Undocumented high school students who want to go to college have support in Illinois.

On a recent school night at Mansueto High School in the Backyards, college recruiters from across Illinois gave a speech to an unlikely audience—one whose members have every reason to believe college is not for them. The event was the sixth annual college fair organized by the charter network Noble Schools specifically for undocumented students.

“It’s very welcoming because universities are saying, ‘Yes, come to us, we’ve got you.’” We will help you pay for it. We will give you a scholarship. We’re going to build this club,” says Brisa Angel, a college counselor, as she watches her students talk to recruiters. “It’s one thing to see it on the sheet: ‘OK, these are your options.’ It’s another thing entirely to go to a fair and talk to people who say, “Yes, we have these resources.”

Kevin Guzman, a student at David Speer’s ITW Academy on the West Side, says before the event that he was hesitant about going to college because of his immigration status.

“I was originally going to join the army because I thought it would be the easy way out. … I was going to get citizenship and a lot of money,” Guzman says. “Now I look at these colleges here and think, ‘Okay, maybe May be I have a chance.”

For years, undocumented students have been told in big and small ways that they don’t belong in college. They don’t have access to federal financial aid, and in most states they have to pay for out-of-state tuition without the help of government grants.

But in Illinois, undocumented students have a better chance of going to college and paying for it. The state is one of 19 where undocumented students can apply for state funding and one of 25 where they pay state tuition rates.

Equally important is the network of adults working overtime to help these students navigate the maze of paperwork and find a campus where they can get the support they need to succeed. This network includes Angel, who was once an undocumented high school student with dreams of college.

“I didn’t know what being undocumented really meant until I came to apply to college,” Angel says of the obstacles she had to overcome to gain access to higher education. “It was actually very scary because I thought, ‘Oh my God, what am I going to do with my life?'”

Angel says her college counselor stepped in and helped her apply to 42 colleges.

“She was like, ‘I don’t know what it’s like to be undocumented, but I got you,'” Angel says. “She basically held my hand and pulled me across the road, and she said, ‘You won’t give up.’ You’re not going to give up.”

Now Angel pays it forward. Three months ago, she became a college counselor at ITW David Speer Academy, the high school she attended. She wants younger generations of students to also have college options, regardless of whether they have legal immigration status.

Her efforts come as tuition costs and student debt rise and more Americans question the value of college. A poll released by Gallup in July found that nearly a third of Americans have little or no confidence in higher education.

But the work of Angel and advocates for undocumented students across the state is pushing back against the skepticism about college—from one of the communities with the least access to it.

“College is not the only path to success. It’s true,” says Aide Acosta, chief college consultant for the Noble network. “But do we say this to all children? Or are we only telling this to black and brown kids? Because I refuse to reinvigorate gender and racial stereotypes about our communities, college is not possible for them.”

Acosta, who was once undocumented, says her parents did not have college degrees and had to work long hours in physically grueling jobs. She says they wanted something different for her.

“We often talk to students who are just learning what their status means for the first time and feel hopeless,” she says. “And I always remind them that education is the one thing that no one can take away from you, no matter where you are in life, in the world.”

It’s something students can hold on to when so much, including their legal status in this country, is out of their reach, she said.