Post Classifieds
CAC works with local refugees
By Brian Alexander
On March 26, 2012
Every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, children from places like Iran, Burma and
Eritrea walk into the Community Academic Center, hang up their coats and sit down
to start coloring as they wait patiently for their teachers to prepare the day's lesson.
Buffalo Beginnings, housed and run by Buffalo State's Community Academic Center,
is a program that tutors refugee children on Buffalo's West Side. Three days a week,
the children are brought in by their parents in order to learn key English phrases
and other basic skills like school and community familiarity.
AmeriCorps associate Karalynn Brown said the program began five weeks ago as
a joint effort between Buffalo State and Journey's End refugee services to fill in
the gap between the time the students come to the country and the time they start
school.
"The idea is that we will take students who are for some reason waiting to start
school," she said. "So they're either recently resettled refugees who are new to
the country and they have a two month waiting period before starting school for
medical reasons, or like both of our students now, are pre-k aged and we are taking
them because for some reason they can't get into a head start program."
Megan Shear, a tutor with the CAC, said she works with children by incorporating
basic vocabulary and behavior exercises in word and visual association games.
She said students are very eager to learn in school, but difficulties arise because of
culture shock and not knowing how to ask for simple things. As a result, they work
to minimize those issues.
"Some of our earlier students were kindergarteners so there was still some anxiety
with first starting school, but they seem to adjust after a day or two," she said. "Or
they may be older and never have been to school in the old country, never held a
pencil or never been surrounded by peers that are not family."
The CAC works with parents and older children as well. Brown said because the
parents and teenagers are usually more familiar with the language, the tutors work
with them more on conversational English and social customs.
According to Brown, this is important because it allows the parents to get out of the
house with their children and do something constructive to break up their routine.
"I think they really enjoy the program because they are able to get out and learn
something," she said. "They're very eager, the children as well as the parents. Their
children are very smart and they really, really love to learn to speak English. They
don't often times get that experience at home unless they watch TV."
Staff associate Maureen McCarthy said they are hoping to continue the program into
the summer as well, but it's dependant on more refugees being relocated to the area.
"Through Journey's End, we've reached out to the other resettlement agencies so the
program is made available really to anybody who's coming to the area," she said.
In addition to paid tutors, the CAC currently has three student volunteers from
Buffalo State who come in a couple times a week to participate in learning games
with children and help set up lessons. McCarthy said they've had to turn some
people away, though, because there has been so much interest.
"Right now we have a good teacher-to-student ratio," she said. "Having too many
adults in the room can kind of disrupt the learning process and what's going on, so
we try to keep that in mind."
"We've gotten a lot of positive feedback from the different resettlement
organizations in the community about the need for this program," Brown
said. "When kids come here, if they're waiting to be placed in school, they basically
don't have anything to do. So if we can get them into a classroom setting and get
them more used to the American school system, I think it's beneficial for them."
"I give Kara and Megan so much credit because they've really taken this program
and built it from the ground-up," McCarthy said. "It's been a lot of work, but it's been
a really great experience so far."
Brian Alexander can be reached by email at alexander.record@live.com.
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