Tag: immigrants and refugees

Voices of Tomorrow: Breaking down cultural barriers in child care

Voices of Tomorrow: Breaking down cultural barriers in child care

Story by Joy Okot-Okidi

Voices of tomorrow has been serving East African childcare providers and their families for more than five years. The co-founders Zamzam Mohamed and Iftin Hagimohamed saw how a lack of cultural understanding in early learning was impacting their community. So they set out to better equip East African child care providers, children and families while breaking down cultural barriers.

Their mission reads, “helping today’s children for a better tomorrow.”

CEO Zamzam Mohamed says the hopes the organization will, “further bridge the cultural gap between Westerners and immigrants as far as childcare and raising children goes.”

The organization fully came together in 2012. Since then co-founders have worked to put together programs and conferences along with members of the community.

One such event in December was The Somali Women’s gala. The purpose of the event was to celebrate and empower Somali women in the local community. It also serves to appreciate and acknowledge the many women who work in the childcare field.

They also hold an annual childcare conference is held to support providers. This conference not only holds mandated trainings and improves professional development, but connects members of the community working towards a similar goal.

After receiving a grant from the City’s Technology Matching Fund, Voices of Tomorrow pushed to open a computer lab in the Hope Academic Enrichment Center, close to Voices of Tomorrow’s headquarters in South Seattle. The lab supports local childcare providers in gaining computer skills such as opening emails, responding to licensures and writing documentations.

Voices of tomorrow co-founder saw a common challenge among the 400 plus childcare providers in King County, and 166 in the Seattle area. They launched the computer lab project was started to improve tech literacy.

“People come in at different levels, so we created a ‘tailored needs service,’ where we will pair two people up. One who is very knowledgeable in the subject and someone who wants to learn about the certain subject. We use this system because our community of immigrants, especially where I am from, really thrives well with peer to peer support and activities,” said Mohamed.

Community members also come in to the lab to help providers with the various computer skills. In addition, about 80 children were given access to the computer lab for homework help, and to work with a teacher on computer skills like typing. Children in grades six and up were using the computer lab.

The lab features a total of eighteen HP computers, including a printer, copier, scanner and projector. The projector was used during a nine week literacy training, in three hour sessions taking place every Wednesday and Saturday beginning last December. After a successful launch, the computer lab has moved to the Voices of Tomorrow office, where community members can still drop in and assist each other with various skills.

Mohamed says East Africans have valuable cultural assets that can be applied to childrearing

“For example, our families use a lot of storytelling,” she explains “and parents may think that they have to relearn skills to help their children with what is being taught in school, But they already have the skills. They just have to connect the dots using the methods that they have.”

Voices of Tomorrow started with the idea of breaking that cultural barrier. So Mohamed says that when childcare providers can call Voices of Tomorrow and there is no barrier in understanding, it brings her immense joy.

She says that the most rewarding part of her job is when childcare providers have the “A-ha moment” where they try out a method in their own childcare program and it successfully helps a child do better.

In 2016 the City of Seattle awarded 10 community organizations a total of $320,000 in Technology Matching Funds (TMF). This funding will assist more than 2,500 residents in historically underserved or underrepresented communities who lack the necessary technology access and essential digital skills to thrive in the 21st century.

East African Community Services proves representation is key to education

Story by Damme Getachew

East African Community Services (EACS) is a lighthouse for hundreds of youth who simply want to succeed in education and life. It’s located in the New Holly Neighborhood Campus in Southeast Seattle, where more than 65 percent of residents are East African.

As a first-generation Somali-American, Executive Director Faisal Jama knows what it’s like to be in the shoes of the students he passionately serves. There is an opportunity gap that East African youth experience in traditional school systems, and even within their own communities, Jama says.

As children of immigrant parents, or as immigrants themselves, East African youth grow up with less understanding of how to successfully navigate the education system than their counterparts.

That’s why EACS exists — to provide “culturally responsive” K-12 education programs during after-school hours throughout the academic year and in the summer.

“We focus on being proactive, not reactive so that our kids are prepared,” Jama explains. Students start algebra by 8th grade instead of 9th and take math for four years instead of the three-year high school requirement.

They also hold frequent workshops where community members come in to talk about their careers, family, culture and identity, providing East African youth with tangible role models for success.

“In our community, there are a lot of people that are serving our kids, but it’s not us…” Jama emphasizes. “We make sure our professionals and our volunteers can relate to them.”

