03/12/2011 v1
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Those who might benefit most from high tech lose out
FOR YEARS GREENSBORO HAS BEEN designated a "preferred community" by the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), making Guilford County the leading resettlement county in North Carolina. (1) Private contractors ("refugee services providers") together with a confusing host of nonprofits and volunteers created a fragmented support network responsible for delivering to newly arrived refugees time-sensitive medical care, legal assistance, housing, ESOL and employment help. Today, the system shows signs of breaking down as the economy, funding reductions, and critical news stories forced a major service provider to quit the area after 30 years.(2)
• Center for New North Carolinians (CNNC) estimated some 50,000 refugees and immigrants live here, representing more than 100 languages (3). (Pre-Census 2010 numbers)
• 2009 Federal grants to North Carolina amounted to about six million dollars (4) to settle 2,247 refugees (5), of which 894 came to Guilford (6). (Untracked additional local dollars contribute to the per capita costs of resettlement.)
• Newcomers School, a year-long transitional program for mostly refugee kids, has the highest free/reduced lunch (FRL) student body — 99%. Of its 300 students, 75% are refugees, 67% Asian, 15% Central and South American, 11% African, 5% Middle Eastern, 2% European. (7)
• Compared to mainstream American students, adult ESOL students seldom use technology and rely on seats, whiteboard, pencils and notebooks.(8)
• Pending Census results, Guilford County has probably the largest Montagnard community outside of Southeast Asia, perhaps 5,000 with a total of 10,000-12,000 across the central Piedmont. (9)
• Some refugee groups are preliterate — unable to write their own language. These include the Montagnards, whose complicated past has made them among the toughest communities to work with. (10)
• One year of federally funded support, after which services drop off dramatically (12)
• Dependent on grants, volunteerism (13)
• System “success” based on private contractors’ performance benchmarks, not community interests. (14)
• Severe cultural and linguistic isolation in refugee communities (15)
• Old fashioned, technology-averse system with lack of data and feedback (16)
• No available numbers about per capita costs of resettlement (17)
• No end game, no vision of the future (18)
Incremental Steps
• Refugee health and nutrition studies by UNCG researchers (19), investment by UNCG into a modest "promotoras" training for Montagnard women (20)
• Increased refugee involvement by Reading Connections, a local literacy nonprofit (21)
• New Arrival Institute, a private nonprofit successor to departed Lutheran Family Services (LFS) (22)
• Elon University law center, a successor to legal services formally provided by LFS (23)
• Announcement of the Triad Nepalese Community Center (TNCC), a new ethnic-based organization. (24)
Game Changers
• Montagnard Dega Association closes, triggering a serious system review by local and state politicians (25)
• UNCG and/or an alliance of organizations emerges to take charge (26)
• Big NIH or other grants with built-in service components diminish private contractors’ influence (27)
• New ethnic-based organizations assert control (28)
• Massively deployed, cheap, proven, customizable technology delivers state-of-the-art, learner-centered language skills, job-training and community-building.(29)
Notes
(1) US Dept of Health and Human Services, Administration for Families and Children, Office of Refugee Resettlement. As Census numbers continue to roll out, Wake and Mecklenburg Counties may outpace Guilford in refugee resettlement in coming years.
(2) News-Record, Feb 23, 2010, Lutheran Family Ends Local Refugee Resettlements
(3) Center for New North Carolinians, Newcomers to Guilford County
(4) US Dept of Health and Human Services, Administration for Families and Children, Office of Refugee Resettlement
http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/orr/data/state_profiles.htm
(5) US Dept of Health and Human Services, Administration for Families and Children, Office of Refugee Resettlement
http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/orr/data/fy2009RA.htm
(6) As reported by refugee service providers at meetings of Refugee Information Network of Guilford (RING)(7) Doris Henderson Newcomers School Annual Report, 2009-2010
(8) Many classes take place in non-school settings such as churches or other spaces. ESOL adult learners have limited time on computers during classes. Some programs can offer them open lab times. At MDA, there are no computers for students to use. It would be interesting to study media and information access by ethnic group in Guilford. Well educated refugees, like Iraqis or Ethiopians, may have regular access through broad band connections. Others, like preliterate Bhutanese and Montagnards, might have satellite TV and cell phones, but very limited understanding of new media and information access.
