The Immigration Working Group  

Nazreen S. Bacchus
Interests: Urban Immigration (particularly of South Asian Americans), Ethnography and Critical Feminist Issues.
Bio: Attained BA in Sociology/Anthropology from Pace University, NYC and MA in Liberal Studies from The Graduate Center, CUNY. I became interested in studying South Asian Americans through grappling with identity issues as a second-generation Indo-Guyanese American. Most of my research focuses on generational, religious, gendered and class differences that shape ethnic identities. I am also interested in sexual agency and sexual health issues which are almost invisible in most South Asian sociological publications. Currently, my dissertation research grapples with the reconstruction of a West Indian American identity through the lives of second generation Indo-Guyanse youth in the New York Metro Area.

Valerie Francisco is in her third year in the sociology program at CUNY, The Graduate Center. Her interests include transnationalism and diaspora with a special interest on the Philippines and migrant issues, gender and labor, and globalization. In the past years in the program, she has directed a participatory action research project with Filipino immigrant and Filipino American youth about sexuality and sexual health funded by the Ford Foundation. In collaboration with youth and youth organizers, we found that sexuality education must consider the multiple dimensions of immigration, race, class and gender in developing alternative sexuality education models. The research project assisted in creating sexuality education youth programs for and guided by Filipino youth in Queens. Currently, she is working on a project with Filipino immigrant women working as domestic workers in New York City. She has won the Sue Rosenberg Zalk Travel award from the Women's Studies Certificate Program to examine the transnationality of Filipino immigrant women's lives by going to the Philippines in the Fall of 2009.

Leslie A. Martino's research surrounds issues relating to immigration, education, language and technology, in the United States as well as in Latin America, primarily Mexico. Prior to receiving a Masters degree in Anthropology and Comparative and International Education at Teachers College, Columbia University and starting her PhD in Sociology at the Graduate Center, she was a classroom teacher and teacher trainer for twelve years in schools in Los Angeles, New York and in Mexico.

Allison Padilla-Goodman
I am a doctoral student in Sociology at the CUNY Graduate Center. My interests are in racialization, labor migration, new immigrant destinations, migrant worker human rights, and the politics of immigrant reception vis-a-vis the State. My dissertation research is on the politics of "repopulating" post-Katrina New Orleans, with a particular focus on the new Latino migrant population.

Binh Pok
I am a Ph.D. student in Sociology at the GC. My interests are immigration and mass migration-- in particular cross-national comparisons. I am currently working on comparing the experiences of second generation Asian immigrants in France and the United States.

Stephen Ruszczyk
Interests: Children of Immigrants, Undocumented Immigrants, Immigrant Education
After teaching ESL and training teachers in Brooklyn for several years, I am now a Ph.D. student in Sociology at the Graduate Center. Inspired by my students' experiences, I am currently researching the impact of legal status on immigrant educational attainment in two Brooklyn high schools.

Jennifer Sloan
I'm a PhD student in the Sociology program at the Graduate Center. Broadly, I'm interested in studying the effects of negative stereotypes and discrimination on second generation Turkish and Moroccan immigrants in the Netherlands.

Jessica Sperling

Interests: Immigrant and minority community-based organizations; processes of assimilation; policy-based creation andinstitutionalization of ethnic or racial categories; immigrant educational issues; immigrants and language

Bio: Received a B.A. with honors in anthropology from Washington University in St. Louis (2004). Before beginning at the Graduate Center, worked as a bilingual teacher and in translation/interpretation provision in the New York City Department of Education.

Utku Sezgin was born in Turkey. He graduated from the University of Texas-Arlington with a BA in 200. Utku received a Master in International Business Economics from the Catholic University of Leuven in 2004 and an MA in American Studies from the University of Antwerp in 2005, both in Belgium. He is a PhD candidate in Political Science at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He has also taught Politics and Sociology at the City University of New York for 3 years. He is currently teaching immigration-related courses such as Peopling New York and the Politics of Immigration and Citizenship in Europe and the US.
His dissertation is tentatively entitled “Remaking Nationhood: Assimilation and Citizenship among the College-educated Second Generation in New York and Berlin.” The dissertation examines the interaction of the biographies of upwardly mobile Dominicans in New York and Turks in Berlin with the historical and institutional context found in each society. The dissertation explores how these upwardly mobile children of immigrants from low income groups understand citizenship, assimilation, and national/ethnic identity, while analyzing what institutional and historical aspects of host societies enable equal citizenship rights and a feeling of inclusion in the national and local (political) community.The dissertation also seeks to analyze the social and political construction of national identities in each context. Qualitative interviews are utilized.