Last month, Hyde Park Refugee Project founder Dorothy Pytel was invited to give a talk at Montgomery Place, a high rise retirement community in East Hyde Park., 

Resident Bernard Strauss helped make the arrangements.  “One of our residents talked to me about the general topic and suggested that Bernie Brown [former Dean of Rockefeller Chapel] would know more,” says Strauss. “I contacted Rev. Brown and he gave me Dorothy Pytel’s name along with a glowing recommendation for her as a speaker.”

“It was a lovely evening,” said Pytel.  “Carolyn Lawrence, one of the interns, and I first had dinner and great conversations there with a group of residents that organize the speakers.”

During her presentation, Pytel talked about how the project got started and the challenges facing the families the Refugee Project is helping. She also told a few stories about how the education they are receiving in the US, supplemented by the tutoring they receive from Refugee Project volunteers, is giving hope for their children’s future. A lively question and answer period ensued.  

“I have known about the project for a year or more, through my participation at Augustana,” resident Phil Hefner said. “We like to keep our residents informed about important projects, especially those in Hyde Park. Everyone I spoke with appreciated the talk.”

He added that at least one of the audience plans to suggest Hyde Park Refugee Project as a possible addition to the charities supported by the resident’s fund.

Hyde Park Herald recently interviewed Penny Visser, co-director of Hyde Park Refugee Project, and long-time volunteer Susan Augustine about the Refugee Project’s efforts to recruit more volunteers.

“All of the refugee families we’re working with recognize the vital importance of education for their children, and they are grateful to the support our community is providing,” said Penny Visser, co-director of Hyde Park Refugee Project. “We’ve partnered with some of the local schools the children attend, and we’d love to expand those partnerships and provide more volunteers to work in the classrooms.”

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Photo credit: 2017 WNPR-FM

Want to make a difference in a refugee’s life? Hyde Park Refugee Project invites you learn more about our volunteer-based organization and opportunities to get involved.

We will be hosting a special information session on Tuesday, October 16, 6:30 p.m. at Augustana Church, 5500 S. Woodlawn in Hyde Park.

The purpose will be to orient newcomers and provide an update on our progress and plans. We kindly ask that you RSVP for the program so we can gauge attendance.

Please email hydeparkrefugeeproject@gmail.com to let us know you’re coming.

Thanks. Hope to see you there!

FORCED FROM HOME PRIVATE TOURS

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 26
6:56 PM and 7:04 PM
Richard J. Daley Center
50 W Washington St
Chicago, IL

Join us for special guided tours of ‘Forced From Home‘ Doctors Without Borders’ interactive, behind the headlines exhibit that’s coming to Chicago’s Daley Plaza Sept 23-30.  Hyde Park Refugee Project has reserved space for two private guided tours on Wednesday, September 26 for HPRP volunteers and supporters. The tours begin promptly at 6:56 p.m. and 7:04 p.m., respectively and last approximately one hour.

Guided by experienced Doctors Without Borders aid workers, you’ll travel through a 10,000-square-foot space designed to convey the challenges facing a person forced to flee. You’ll also learn about the humanitarian aid Doctors WIthout Borders provides along the way.  Visitors experience virtual reality and 360˚ video, and interact with materials gathered from refugee camps, sea rescue missions, and emergency medical projects around the world.

FORCED FROM HOME tours are free, fully accessible, and take roughly one hour to complete. If you can’t join us on Wednesday, you can catch the exhibit any time during its run. Families are welcome, however the content is best suited to children ages 12+.

Registration is required. Please arrive by 6:50 p.m. and you will be placed in groups on a first-come, first-serve basis.

This spring, volunteers have been busy making our organization more efficient and developing a new summer enrichment pilot program for refugee families that we hope to launch this summer with your help.

Here’s a quick update of what we’ve been up to:

• Created a formal employment team and recruited seven volunteers to help find sufficient employment for the Congolese family that we began assisting in December. The family has several adult children. The employment team is also helping our Syrian families find supplemental employment to help make ends meet.
• Placed nine volunteers at Kenwood Academy to work as classroom assistants with English Language Learners during the school day.
• Created a formal volunteer intake system that we will implement soon (online volunteer application and background checks will be done directly by the Hyde Park Refugee Project)
• Welcomed three interns from the Public Church Program at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago this spring. These graduate students bring sustained energy and are directly responsible for some major organizational growth this spring.

Now we need your help!

