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| Refugee Transitions Volunteer Newsletter |
February 2009 |
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Greetings!
We hope this email finds you and the students with which you work happy and healthy! Thanks for another month of hard work with your students.
This month, a lot has been going on in the office. Our case managers are hard at work connecting families with essential services, and our volunteer coordinators and EDs are bringing in and matching dozens of new volunteers. As always, we are in awe of the work that you all do in Bay Area homes and communities. We love getting your updates--please let us know if you would like to share your story in this newsletter!
Because of all your hard work, please note that next week, March 12th, we will be hosting pan-bay celebrations of YOU--our wonderful volunteers! In addition to being opportunities for us to honor you and your important work, these events are great ways for volunteers to get to know one another, swap stories, share resources, and have a good time. We hope you come! (See details below, and Evites are on the way.)
Take care, and we hope to see many of you next Thursday!
Sincerely,
The RT Team
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 RT Welcomes its first Student Intern! High School Junior Bebe San (pictured on right) says she has always dreamed of working for an organzation like Refugee Transitions to help her fellow refugees.
Bebe, a Karen refugee from Burma who was born into a refugee camp in Thailand, shares her story:
Hi, my name is Bebe. I am 17 years old and I come from Thailand (Mae La Refugee Camp). I came to the United States on June 19th, 2007. Now I live in Oakland. I go to Oakland International High School. In my school we have 24 different languages and cultures.
I want to help other people. I want to help people because it is very important in my life to help people, and other people have helped me like IRC, my teachers and my tutor Shannon. Our people need help with everything like language, studying, food stamps and jobs. If I am the one helping people then I feel happy. Especialy new immigrants students. I understand their experience like hard time to understand the language, what teachers are saying, doing their homework, and how to communicate. They can feel sad and like they don't want to go to school.
I want to help students in tutoring class. Working together with them and helping them by language and help them to finish their home work. I want to make students happy by learning and going to tutor. Making more friendship and spend smart time in tutoring class will be great for me and all students. Sharing different ideas and sharing information to other students how we can help each other.
I hoped for a long time to get this job. I am so happy working in Refugee Transition because I am almost going to 18 years old. I need more experience about working in office. It is my parents dream for me in the future to work at a place like Refugee Transitions.
Bebe will be working as an Intern in our office one day a week,
and is serving as a peer tutor once a week at our after school program
at Oakland International High School | |
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FREE Film on Liberian Human Rights Defenders this Thursday
Pray the Devil Back to Hell
Thursday, March 5th
6:00 p.m.
Mills College Concert Hall
This is a great event to attend for background information about one of the biggest populations that RT serves. Bring your students!
"Pray the Devil Back to Hell chronicles the remarkable story of the courageous Liberian women who came together to end a bloody civil war and bring peace to their shattered country.
Thousands of women - ordinary mothers, grandmothers, aunts and daughters, both Christian and Muslim - came together to pray for peace and then staged a silent protest outside of the Presidential Palace. Armed only with white T-shirts and the courage of their convictions, they demanded a resolution to the country's civil war. Their actions were a critical element in bringing about a agreement during the stalled peace talks.
A story of sacrifice, unity and transcendence, Pray the Devil Back to Hell honors the strength and perseverence of the women of Liberia. Inspiring, uplifting, and most of all motivating, it is a compelling testimony of how grassroots activism can alter the history of nations." |
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Want to Teach a Class?
RT often received requests from our community partners to use our ESL expertise and extraordinary pool of volunteers to teach community classes. The following two San Francisco locations are looking for committed volunteers to teach ESL to small groups of students once a week.
Mercy Housing/ St. Francis of Assisi Community Senior Center
145 Guerero St. (at 14th St.--close to BART)
We are looking for a tutor to teach ESL once a week to a group of about 10 energetic senior citizen students. Preferred time is in the afternoon. We have taught this class before--students are very engaged and want to practice their ESL. Since the end of the class a few months ago, students have been asking about it nonstop!
Menorah Park Apartments
Sacramento and Presido Sts, San Francisco
This apartment complex serves low-income immigrant families, mostly from Russia/Eastern Europe and China. They are looking for someone to teach a class in their community room once/week. Students are very excited to learn and have activities in their home environment!
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Useful Resources for your work as an RT tutor
Koshland Young Leader Awards of the San Francisco Foundation is accepting nominations for economically disadvantaged students living in San Francisco who want to go to
college. They provide two years of money for school-related costs to high school juniors. Read more here.
