I’ve been avoiding that question,” he told AP. “This was especially meaningful for them. It was like a validation of the sacrifices they’ve made for me.”
Park isn’t alone in his fight to secure the right to return to the United States. Previous Rhodes scholars and others connected to the Rhodes Trust are lending their assistance, while the case to keep DACA makes its way to the Supreme Court.
Predictably, United States Citizen and Immigration Services, which runs DACA, failed to respond to requests for comment.