This summer the Hyde Park Refugee Project is piloting a summer enrichment program for the families supported by the Hyde Park Refugee Project. Your generous support is needed to cover the costs of summer enrichment activities that will help children and young adults in our community whose lives have been disrupted by war and conflict. As this Wall Street Journal article points out, children and teens that come to the US as refugees have unique educational challenges.

The Hyde Park Refugee Project has a vision to provide a two-week English language immersion program in mid-summer that will instruct, integrate, and enrich the lives of parents and children alike. We are also in discussions with local sports, arts and other non-profits to provide additional summer enrichment opportunities for the many refugee children living in Hyde Park.  If anyone is interested in volunteering with us this summer or is associated with a local organization that might be willing to donate or give reduced enrichment opportunities this summer, please contact us at hydeparkrefugeeproject@gmail.com.

To make an online donation to help fund summer enrichment for our community’s refugee family, please click on the DONATE button at the top of the page.

We thank you for your ongoing support!

“Helping others,” a major tenet of The Scout Oath, was demonstrated recently by Cub Scout Pack 3599, a 45-member group of six to 12 year-olds from Chicago’s South Side. The Pack donated several boxes of office supplies to Hyde Park Refugee Project through Augustan Lutheran Church of Hyde Park, the Pack’s Charter Sponsor since 2016.

“My office was relocating and we had excess office supplies,” says Cub Master James Roger Poueymirou. “Augustana has been a great to the Scout Pack, so we wanted to give back,” said the 40-year resident of Hyde Park.  

In turn, Augustana Church administrative coordinator Elizabeth McCreless, with the approval of church pastor Nancy Goede, suggested the supplies go instead to Hyde Park Refugee Project that holds weekly meetings, ESL tutoring, and other refugee assistance programs at the church. Run entirely by volunteers, the Refugee Project relies solely on community goodwill and donations to further its mission. Poueymirou generously agreed.  

On the first, third and fifth Friday of each month from 6:45 – 8:15 p.m, Lions, Tigers, Wolves, Bears and Webelos meet at Augustana to engage in service projects and participate in outdoor activities from bird watching in Jackson Park’s Bob-o-link Field to hiking, camping  and neighborhood clean-up projects. “Dens” are divided by grade and include scouts from a potpourri of backgrounds and religions who attend Ray School, St. Thomas the Apostle, The Ancona School, University of Chicago Laboratory Schools and other area schools.

“Scouting is about character building, leadership training, outdoors and having fun,” says Poueymirou. “If they learn to be good citizens and work with trusted adults, these are all positives for young boys.”

This September, girls also will be able to join. “It’s all about inclusion.  We want to make sure that we’re giving opportunities to those that want to participate. It’s also the right thing to do.”

For more information about local Scouting units, please visit Scouting Spirit!, a new column in the Hyde Park Herald written by Cubmaster Poueymirou.

Pictured above: Roger Poueymirou, Pack 3599 Cub Master, and Elizabeth McCreless, Augustana Church administrative coordinator

The Refugee Experience:
Background Information for Teachers and Tutors
Wednesday, March 14, 2018
6:00 – 8:30 pm
Indo American Center
6328 N. California Ave.
Chicago, IL 60659

Are you a tutor, or do you want to become one and work with students from refugee backgrounds? Literacy Works will offer a training session on Wednesday, March 14, 6-8:30 p.m.  Hyde Park Refugee Project volunteers can attend this training for free.  Just mention our fiscal agent, the Hyde Park & Kenwood Interfaith Council.  

The training is designed to give you a deeper understanding of what refugee students may have gone through and the realities of their life right now in order to support them more effectively as a teacher or tutor

Discussion points will include:

• The long journey from fleeing one’s home to being resettled in the US
• What a resettlement agency does, in detail, including housing, job development, financial support, counseling, and more
• The wide range of refugee populations currently settled in Chicago and the unique challenges they face
• Cultural adjustment issues to be aware of
• What problems you can help with vs. which should be addressed by a manager or the student’s resettlement caseworker

This training is appropriate for volunteer tutors and staff.

Presenter:

Helen Sweitzer has been working with refugees for about 15 years. She started as a volunteer ESL teacher, and is now the Director of Resettlement at RefugeeOne, overseeing case management, employment, Women’s
Empowerment Program, ESL, cultural orientation, and intensive and medical case management programs.

Trainings are free for Literacy Works’ members. $20 for non-member agencies.

