by Amerra BukhariIf someone were to ask me what New York City is? My answer would be a city full of different culture, people and languages, not the Empire State Building, Central Park or Times Square. These attractions might be what makes NYC an attractive city but it is the 8 million people who live her, make the city adventurous, enjoyable and breathtaking. I intern at the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs – We Are New York. This program is designed to help 1.8 million immigrants whose English is limited. We Are New York is an Emmy award winning television show, it is a 10-episode series that centers around immigrants living in NYC. Through the episodes, they are able to learn how to get access to services such as: education, health, and employment. It also teaches them that they are not alone in this city and that there are many sources of help. This program is linked with organizations across the five boroughs where volunteer conversation group facilitators provide English language support. The conversation groups meet for 2 hours a day for ten weeks. I was placed at Queen Satellite High School for Opportunity, where they have a program called Pathways to Graduation, where students have the opportunity to get their high school equivalency diploma for the ages 18 – 21. I worked with 26 students every Friday from 9 – 11am. I was very nervous about my first day because I am not a person who stands up in front of large groups and teaches. The one thing that kept me going was that I was helping immigrants while being an immigrant myself. I once went through what they are now going through. My responsibility was to lead conversation groups with the students, show them the We Are New York episodes, go over the episodes and ask them questions. After that, I explained to them in detail what they saw because some students had trouble understanding what was being said. The students in the classroom were from India, Bangladesh and Haiti. When I introduced myself to the students, I told them that I, too was an immigrant and came from Pakistan and spoke Urdu. The students from India got excited because they were able to speak to me in Hindi and/or Punjabi, if they did not understand something I said in English. After the introductions, I felt a little more comfortable standing in front of the room. The fact the students were close to my age, made it even comforting. I was able to converse and help the students as if they were my friends or classmates. We would joke here and there, sometimes they would ask me things like how to open up a student bank account. There was one student Gurmail Singh, he asked if I had a student bank account and how I had opened it. I sat down and explained to him what he needed to bring with him to the bank, such as: a school identification card, social security card, a minimum deposit and a government issued identification card. Every Friday, I would go early to class, around 8:30am. The class would begin at 9am and I would set up for the morning with the in-class teacher Mr. Sanders. I would go over the lesson for the day with him, show him which episode I would be showing and the exercises I would have the students do. Mr. Sanders knew his students’ strengths and weaknesses well and would printout worksheets to address their educational needs. I would have them do the exercise that related to the episode of the day right before I showed the episode. I would ask them what the episode might be about and what would happen. During the viewing of the episode, I would have them take notes and pay close attention because they would be responsible for finishing the exercise afterwards. I would walk around, watching them do their work. The students were an eager bunch and loved getting their work checked. They would call me “Miss! I’m done” and I would go over to them and check it. But, there were some students who did not do their work and would talk to other students in the class. I would walk over to them and ask if they needed help because they weren’t doing their work. The majority of them did their work and were happy to call out the answers, then I would have to ask them to raise their hands. They often got very chatty and would talk across the room in their own languages. Mr. Sanders was very strict about talking across the room, especially in languages other than English. Sometimes, I would not understand what they would said and feel out of the loop, like Mr. Sanders does most of the time. I felt a personal connection with them because I am an immigrant as well and I understand their confusion in a new place. When I first came here, I didn’t know English and it like “blah blah blah blah” to me. I had teachers in my schools help me with and now I am able to help other immigrants. The number they remembered as most important was 311. If someone needed an interpreter for a school meeting or to find out information about high school or programs they were able to call that number. The funny part was when I went to say “you should always call-“they called out “311, yes we know”. I spent every Friday morning with them for ten weeks, so when it was time to hand out their certificates for completing the program, it was bittersweet. Working with these students made me want to do more work with immigrants in NYC. Immigrants are who make NYC a wonderful place to live in and create and recreate its cosmopolitan vitality.
1 Comment
John McDonnell
2/27/2017 03:46:50 pm
Our country was built by people like yourself. Everyone should be as eagerly helpful to our future Americans
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