Joan Shauri didn’t appear nervous as she approached a microphone at Northern Essex Community College in Lawrence.
Just after Gov. Maura Healey helped her stow her purse away under the podium, despite the fact it was probably the first time she’d ever stood next to so many state officials for a press conference, when she started to share her story she did so standing straight-backed and without a quaver in her voice.
The nursing student was an obvious outlier in a line-up otherwise composed of public figures, visibly far less advanced in years than those around her, and one of the last to speak after about a dozen state officials and college system administrators had explained what brought everyone together Tuesday morning.
They’d gathered because for some students, like Shauri, the state has paved the way for them to get a higher education otherwise made more difficult or denied through no fault of their own.
Brought to the U.S. from her native Tanzania as a 10-year-old, Shauri told the audience of her move to Massachusetts, her time going to school in Andover and working to assimilate while studying hard in the hope of attending college. She wanted to become a nurse and work for the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund after graduation.
Her hopes were dashed, she said, when upon applying to college she learned she wasn’t a U.S. citizen.
As difficult as that revelation was to bear, it also meant she wasn’t a Massachusetts resident as far as the school system was concerned. She would have to pay, she said, several times what her high school classmates would when taking the same college courses. At that cost, college was effectively unaffordable.
“My story is not unique,” she said. “Many undocumented people have undergone similar struggles when it comes to college and tuition.”
Until now, she said Tuesday.
With the signing of the state’s fiscal 2024 budget, Healey made it the law of the land that migrant children no longer have to pay more — sometimes many times more — than their citizen peers do at UMass system schools and community colleges, a move she and Senate President Karen Spilka both called a “no brainer” at a press conference in Lawrence.
“This is a great day for our state,” Healey said.
Effective immediately if a student spends three years at and makes it through a Massachusetts high school or earns their GED they’ll pay in-state tuition costs at state schools regardless of their citizenship status.
Standing alongside Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll, UMass President Marty Meehan and Secretary of Education Patrick Tutwiler, Healey became emotional when asked if she could speak to the impact lowering the cost of education can have on an immigrant student.
“I can,” she said, before taking several moments to collect herself. “I would challenge anyone who has questions, concerns, wants to talk about immigration right now — to listen to Joan’s story.”
The governor said that, though some would use this as an opportunity to “stoke fears and bigotry” in the pursuit of partisan political gains, the new rule is a matter of principle.
“It’s about empowering people. It’s about giving opportunity to people. It’s about what this country has purported to be about from its very beginning,” she said.
Healey’s staff said any student who is in college now that would qualify for in-state tuition under the law will begin paying that rate at the start of the next semester. Refunds for previous out-of-state tuition costs will not be made. The administration did not immediately have numbers on how many students will qualify.
According to information published by their financial aid office, a student paying in-state tuition at UMass Amherst for fall of 2023 can expect to pay just over $33,000 per academic year. An out-of-state student can expect to pay over $55,000.