Instructions

Please read the article on Immigration Resources and then REPLY to this post and answer with:

1. Copy two present tense sentences from the article, and then change them to simple past. (With section #
   

   Article about Resources for Immigrants in Cleveland

   ‘We’ve become like a family’: Refugee Response helps refugees settle and succeed: Cleveland Champions

   Updated Dec 13, 2019; Posted Dec 05, 2019

   

   By Amanda Holpuch | The GuardianThis story is part of The Plain Dealer’s Cleveland City Champions series, which honors people and organizations that have done bold, innovative work to lift up a neighborhood or a community. The series was produced in partnership with The Guardian and with public broadcaster Ideastream. To read about other Cleveland City Champions, go to tinyurl.com/CleChampions (Links to an external site.)

   1. CLEVELAND, Ohio — Like many ambitious teenagers, Sabzina Muhibzada is busy getting good grades in her classes, holding leadership positions in clubs and completing internships. But it was just five years ago that the 18-year-old had only ever had home schooling.
   2. At the time, that was her only option as conflict raged outside near the contentious border between Pakistan and Afghanistan where she lived.
   4. Since then Muhibzada has transitioned from a young refugee waiting to travel to the U.S. to a college-bound teenager in Cleveland.
   6. Helping her on that journey has been a not-for-profit, Refugee Response, which creates programs to address the needs of the 2,500 refugees who have settled in the city since 2008, and is one of 25 organizations the Guardian, Ideastream and The Plain Dealer are highlighting in our Cleveland Champions project.
   8. In 2018, a man walks down a row of vegetables during morning harvest at Ohio City Farm. The farm hires many refugees for a program called The Refugee Response. The group that has been farming the land behind CMHA since soil was first tilled there. (Gus Chan / The Plain Dealer) The Plain Dealer
   9. National cuts to refugees
   11. Nationally, President Donald Trump’s administration has cut the refugee program to admit the fewest number of people in the nearly 40-year history of the program, with a ceiling of 18,000 people announced for the coming year. Refugee officers, resettlement groups and advocates say the government has effectively stopped the program and, in October, not a single refugee was resettled in the U.S.
   13. But, while the administration’s drastic cuts to the refugee program have caused dozens of resettlement offices to close down, because Refugee Response is not directly tied to the government’s resettlement program, it has doubled in size in the past two years.
   15. “I think it’s a testament to work our teams do and the need for it in the community,” said Patrick Kearns, Refugee Response’s executive director.
   17. Cleveland has historically welcomed refugees and as the federal government has shrunk the resettlement program, Mayor Frank Jackson has repeatedly affirmed the city’s support for these immigrants.
   19. “Cleveland is a city that is open and welcoming to all people and families, no matter from how near or far they come,” Jackson said last year. “It is important, now more than ever, that we stand in solidarity with those who come to Cleveland seeking a better life in our city as refugees.”
   21. Mohammad Noormal, an Afghan refugee, quarters loaves of flat bread to be packaged as part of the CSA program at Ohio City Farm. The Afghans are participants in The Refugee Response. Photographed on October 17, 2018 (Gus Chan / The Plain Dealer) The Plain Dealer
   22. ‘Like a family’
   24. Refugee Response’s services include in-home tutoring, work on one of the largest urban farms in the country and a program for high school students such as Muhibzada.
   26. “We’re all about not just providing one-time aid, or a one-time donation or a gift, but seeing through on a path that is going to be transformative,” Kearns said.
   28. The program Muhibzada is in, Teen Response, came about to address the gap in what a school system can provide to refugee students who may have been exposed to unique traumatic situations, inconsistent education and other obstacles specific to people fleeing conflict zones.
   30. In addition to providing tutoring, career counseling and cultural education, Muhibzada says Teen Response creates a built-in social support group with people from all over the world. “We’ve become like a family,” she said.
   31. Teen Response, intentionally, also benefits Muhibzada’s family. While her father, who supported the U.S. armed forces in Afghanistan, is fluent in English, Muhibzada is able to share what she learns in English tutoring and career counseling with the rest of her family. “I teach my sisters what this means, what I learned and you have to know this is important,” Muhibzada said.
   33. And for her, Teen Response has helped her manage a busy schedule which in the past year has
   35. included organizing logistics for the school’s U.S. military student training program, JROTC; being treasurer for her class; participating in the Upward Bound college preparation program; taking college-level courses at a nearby university; and interning at a retirement home.
   36. “Even if I need help in my classes, I come here and finish it,” Muhibzada said. “When I go home, I relax and go to sleep,”
   38. Feeling violence
   40. Refugee flows follow international crises – while many refugees in the past decade have been from the Middle East, in recent years, there has been an increase in people arriving from the Democratic Republic of Congo. Each population has different needs, and Refugee Response is built to respond to the shifting nature of these populations.
   42. When there was an increase in Afghani families arriving in Cleveland, Refugee Response surveyed the new arrivals and identified a gap in educational opportunities for adult women. “We saw that particular population was becoming very socially isolated, left at home with young kids and no real outlet or access to understanding the new society or new world they are in,” Kearns said.
   44. * * *