HomeNEWSRefugee Community Day Held at Saint Rose and RISSE

Refugee Community Day Held at Saint Rose and RISSE

By SERIAH
SARGENTON
Distribution Manager

Not everyone is on an even playing field when pursuing the “American Dream.” On Friday, Jan. 26. The College of Saint Rose Community Advisory Board and Refugees and Immigrant Support Services at Emmaus (RISSE) held a refugee community day from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. to share personal stories and meet each other.
The event began at the Hubbard Interfaith Sanctuary at 959 Madison Ave, where Francis Sengabo, the director at RISSE spoke about his experience as a refugee in his early years in Albany and how he came to find RISSE.

Sengabo came from Rwanda in 2007 as a refugee because his father, who was a political figure, was killed in 1998 alongside his mother and he couldn’t go back home or he would have been persecuted. Since coming to Albany, Sengabo has worked hard at RISSE to ensure that adult refugees are transitioning into American life smoothly by helping them utilize the services available to them.

When speaking to the students and staff who attended the event, Senagbo said that at refugee camps many people die because of the lack of food, resources, and sometimes not having a shelter.

“When you’re at a refugee camp, you have to start at zero, and it takes time,” said Sengabo.

After hearing such a heartbreaking story, students expressed much interest in learning more about RISSE with the hopes of making an impact on the refugee community.

Victoria Bryan, a freshman at Saint Rose explained how she personally connects to the mission RISSE has to help refugees in need.

“My grandfather came from Cuba, and knowing that makes me want to learn more about refugees because it’s not a group of people, it’s individual,” said Bryan. “His story showed that you can have bad circumstances and still rise up from it, and it’s not just for himself either.”

As a political science major at Saint Rose, one of the many reasons she attended the refugee community day event was because she felt like she needed to learn the truth about how refugees live. Bryan plans to volunteer at RISSE in the near future after gaining insight to other people’s lives and how difficult it can sometimes be for them.

Bryan noted that in today’s political atmosphere she felt that when refugees are spoken about it’s often in a broad sense because people forget that refugees are just groups of individuals.

“Bringing a negative connotation to refugee definitely hits home because right now it’s not just affecting us, but other people as well, especially in our political atmosphere.”

Bryan wasn’t the only student who felt like she needed to make an impact on refugee lives.

Liana Frauenberger, a childhood education major at Saint Rose had heard about RISSE through the school and used the community event to learn more about the programs and ways she can volunteer to give back.

She hopes that by volunteering at RISSE she’ll gain the necessary skills needed to help refugee and immigrant students who may walk into her future classrooms. She wants to gain a better understanding of how hard it was for people to move into the United States from their countries.

 

“Hearing today’s stories empowers me to want to change the political climate,” said Frauenberger.

RISSE and The College of Saint Rose partnered with the U.S Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI), Healthy Capital District Initiative, Albany County District Social Services, Habitat of Humanity, and The Legal Project to bring information to refugees about the numerous services they can utilize to help themselves transition into the American life.

Saint Rose began its relationship with RISSE in 2006 when the pastor of the Emmaus United Methodist Church if students wanted to come work with refugees, according to Ken Scott, director of the community service office at Saint Rose. Over time faculty members such as Fred Boehrer, coordinator of academic service learning and Claudia Lingertat-Putnam, a professor of counseling and department chair, began bringing students to RISSE so they could earn credit for service learning.

The Refugees Community Day event was a collaboration event in which the community advisory board and RISSE met up to discuss how they can introduce students to volunteer with refugees. The community advisory board is a group of non-profit leaders who seek to strengthen the bond between Saint Rose students and the local community.

Boehrer explained how the board and other members of the community noticed an increased interest in working with vulnerable immigrants and refugees. Part of the event, Boehrer said was for some of these refugees to share their personal stories with students to help them gain a better insight on just what life is like for them. He hopes after the event students will begin to look at RISSE as neighbors and will take more initiative into helping the lives of others.

“Stories, narrative is an important learning device,” said Boehrer.

RISSE student Mahmood Luay attended the event. The 50 year old Iraqi refugee came to Albany in October 2014 with his wife and eight children. When he first arrived, USCRI helped him and his family find a home that would be suitable for them and with schooling.

Prior to Albany, he lived in Baghdad, the capital of Iraq while he was working for an organization that often volunteered in the states. Luay has two engineering degrees and was living happily up until ISIS came across the river endangering him and his family.

“ISIS would kill anyone who had money and a nice house,” said Luay.

Now, in 2018, Luay is happy to say that his children are all succeeding in school with above 90 grade point averages and his eldest daughter has gotten scholarships and accepted to numerous colleges because of her academic success.

Elif Yapar, a Turkish immigrant came to Albany July 2017 because she and her husband wanted to learn English and make their lives better.

Yapar was an accountant in Turkey and saved all the money she could so she could move to the United States to learn English. In 2017, after she was able to save enough money to move she applied for the green card lottery and won it. Her husband’s uncle lives in Albany and they hope to stay in the United States and travel as much as possible.

She says she enjoys the United States and that it’s very different from where she’s from.

“You guys aren’t angry. Your very relaxed and social. Where I’m from everyone’s always so angry and busy,” said Yapar.

The event was a welcome opportunity for members of the Albany community to connect with each other. Students were able to learn about the benefits of volunteering with refugees and refugees were connected with local programs and services that will help further their living.

“I know how hard it was, but I didn’t know how challenging everything was until I heard the stories,” said Frauenberger.

RELATED ARTICLES

Most Popular

Recent Comments