PODCAST:
Jan. 30, 2026 ~ Chris Renwick and Lloyd Jackson cover Detroit Public Schools. Superintendent Dr. Nikolai Vitti discusses immigration concerns. He highlights academic progress: rising graduation rates and shrinking achievement gaps, outpacing state averages.
DETROIT ~ Detroit Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Nikolai Vitti is expressing concern over how federal crackdowns on immigrants is impact local school children and their education.
“As an American citizen, I’m outraged over how we’re handling the issue,” he told WJR. “Certainly, you can make an argument as an American that undocumented immigrants are an issue. I don’t know if you can logically and rationally say it needs to be this level of a priority in our country when I can tell you we have a $1.5 billion infrastructure problem with schools. That to me is more important than undocumented immigrants. But with that said, how it’s being addressed is unfathomable.”
“As a superintendent, as an educator, as someone who believes my role is to advocate, protect, and support all of our children, whether they’re undocumented or not, or their families, there’s a great deal of fear, anxiety in the community right now,” Vitti continued. “There are, anecdotally, children that are not coming to school consistently, parents who no longer walk their children to school or drive their children to school, and there are alternative strategies that are (being) put together.“