To register, please email register@litworks.org with your name, email address, phone number, and title of training. Please indicate that you are affiliated with the Hyde Park & Kenwood Interfaith Council and also indicate if you are a volunteer, teacher, or other staff member.

For any questions, please contact Literacy Works at register@litworks.org.

Volunteers and donations needed for recently resettled family from the Congo

Through our collaboration with local public schools, the Hyde Park Refugee Project became aware of a family recently resettled from the Congo that is in need.  Many of you are already familiar with this family, as you responded with generosity to our request for blankets and comforters  in December.  

Over the past month, our volunteers have gotten to know several members of this family of 14.  We have been busy developing a comprehensive response to help the family find its footing on its journey towards independence.  We have already helped one family member get a job! But there are several family members, including the father and several adult children, that are very eager to find either full-time or part-time employment.  

Now we are reaching out to you for your support.  

Here are the ways that you can help:

Providing employment leads

Our volunteers will follow up on all possible job leads.  The best leads are specific employers or businesses with a current opening (that ideally provides health benefits) or an employer you have a relationship with that might be open to a new hire. General job suggestions tend to drain limited volunteer time.  We are also looking for employment mentors who will assist the family through the complicated job application process.

Please contact Diane Salk dmsalk@mac.com with job leads or to find out how to become an employment mentor.

Donating household items

The Congolese family has requested a number of items for their kids and home.  Please click here to sign up to donate specific items.

Tutoring

There are immediate opportunities to provide homework assistance and English tutoring for the Congolese family.  Beyond helping the family at home, the local public schools are excited  that the Refugee Project has begun to place volunteers directly in schools. The options include:

• tutoring at school (daytime and after school)
• tutoring in the family’s home (evenings and weekends)

To find out more about how to get involved in tutoring, contact Kate Hannigan at katehannigan@gmail.com.

Providing early childhood enrichment

The Refugee Project began hosting a free three-times-a-week class for English Language Learners at Augustana Lutheran Church in Hyde Park.  Families bring along non-school-age children.  Children receive enrichment in a nursery while the adults go to “school” down the hall.  We are seeking volunteers to help with this program. Individuals with young children are welcome to volunteer as well.

To find out how to get involved, please contact Linda Pope devinlinda@yahoo.com.

Donate to family emergency fund

Your financial contributions will help cover emergency needs such as rental assistance, food assistance, bus passes, etc.  Our goal is to raise $7,000.  Any financial donations beyond this level will help provide additional resources for an English Language Learners class and an early childhood enrichment program for non-school-age children for the refugee families.  The volunteers who lead this class were trained in August 2017 by Literacy Works. This training was made possible by your generous donations to the Refugee Project last year.

Please click here to contribute to the family’s emergency fund.

Your generosity has already helped two Syrian refugee families gain a foothold in our country and community.  Your continued support of the Hyde Park Refugee Project will enable our new Congolese family to move a step closer to its goal of a brighter future.

Thank you!

A few days before Thanksgiving, while most people were deep into preparations, Natalie Tessler was thinking about who might benefit from a free meal.  

While talking with a friend whose children, like hers, attend the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, Tessler learned about the Syrian families served by the Hyde Park Refugee Project.  Her friend’s daughter, a high schooler who tutors some of the refugee children in her spare time, often spoke about the daily struggles the families faced.

“It kind of struck me, as we were planning for Thanksgiving, how nice it would be to make these people feel more welcome,” said Tessler.  “We usually donate Thanksgiving dinner to someone every year. This year felt like the ideal situation.  All this talk about refugees being a threat to our community really bothers me and, I think, a lot of people in our community.”

She reached out to the Refugee Project’s tutor coordinator Kate Hannigan who identified four families that would very much welcome the gesture.  That evening, Tessler met with her book club and shared her idea. Without hesitation, all eight of her friends offered to chip-in so that each of the families could experience Thanksgiving.

On Thanksgiving morning in a car loaded with food, Tessler and her family members delivered turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, vegetables and pies to the refugee families.  Each time, they were greeted by excited kids and invitations for tea and coffee.

“All the volunteers were so excited and touched that Natalie and her book club stepped up to take on the holiday,” said Hannigan. “The consensus from the moms was that Thanksgiving was fantastic! They liked the food, and the kids especially loved the pie desserts.” 

“I believe that there’s a huge appetite in our community to lend a hand to refugees and others in need, but many simply don’t know where to go to find opportunities to help,” said Tessler. “I’m grateful that the Hyde Park Refugee Project had the information and ability to make this happen.”

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