(9) Center for New North Carolinians gives numbers starting at 5,000 and up to 7,000 (http://stephensills.wordpress.com/2010/01/08/immigrants-in-the-triad/) This material is slightly dated and may not account for children born here in the US. In the 2010 Census, Montagnard pastors agreed to a strategy for community members to check "Other Asian" and write "Montagnard", the first concerted effort to get official numbers counted.
(10) Because while they may not read or write, they might speak 5-7 languages. Unity has been a historic problem; they tend to divide themselves by tribal, church and language affiliation. PTSD and other serious, untreated illnesses probably persist in the community.
(11) My persistent calls for public dialog, published minutes, and better use of the Web to communicate and bring organizations closer together have been regularly resisted. Refugee meetings tend to consist of announcements about what each group is doing. Only in the wake of Lutheran Family Services' departure have stakeholders been forced to take concerted action.
(12) These ehow pages roughly describe why individuals and families receive different amounts of aid.
http://www.ehow.com/info_7882975_much-money-refugee-government.html
http://www.ehow.com/info_7881246_welfare-benefits-refugee.html
(13) Office of Refugee Resettlement and USCIS regularly announce grants. Other grant sources, including local foundations, are scrambled over by agencies. Volunteers and old time sponsors contribute thousands of dollars of unaccounted assistance, sometimes in the form of cash gifts. Without supplemental dollars, refugees’ needs could not be met.
(14) In refugee discussions it's easy to assume, as private contractors do, that their interests, refugee interests and larger Greensboro interests are one and the same. But since refugees are rarely present or speak out and local politicians don't participate, these views aren't heard.
(15) When preparing resumes for Montagnards who had been here for over ten years, invariably few could name an American as a character reference, professional colleague or friend.
(16) Many stakeholders are elderly veterans of early resettlement days. Email is as far as they're willing to go. There's a distinct break in understanding technology between AmeriCorps and other young workers, and their 40+ year old supervisors. Excellent data often exists on refugees, collected at the time of their entry and initial settlement, but it is largely inaccessible.
(17) Individual refugees and families represent very different circumstances and needs, but after 30 years, we should know something.
(18) At refugee meetings one rarely hears what is supposed to happen to a refugee once she has her available funding has run out or after she's gotten citizenship. There's vague talk about the role of ethnic self-help organizations, but nothing that suggests a vision of empowered refugee communities displacing the role of American service providers.
(19) Food Insecurity, Disaster Preparedness, Diabetes Prescreening.
(20) Funded by CNNC and Project Shine.
(21) Including classes in Montagnard churches.
(22) Announced in January 2010 in a follow up Open Space meeting of refugee stakeholders held at Holy Trinity Episcopalian Church
(23) Announced in January 2010 in a follow up Open Space meeting of refugee stakeholders held at Holy Trinity Episcopalian Church
(24) Announced in Feb 2011, although formed in March 2010
(25) MDA has continued to suffer cut backs year after year. At some point it will be so hobbled it will be unable to fulfill its contract, at which point the state will permanently end funding. Will such a move start a system investigation? The Montagnards have strong friends in Vietnam vets who might intervene on their behalf. MDA is the oldest Mutual Assistance Association in the area and if Montagnard Human Rights Organization (MHRO) also fails, Special Forces vets from across the country might speak out. If MDA goes under, it will follow Lutheran Family Services, which closed its flagship Greensboro office after 30 years, due to State and local inquiries into its practices.
(26) CNNC is going through a review by UNCG as part of a larger reorganization effort.
(27) Preliminary UNCG studies could lead to large scale funding. Among refugee groups, the Montagnards constitute a unique population that could be the subject of focused research and ongoing fieldwork by students.
(28) Such as United Hmong Association. But MDA is in trouble, and Montagnard Human Rights Organization (MHRO) is also struggling.
(29) Leung, Linda, Feb 2011 Taking refuge in technology: communication practices in refugee camps and immigration detention has a fascinating list of References.
