Computers in Homes Refugee Programme Update

Auckland and Palmerston North are training 12 families who will be ready to graduate in November. Auckland have their 3rd intake also underway and will graduate in December.

Nelson Refugee at Victory School

We generally run Computers in Homes for 15 refugee families a year in Nelson and this time almost a hundred people gathered in Victory Community Hall to celebrate their 2014 graduation on 16 September.
Special guests included Erika Ross, Regional Director Ministry of Education, Hassan Ibrahim, Southern Regional Refugee Education Coordinator MoE, Nelson City Councillor Matt Lawrey and Marion Street MP.
All expressed their congratulations to the graduate parents for the commitment and tenacity shown to complete training to help their children with their school work.

We were warmly hosted by Principal Helen Taylor-Young and school coordinator Dianne Goodwin who has been working with refugee children and their families for over a decade. Previous principal Mark Brown has now moved to Newtown School in Wellington and is planning CIH for families there in 2015. Erika Ross was called upon to present certificates and will feature some of our photos in the next Ministry of Education bulletin.

One unique feature of Refugee graduations at Victory School is the community involvement and how previous graduate families support the newly arrived ones. Their wonderful children and older students entertain us with dance and the parents sing for the guests. The costumes and music are an amazing experience every time.

Another feature is how Computers in Homes provides opportunity for personal growth and development of youth. Previous CIH graduate families have provided fantastic interpreters, trainers and technicians who come back to work on the programme and further afield. Dhan and David rose to the occasion as trainers for this intake, and Dhan will go on as Family Liaison and Technical support. Dhan is currently studying Computer Engineering, while David enters tertiary education as an Engineering student at Canterbury University in 2015. We wish them well in their journey.

Many thanks to all the amazing people who contribute and make this event happen!

Click to play this Smilebox slideshow

Auckland Refugee

Salaam Alaykum, Mingalaba, Kia ora koutou and greetings to all RYAN (Refugee Youth Action Network) as part of Refugees as Survivors (RAS) is hosting 3 classes this semester and the first group graduated on 11 October 2014. The other two groups will graduate together in December. These first 5 families gathered at the RYAN Centre in Mt Roskill and despite a few operational hiccups we had a lovely time together. The computers arrived late but with a few frantic phonecalls and express delivery we got there in the end! Adel Salmanzadeh, Refugee Education Coordinator Auckland Ministry of Education, presented the certificates along with trainer Elfadil Sabeel and Family Liaison Patrick Saw who do a great job in tutoring and supporting the families. We are also grateful to our awesome Technical Support expert Hameed Sharifi who will set up everyone’s internet at home and make sure the equipment is running efficiently. Happy to report Hameed is also engaged in the schools’ CIH programme in wider Auckland and is currently supporting families from Ngā Iwi School in Mangere. (see Auckland CIH blog) We were missing our friend and colleagues Parvathi Raghunathan who has gone to India on family business, and Dr Arif Saied who was recovering from ‘flu at home. Arif’s wife Fahima hosted us instead and it was wonderful to reconnect with her the following day at Gp2 training and see refugee women learning the skills of quilting. Here are also photos of Sunday’s activities at RYAN. I met the new Gp2 class training and look forward to their success also.

Click to play this Smilebox slideshow

Webinar: Generation to Generation: Empowering Newcomer Youth and Families

October 31 in New Zealand, Australia
8:00 am AEDT Melbourne, Sydney
10:00 am NZDT Auckland, Wellington

Join Cities of Migration for a webinar to learn about award-winning programs from Wellington, New Zealand and Toronto, Canada that improve language and digital literacy for immigrant families and youth by removing barriers to technology, promoting inter-generational tutoring, and strengthening community relations through education.

The Computers in Homes National Coordinator will be presenting at the Learning Exchange Monthly Webinar under Empowering Newcomer Youth and Families.
To join the webinar, please click on the below link:
http://citiesofmigration.ca/webinar/newcomerfamilies/