A school district in Minneapolis is trying to figure out how to bring new Somali kids up to speed educationally, how to “jump-start” them.
http://daughternumberthree.blogspot.com/2010_04_01_archive.html
The story at the Star Tribune this past week mentions that there are many more kids arriving from Somalia than in recent years, but no mention of why that is. Somali family reunification from Africa is now up and running again after about a four year hiatus that ended in 2013. It had been closed for years due to the widespread fraud uncovered by the US State Department in 2008.
Going to the DHS’s Annual flow report, see that in 2010 we resettled 4,884 Somalis, 2011—3,161 and 2012—4,911.
In fiscal year 2013 we had a big jump to 7,608 Somalis and in the first three months of fiscal year 2014 we have resettled 1,744.*** It stands to reason many went to join their people in Minneapolis.
From the Star Tribune:
Shuttling between classrooms at Anne Sullivan school in Minneapolis, teacher James Kindle noticed that classroom teachers were stretched mightily to serve the wide range of abilities in a school with many immigrants.
A teacher might be showing one group of students how to measure the angles in a triangle, while other students in the same class were just learning that “triangle” is the word for a three-sided polygon.
Kindle did some research, talked to other teachers and together they went to school district officials. The result is a pair of “newcomer classrooms” and a concentrated effort to jump-start the adjustment of Somali students in American schools.
The timing is good for Sullivan and other schools receiving a surge of Somali refugees.
“This is a heroic effort on Sullivan’s part,” said Lynn Harper, a district K-8 multicultural specialist.
The newcomer program is aimed at Somalis, but the concept could be adapted to any immigrant group, she said.
Students new to the country are steered into a classroom with other newcomers, so they can learn things like “triangle” before heading into classes with other students.
The district is ramping up the effort even before knowing results. The school board last month approved an expansion from Sullivan’s two classrooms to eight newcomer classrooms, split between Sullivan and Andersen United school. Together the two schools account for one of every six K-8 students in the district from a Somali-speaking family. The expanded program starts next fall.
The Sullivan experiment comes as the school district sees an influx of students from Somalia. At the start of this year’s classes, 336 refugee students had registered recently enough that they could have been eligible for newcomer classes. That’s a marked increase over previous years.
The influx won’t be ending anytime soon for “welcoming” cities like Minneapolis.
For the numbers of Somalis arriving in the last three decades, visit one of our most-read posts here at RRW. In three years of the Bush Administration the numbers topped ten thousand per year!
***While you are checking those stats for Somalia at WRAPSnet, note that Somalis make up the fourth largest number of refugees resettled in fiscal year 2014. The top three in the first three months of this fiscal year are:
Iraqis: 4,111
Burmese: 2,316
Bhutanese: 2,257
Somalis: 1,744