Changes in the federal refugee resettlement program now allow local families to host refugees when they come to Vermont.
And so refugees are settling outside of Chittenden County, where the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants has an office in Colchester.
That means some schools are now hosting large groups of refugee children for the first time.
About a hundred Afghan refugees settled around Brattleboro just over a year ago.
In January 2022, about halfway through the school year, Deb Coombs got a dozen new Afghan students in her English language learning class at Academy School in Brattleboro.
Coombs says the number of children in her class has fluctuated through the years, and the Afghans showed up after the district had cut one teacher from her program.
“So, yeah, it was like, okay, let’s put a blanket on the floor ‘cause surely there’s not room for everyone to sit in a chair, you know, and just, yeah, roll with it,” Course said recently while talking about the group of students who moved into Academy School last year.
"It's good to know about each other culture. And, we want to live here, it’s very important to accept each other and know about each other."Neda Amiri, Afghan liaison in Windham Southeast School District.
Coombs got her second teacher back, and an extra classroom, and on a recent morning a 9-year-old girl named Nasima was working her way through her English lesson.
Nasima is in third grade, and she’s come a very long way from her home in Afghanistan.
“We’re doing reading group, and we’re learning English,” she said. “We do spelling, and it is so good. And I like all of the teacher, because last year I wasn’t speaking English, because I wasn’t good on it, and now they help me.”
Nasima said at night she’s been working with her family to help all of them settle into their new home in Vermont.
“I want to, like, speak English really better. My dad told me, if you speak more than better, if you’re in another country, and you can learn everything,” she said. “Or if you’re here, if somebody doesn’t know how to translate, and you can help them.”
Coombs says language helps the kids process and share what they're feeling.
“Things they share with us are hard,” Coombs said. “You’re reading a book, and you see a helicopter, and you think, ‘Oh. Wow. That’s, like what we experienced,’ you know? So, there’s an alarm and it triggers something, or, you know, it can be anything. Trying to help them have language to talk about it. Like, rather than just, ‘No,’ you know? So trying to help them, like, with skills for life."
As more students spread out through the state, the Agency of Education says it wants to a better job tracking what works and what doesn’t in the English language learning programs, and offer more support, especially to districts that haven’t seen refugee students at all.
Anne Bordonaro, Vermont's director of federal programs at the Agency of Education, says schools across the state are now educating populations of students they haven’t seen before.
Recent Afghan arrivals, as well as Ukrainians, are "a population coming through a different process, and being resettled very differently, without some of the supports that traditionally have gone to refugees through the USCRI in Colchester,” Bordonaro said. “So we’re getting a ton more questions.”
The Agency of Education recently added a new position to Bordonaro’s office specifically to work with schools that are teaching the refugees, many for the first time.
At Brattleboro Union High School Jennifer Course, who has worked in the English Language Learning program for more than 20 years, is using liaisons for the first time in her career to connect with the Afghan families in the district.
The liaisons are Afghan adults, who are employees of the district, and who meet with Course and other teachers in the district twice a week.
“We knew for quite a while that Brattleboro could be a designated community to welcome refugees, for a while,” Course said. “So, you know, that’s obviously unique because it’s a lot of people coming at one time. So in that way it’s different than before.”
Neda Amiri came to Brattleboro from Afghanistan last year, as a high school senior.
This year she is one of the two liaisons working with the Afghan families and the school district.
She says language is an important part of building a new community, here in Vermont, with people who needed to leave a land they love and are trying to fit in at the schools and workplaces of their adopted home.
“Afghan families, they come from Afghanistan, we have different culture. And you have different culture,” Amiri said. “And it’s good to know about each other culture. And, we want to live here, it’s very important to accept each other and know about each other, for living here, and stay here.”
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