Immigration and other thoughts

Ok, today in professional development we learned that one of our students who has been with us for 6 years has cancer. This is complicated by the fact that he is not a citizen and does not have citizenship. His mother is in the process of getting her citizenship and is not allowed to go visit son who is now in Mexico receiving treatment. No dad in the picture evidentally, and there are several kids, besides the one who is ill. I've got lots of disparate thoughts about this: why bring your kids to a foreign country? where is dad? (can't people stop getting pregnant if the dad isn't going to be around?), why is INS being such sticklers when the kid is obviously very sick? (mom was denied permission to go to Mexico to visit son). It's a mess. I'm sorry for this family -- it really stinks that their son has cancer. But why put your kids in such a situation? Why have so many kids? Why bring kids illegally to another country? If I brought my kids to Mexico, what hoops would I have to jump through to get them in to school? Yet in the USA, thanks to Plyler, any kid who resides in a school district, legally or not, gets to go to school. m.Go figure.