Ellen Balleisen is a blogger for Migrant Matters. She is a retired educator who spent over three decades years working in the City University of New York system. For 25 years she taught English to immigrant college students. She then spent eight years as the director of three college preparatory programs at Bronx Community College. While teaching, she also worked as a pension counselor for the Professional Staff Congress, the union that represents CUNY faculty and staff, and wrote articles for the union’s newspaper. Working with immigrant students, she witnessed the many barriers that face people starting a new life in a new country as well as the determination and resilience that can enable immigrants to thrive in a new home. Now she is widening her focus to look at immigration, migration and asylum issues from a political and economic perspective. She holds a B.A. in English from Barnard College, Columbia University, and an M.A. in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages from Hunter College, City University of New York. She lives in New York City.