Spring Catalogue for the Oakland Adult Education and Career Education Program (OACE) is out OACE provides free and low-cost classes to adults in Oakland. Classes include: ESL, ESL for Citizenship (a great one for Liberian families!), Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) Training, Computer Classes, Parenting Education, Career/Technical Education, Senior Classes...and more!
Call the Edward Shands Adult School at (510) 879-4040 or visit the OACE website for more information on these classes.
Reading List on Refugee Issues
See the Office of Refugee Resettlement's Reading List for great titles and resources on refugee contexts, the refugee experience, and about courageous individuals rebuilding their lives in exile.
San Francisco City ID Card The SF City ID Card is a photo identification card for San Francisco residents that streamlines access to City programs and connects residents to local businesses. Extremely useful for undocumented students.
San Francisco International High School Opening in August of 2009 Email Principal Sonia Geerdes for more information, or to refer your San Francisco youth tutee.
USCIS Citizenship Test Questions Have Been Updated Use the new USCIS question flashcards to quiz your clients studying for the citizenship exams.
Free Tax help for students Tax Aid can help low-income families earning less than $45,000/year file their 2008 taxes | |
Complete This Month's Volunteer Log!
Help us track our students' progress
By filling out your monthly logs, you help keep us abreast of the fantastic work you do. This is crucial for our grant reporting and our ability to support volunteers. Submit your log on our website:
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VOLUNTEER APPRECIATION EVENTS, Thursday March 12th
In both the South Bay and San Francisco, we will be hosting Volunteer appreciation events on Thursday, March 12, 2009
Look out for Evites inviting you to our Volunteer Socials.
San Francisco:
Happy Hour at Bissap Baobab Restaurant, Mission St. at 19th St.
South Bay:
Dessert Social at Prolific Oven/Rivermark Village 7:15 pm. |
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Celebrate Burma Human Rights Day with the Burmese American Democratic Alliance (BADA)
Saturday March 14th, 2009
1924 Cedar St (at Bonita) in Berkeley
6:00-10:00 pm
To continue to raise the awareness about the human rights abuses in Burma and to discuss planning actions, this year again, BADA will hold its ninth Annual Burma Human Rights Day event on Saturday March 14, 2009 at the Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists hall. The event will feature a Burmese style dinner and a Burma documentary film along with two outstanding Speakers on Burma: Min Zin and Zoya Phan. |
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Thank you to the Bay Area Diaper Bank!
The Bay Area Diaper Bank has generously donated 1,986 diapers to Refugee Transitions-South Bay. These diapers will be a big help to refugee families with young babies who struggle to pay for the bare essentials. Thank you, Bay Area Diaper Bank! |
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Become a Friend of RT on Facebook
In attempts to keep volunteers connected and updated with the latest news from RT, we have a Facebook page--and we'd love for you to be our friend! |
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Is your Student Ready to Take an Updated Language Test?
By testing your adult or high school student, you help RT monitor our students' progress and collect valuable data for fundraising purposes.
Email Lauren at lauren@reftrans.org to have her send you the next tier of tests for your student. |
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New York Times Article "In School for the First Time" profiles the struggles of teenage immigrant students in NYC public schools. This article highlights many of the same issues facing our students, and shows that there is national attention on this growing demographic.
"In school for the First Time" by Jennifer Medina
Fanta Konneh is the first girl in her family to go to school. Not the first to go to college, or to graduate from high school. Fanta, 18, who grew up in Guinea after her family fled Liberia, became the first to walk into a classroom of any kind last year.
"Just the boys go to school, so I always knew I was left out," said Fanta, a student at Ellis Preparatory Academy in the South Bronx. "But here, I am trying. I can say many things I did not know before. I can learn things more."
New York City classrooms have long been filled with children from all over the world, and the education challenges they bring with them. But hidden among the nearly 150,000 students across the city still struggling to learn English are an estimated 15,100 who, like Fanta, have had little or no formal schooling and are often illiterate in their native languages.
More than half of these arrive as older teenagers and land in the city's high schools, where they must learn how to learn even as their peers prepare for state subject exams required for a diploma.
Read the rest of this article in the New York Times. | |
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Know someone who wants to Volunteer?
 If you know someone who wants to volunteer with Refugee Transitions, we are always looking for more help in the East Bay, San Francisco and the South Bay!
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Thank you, again, for all that you do to serve the immigrant and refugee populations of the Bay Area. You are the heart and soul of what we do!
Sincerely,
Lauren, Laura, Tenley, ZarNi, Grace, Elsa, Nandi, Nakachi and Christina
(The Refugee Transitions Team) |
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