In other workshops, students engage in discussions on African and African-American literature. It’s important that one knows where you come from — it encourages self-love, Jama says.

Since its inception, EACS has transitioned alongside the East African immigrant community it serves — from aiding newly-arrived refugees in the ‘90’s with necessary social services, to offering full-blown educational training for the children of those same families a generation later.

As Jama puts it, EACS doesn’t intend to be-all and do-all for East African youth. Instead, the organization recognized that becoming an education-only institution was exactly what the kids needed.

In partnership with local colleges, student-teachers instruct their classes. EACS also regularly employs high school students as interns and brings in volunteers from the community to ensure strong support in the classrooms.

Since their full transformation in 2013 to an education organization, EACS has seen a 30 percent increase in student enrollment. “It’s all from word-of-mouth,” Jama explains. Parents are telling other parents.

EACS alum Ahlaam Ibraahim is an example of what continuous and culturally-relevant support can do. Ibraahim was recognized for her high academic achievements in a recent Seattle Times article, and has become well known for her community activism. She even launched her own initiative, “Educating the Horn,” in connection with EACS recently, to help high school students fill out college applications and apply to scholarships.

Beyond college, EACS is also laying the groundwork for more representation from the East African community in the tech industry.  With support from the City of Seattle Technology Matching Fund  EACS recently began its ICT (Information Computer Technology) Learning Center to offer robotics along with college and career readiness classes. Students gain programming skills, learn how to code and use JavaScript, and more.

“The key is bringing in people that can show them what it looks like,” Jama says. “It’s about career awareness.”

He says it’s not just STEM learning that’s beneficial, it’s the visual depiction that people of color can and do succeed that reaffirms the youth’s belief in themselves and their own ability to thrive.

 

The City of Seattle is now accepting applications for the 2017 Technology Matching Fund (TMF). In 2016 the city awarded 10 community organizations a total of $320,000 in Technology Matching Funds. This funding assists more than 2,500 residents in historically underserved or underrepresented communities who lack the necessary technology access and essential digital skills to thrive in the 21st century.

Asian senior healthcare organization uses technology to fight social isolation of seniors

Story by Joy Okot-Okidi

Founded in the 1980s as the first Chinese nursing home operated by the Chinese community in the nation,  Kin On now serves over 500 Asian seniors in the Greater Seattle area.

Asian cultures hold a tradition for families to care for their own, according to Kin On’s website, and caregivers and staff follow a holistic approach to care for their residents.

Their mission is to “support the elderly and adults in the greater Seattle Asian community by offering a comprehensive range of health, social and educational services sensitive to their cultural, linguistic and dietary needs.”

Since opening, Kin On has gone on to win several awards including an honor from the Northwest Asian Weekly Foundation, declaring Kin On Health Care an “Asian-American Pioneer in Healthcare.”

In October 2016, the facility opened a new community center as part of their Healthy Living Program, focused on the physical, mental and social aspects of health for adults over 50. Classes offered include EnhanceFitness®, Zumba®, ballroom and line dance, arts and crafts, technology, evidence-based health education, and more.

At the heart of the Healthy Living Program is the Kin On Smartlab, which was initiated with the City of Seattle Technology Matching Fund.  The goal of the Kin On SmartLab was to “improve social isolation, to increase interaction through email, technology literacy and access to government resources online,” said Jessica Wong who was the main program coordinator from 2015-2016.

Wong said that Kin On serves many immigrants, mostly from China, Hong Kong or Taiwan. She says social isolation is a major problem, so the committee proposed the idea of a “SmartLab” to combat this, speaking to the educational, mental and social components of the Healthy Living Program.

The organization previously applied for the grant from the Technology Matching Fund, and after not being chosen, they applied feedback and received the grant the following year. The SmartLab operates in the 2,600 square foot community center and the program officially began in April of 2016, featuring “all-in-one computers” with a built-in monitor and speakers, allowing for easy take-down and set up, along with a projector allowing students to see skills being taught on a larger screen.

Its first set of classes included “Computers Made Easy,” teaching students basic fundamentals of using a computer. From April to July 2016, four, two-hour classes were taught once a month on select Saturdays by young professionals in the technology field. About 10 volunteers are present for each class to assist the students. There are also two open lab tutors who give one-on-one lessons twice a week.

