In the weeks following the arrival of our first refugee family, volunteers worked closely with the parents teaching them how to navigate the neighborhood and the city via public transportation and orienting them on the basics of life in Chicago. We escorted the family to various medical and administrative appointments, registered their children for school, enrolled the …
On December 23, 2017, the Hyde Park Refugee Project, in partnership with RefugeeOne, welcomed its first refugee family to Hyde Park. Forced to flee their home in Aleppo, Syria due to the escalating violence and conflict there, the family of five made their way to Turkey where they eventually received permission to resettle in the US.
The University of Chicago’s student-run newspaper, The Chicago Maroon, wrote a story about the Hyde Park Refugee project interviewing Dorothy Pytel, founder of Hyde Park Refugee Project, and Kim Snoddy, senior manager of co-sponsorships at Refugee One. Read the story>
DNA Info’s Sam Cholke interviewed Refugee Project founder Dorothy Pytel about early efforts to engage the community members and raising enough money to bring the fledgling organization’s first family of Syrian refugees to Hyde Park. Read more>>
