Syracuse has one of the largest refugee populations in the United States, yet many students are disconnected from the community that lies just a few miles off campus. Two organizations are coming together to bridge that gap.
Thrive at SU, a registered student organization, is partnering with InterFaith Works of Central New York to host an information session Wednesday. This semester marks Thrive at SU’s first full year and its first partnership in the city.
Representatives will educate Syracuse University students about the local refugee community and how to get involved with the Center for New Americans at InterFaith Works.
The organizations will also hold a Q&A session and share the experiences of refugees. All members of the SU community are invited to attend the meeting, which will be held in Bird Library Room 004 from 7-9 p.m.
“(We’re targeting) those who care about their neighbors, those who care about giving back to the city of Syracuse and those who want to dissolve this image of us being on the Hill and everyone else being at the bottom, of us being in an ivory tower and everyone being away down below,” said Khalid Ayaz Khan, vice president of Thrive at SU.
Thrive at SU is a branch of Thrive Projects, a nonprofit community sustainability organization born out of SU. Thrive at SU bridges the gap between the city and the university by partnering each year with a different nonprofit organization in Syracuse that supports marginalized communities. In its efforts, Thrive at SU acts as a marketing team for the organization to get the SU community involved.
Interfaith Works is an organization dedicated to diminishing divides between people of different religions, races and ethnicities and creating a more inclusive community dialogue. The organization has four major programs: Senior Services Program, Center for Dialogue, Interfaith Initiatives Programs and Center for New Americans. Thrive at SU will work specifically with the Center for New Americans, which aids refugees with resettlement.
Syracuse is a sanctuary city, meaning the city protects immigrants from deportation by limiting its compliance with federal immigration enforcement. Center for New Americans is one of two resettlement agencies in Syracuse. They secure housing for incoming individuals and families and assist them in finding jobs and acquiring social security, food stamps, medication and life necessities. In addition, they provide job training, cultural orientations and English language classes.
InterFaith Works has been negatively affected by a series of executive orders from President Donald Trump’s administration regarding immigration, refugees and sanctuary cities. With a cut in its funding, the organization had to cut hours for or lay off 14-15 staff members as of January, resulting in fewer means to accomplish the same goal and serve the same community needs.
“You have entities that have been doing this work for 40-some years saying they don’t have answers for, ‘What is this ban?’ We didn’t know what’s going on,” said Abdul Saboor, the match grant coordinator of the Center for New Americans. “National agencies didn’t know how to respond. People didn’t know what to do with this. It created this atmosphere where people are frustrated with no answers.”
In recent history, Syracuse experienced 70 years of population decline, falling from 197,000 to 146,000 between 1970 and 2000, according to the World Population Review website. Though the decline is evening out, Syracuse has relied on immigrants to work and invest in the city. