The latest generation
Surge in immigrant births is reshaping Massachusetts in ways that are both subtle and profound
CAMBRIDGE - At 11:57 a.m. on Wednesday, Fares Ibrahim breezed into the world at Cambridge Hospital, a bundle of curvy eyelashes and downy black hair.
His arrival added yet another member to one of the fastest-growing demographics in the state: He is the child of an immigrant mother.
Of all the births in Massachusetts, the percentage of babies born to immigrant mothers has nearly doubled since 1989. Back then, 14 percent of all births were to foreign-born women; by 2006, the percentage had surged to 27 percent, according to the most recent figures from the state Department of Public Health.
It is a remarkable figure, which one scholar said the state hasn't seen since the immigrant wave of the early 20th century. And the rise in immigrant births is reshaping the state in ways that are both subtle and profound.
In maternity wards, nurses increasingly chant "push" in Spanish, Portuguese, and Urdu; in schools, translators show bewildered parents how to scrutinize report cards; and in some neighborhoods, more children are debating whether they are African-American, Haitian-American, or black.
"That's a major demographic and social development for the Commonwealth," said Andrew Sum, director of the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University. "It's extraordinary . . . You'd have to go back to the 1910s to find anything like that."
Advocates say the increase is replenishing the state's population at a time when it is losing people to other states. But others say the shift could strain state and local services by intensifying demands for translators, healthcare, and other programs designed to help immigrant parents from Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America assimilate. Among the newest arrivals are the children of legal and illegal immigrants - the public health department doesn't distinguish the two - though studies show the great majority of immigrant families are legally here.
"I think we would be surprised as to the burden on the state," said Steve Kropper, co-chair of Massachusetts Citizens for Immigration Reform, which favors stricter controls on immigration. The state, Kropper added, should study the financial burden the new families place on public schools, healthcare, subsidized housing, and the environment. "Let's find out what the cost is to Massachusetts."
Nationally, the percentage of births to immigrant mothers rose from 14 percent in 1995 to 21 percent in 2004, according to the most recent figures available from the US Census.
In Massachusetts, the percentage of children born to immigrant mothers varied sharply by race and ethnicity, accounting for 12 percent of all white infants, 88 percent of Asian babies, and almost half of Hispanic and black babies.
Various factors are fueling the surge: Immigration has increased in Massachusetts - about 14 percent of all residents are now foreign-born - and immigrant women tend to have higher fertility rates. That, coupled with a below-average birth rate and the exodus of many young American-born families to more affordable states, contributed to the rise in both numbers and percentages.
In total, 20,929 of the 77,670 births in Massachusetts in 2006 were to foreign-born mothers. That compares with 12,756 of the 91,314 births in 1989, according to the state.
The shift has happened gradually, Sum said. Some cities and towns have been dealing with it for years; others are addressing more abrupt changes in population and expanding services to keep up.
The first signs of the shift are in hospitals, specifically in the maternity wards where the immigrants' babies are born. There, doctors and nurses increasingly confront a staggering array of languages, traditions, and beliefs.
Devout Muslim women fast during Ramadan, waiting until sundown to eat, alarming their doctors. Some Somali women accustomed to giving birth at home are reluctant to go to the hospital at all.
Even food can be an issue. In many cultures, women traditionally eat soup - vegetable or codfish in Haiti, corn in Brazil - after giving birth, believing it helps them recover. Hospitals have had to adapt, letting families bring in homemade foods if they wish.
Tufts Medical Center in Chinatown in recent years created regular clinics specifically to expand services to pregnant Asian women. Doctors speak Mandarin, Cantonese, and Vietnamese.
Cambridge Health Alliance, which includes Cambridge Hospital, has been dealing with higher numbers of immigrants for years, but recently, demand is increasing. A "doula" program launched in 1996 pairs women to guide expectant immigrant mothers through their pregnancies. The number of doula-assisted births has soared from 30 that first year to more than 700 in 2007.
"The need has been very great," said Sarah Oo, who oversees several Massachusetts General Hospital programs to help pregnant immigrant women and new mothers in Chelsea. "There's a huge need to make healthcare culturally appropriate. It's a challenge for everyone."
Beyond the adjustments in the maternity wards is a struggle to integrate immigrant families into mainstream America - and some controversy over their contributions.
Many critics raise concerns over the cost to taxpayers. Others say the growth of immigrant families bolsters an otherwise stagnant state workforce and often stabilizes neighborhoods as the parents find jobs and buy homes. "This state really needs the population. It needs younger people, working-age families," said Shuya Ohno, spokesman for the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition.
The immigrant experience - and the impact on society - varies widely, as a walk through the labor and delivery room at Cambridge Hospital last week showed.
Baby Fares is the son of middle-class, college-educated Egyptian parents. His mother, Iman Selim, and father, Tarek Ibrahim, a Northeastern University physics teacher, speak impeccable English. Fares's older brother and sister are in school.
"The education here is perfect," Selim said. "We'll try to give them all the chances we can."
Down the hall, a woman from Brazil, watching over her baby, Alex, has more worries because she is here illegally. The infant's older sister is with relatives in Brazil. The new mother does not speak English and, like her husband, works menial jobs.
The surge in the number of immigrant children is posing a major challenge to public schools, forcing them to find new ways to educate students and their families. Increasingly, children arrive unable to speak English, and parents are ill equipped to help them at home.
Boston school officials recently recruited teachers in Puerto Rico because they speak Spanish and English. Hispanics are now nearly 37 percent of the student body, just behind black students at 39 percent.
In Randolph, school enrollment has flipped from 56 percent white a decade ago to 52 percent black, 24 percent white, and 15 percent Asian this year.
This spring, the schools started offering live translations in Spanish, Haitian Creole, Vietnamese, and Chinese to attract parents to meetings about education, said Superintendent Richard Silverman.
Chelsea schools tapped Ali Abdullahi, a refugee from Somalia who speaks five languages, to teach immigrants from his homeland, as well as Iraq and other countries, to buy T passes, ride the bus, and visit schools.
"They are scared," said Abdullahi, whose position is paid for by Mass. General's program in Chelsea and the schools. "They need a little push. That's where I come in. I give them a little jolt to make them braver."
Though Hispanic and Asian families are known as the fastest-growing groups of immigrants, in Massachusetts a high percentage of black children also have immigrant mothers - and that is leading to differences in how children define themselves.
The state Department of Education calls black students "African-Americans," but increasingly children of immigrants from Haiti and other countries are rejecting that term.
Unlike most African-Americans, who are descended from slaves and fought for freedom, Haitian-Americans often speak another language and trace their roots to a Caribbean nation with a rich but troubled history.
In another example, Andrea Cabral was widely hailed as the first black sheriff of Suffolk County when she was elected in 2004. She is half Cape Verdean, and a strong contingent of Cape Verdeans have claimed her as a role model.
"We need to recognize that the black community is much more diverse now than it ever has been," said Regine Jackson, an assistant professor of American studies at Emory University in Atlanta who is from Boston and studies race and ethnic issues here. "It's not always clear who you're talking to. Sometimes people will say I'm not African-American at all. I'm Jamaican. I'm Nigerian."
Maria Sacchetti can be reached at msacchetti@globe.com
