Yes, they are important to our future!
Many of tomorrow's workers and business owners are the children of today's immigrants. More than 40% of the growth of our labor force in the late 1990s was due to immigrants, and since immigration WILL continue, they are important to our future growth.
A concern is certainly that many of today's Hispanic/Latino immigrants are uneducated and unskilled: this could mean that their children will not fit into our knowledge-based and high-tech economy. Often when parents are uneducated, they have lower expectations and don't encourage their children to stay in high school and go on to college. These parents very often need their children to work in the shops they own or contribute to the household income with outside jobs. Many of their children must drop out of high school to help the family survive financially.
Twenty five percent of the children under the age of six in the U.S. are children of immigrants, the majority in poor families. If these children went to preschool, it would dramatically change their lives, especially if there were also some services available for their parents. If these parents could go to nearby ESL classes and learn some tips on early child rearing, and be shown how important it is for their children to get an education, it would help tremendously in the children's later public school years.
Children who get preschool education are much more likely to do well in school and less likely to drop out or get into trouble. This is true for immigrant children and any other children who are living in poverty.
It would be wonderful if all parents could get some of this training, but poor parents need it most, especially if they don