Learning with FORA (Forging Opportunities for Refugees in America)

Anyone who has moved away from their home knows the struggles of adapting to a new environment. What then of children moving across the world?

Forging Opportunities for Refugees in America (FORA) is an organization in Chicago that helps overcome the language barrier barring refugee children from educational success. The organization was created in response to the Syrian and Rohingya crises as asylees found refuge in America. Working for FORA as a tutor at first sounded like an easy position for a native English speaker, but there was much more than just teaching how to read or write.

FORA isn’t just a tutoring organization. Once you’ve become connected to your student’s life, there is no going back. With tutoring sessions five days a week, you become routine in a child’s life. This is an organization where you learn about the lives of refugees in America and the struggles they face through firsthand accounts. This is why I joined FORA; I knew I would grow as a person by learning about lives outside my own.

My first session proved it wouldn’t be easy, however. I started my first Zoom meeting armed with all the teaching knowledge FORA’s child psychologist had prepared for me. This included a thorough amount of online lessons and documents that tested applicants on how to work with refugee children and whether their background prepared them for it. When we actually began, I realized only experience could prepare me. My student was a middle schooler from Malaysia, who had been constantly moving around since leaving Myanmar with his family. His English was excellent for not speaking the language long, and he had a sharp mind that would make learning to read and write easy for him. Before we could start reading, however, he said:
“Did you know I was robbed?”

I paused the session and let him tell me of the break-in that had happened at his house. The robbers had taken money from his mother and escaped before help could come. The details were traumatizing for such a young child, and I could imagine how it was for his parents, who could not even communicate with the police properly. The head tutor that had been overseeing us was not as shocked. He told me afterwards that this was the life that the refugee students were accustomed to and that there would be many more stories like this in the future.

I never did get used to the snippets of background information my student dropped during our sessions, but soon there was another problem. He no longer wanted to participate. It began with switching off his camera and disappearing for a while, and then it escalated into desperate arguments.

“Reading is hard. There are so many words to know that I’ll never learn them all,” he said.

Even with his camera off, I could hear his frustration through the screen, once again expressing the belief that we were both wasting our time. All I could promise was that he’d learn eventually, through conversation and reading, but it was hard to convince him of that when his past environment had kept him from learning to read in his own native language.

I realized over time that learning wasn’t his problem; he was just exhausted. Exhausted from his all-day school, his responsibilities at home as the sole English speaker, and his extra night lessons. He didn’t have much free time at home, so when we had our sessions, he preferred chatting with me rather than going by the schedule, and if there wasn’t enough time for conversation, he would refuse to read.

Over our many hours together, I learned how to change the way I taught in order to relax him and help him become more willing to learn. He shared his concerns about falling behind in school, and we spent much time devoted to learning what he needed to do to improve his future. His refusal to participate dissipated after learning of the opportunities his education would give him. Learning how to read increased his ability to understand all his other subjects in school, and through this, he realized that a good high school, and even a good college, was possible for him.

Ultimately, by the end of our time together, both my student and I had grown. I opened up our sessions to allow him time to share his worries, and he found that our lessons were finally opening up educational avenues that had been closed to him before. FORA by itself was a unique experience, and it should be explored by anyone who wishes to learn more about themselves and others while helping refugee students adapt to a new life in America.