The SmartLab is open to the community and seniors aged 50+ can sign up by phone, in-person, or with help from a family member or friend, through an online application which is offered in English and Chinese.

Seniors who sign up are encouraged to come in and ask questions about smartphones and tablets and computers. One former nurse from Kin On, Eliane Dao, has transitioned into becoming a regular student in the SmartLab. “It has been about three months and I am very happy that I have found a great teacher,” she explained, “He will teach you anything you ask.”

“We hope to grow to serve more people and also offer a larger variety of classes,” Wong said of Kin On’s goals for the future of the technology program. “For this coming year, we have improved our methods and how we teach by simplifying the classes with more repetition and practice time.” The 2017 classes schedule is now available online.

The SmartLab will continue to push towards its three main goals: combatting social isolation through online access to social media and communication platforms, improving technology literacy, and increasing access to health and government resources online.

For more information or questions, please contact Anne Nguyen who oversees Kin On’s Healthy Living Program at 206-556-2237 or healthyliving@kinon.org.

 

In 2016 the City of Seattle awarded 10 community organizations a total of $320,000 in Technology Matching Funds (TMF). This funding will assist more than 2,500 residents in historically underserved or underrepresented communities who lack the necessary technology access and essential digital skills to thrive in the 21st century.

Empowering immigrants and refugees through computer literacy

Story by Alia Marsha, The Seattle Globalist

Imagine how hard it would be to access information and resources if you didn’t have computer skills. Now imagine if, on top of that, you have just moved to a foreign country and were still learning the predominant language.

The goal for the Coalition for Refugees from Burma’s program “Nexus: Connecting Newcomers with Technology” is to remove those barriers for recently-arrived refugee and immigrant communities.

The Coalition for Refugees from Burma (CRB) has secured a grant from the City of Seattle through the Technology Matching Fund (TMF) for the third time to continue their computer literacy programs

When the CRB began in 2009 there was a larger community of refugees and immigrants from Burma in the Seattle area. Since then, though, a lot of them have moved to more affordable cities. According to the City’s Office of Immigrants and Refugee Affairs, as of October 2015, there are 261 refugees from Burma in Washington state. Five years prior, in 2010, there were almost 800 refugees from Burma in the state, according to data by the U.S. Department of State Refugee Processing Center.

Responding to the change, in 2016 CRB started to expand their computer literacy programs to serve all recently-arrived refugees and immigrants. CRB collaborated with partners like Seattle World School, Somali Youth and Family Club and the Seattle University Center for Service and Community Engagement to ensure its computer classes are linguistically and culturally relevant. It has also expanded its program to include immigrants and refugees in Kent.

According to Siobhan Whalen, a program manager at CRB, this past year in the Kent program alone, CRB served immigrants and refugees speaking over 13 languages from eight countries.

Rosa, an immigrant from Mexico who moved to Seattle in 2002, is one of those clients. Her son goes to Bailey Gatzert Elementary School, where the Seattle University Center for Service and Community Engagement hosts “Family Talk Time,” a program to help English Language Learner families get involved with conversations that happen at the school. This was also where the computer classes taught by CRB were held.

Rosa joined the program at the beginning of 2016. Because of the computer classes, Rosa now has a Gmail account. But there are many other tech skills she wants to learn this coming year.

“I want to know the other programs I have on my computer, use more of my fingers on the keyboard,” said Rosa.

The TMF award will also allow CRB to file paperwork to reduce monthly home internet costs for Rosa and others, from $45 to $10.

Whalen, who is also an instructor, said that the impact of those computer classes on immigrants and refugees is very immediate. “That’s part of technology, right? That immediate access to information, to opportunities, to resources,” she said.

Whalen recalls seeing that impact hit her inbox on a recent day, following one of the computer literacy classes at Bailey Gatzert. Students had just gone through a lesson on making an email account and practicing writing messages to each other.

After the class was over, Whalen opened her inbox to find an email from one of the parents in the class: “We really want more computer classes.”

“We just thought, how cool, that almost instantly that this parent felt empowered and had a platform for her voice to reach out to me and our partners at Seattle U. It was like full circle I think for myself and for the Seattle U folks — that advocacy piece,” said Whalen.

Learning technical skills is an important part of those classes, but Whalen says that the CRB is really interested in building confidence so that the communities they serve are able to advocate for themselves and their families.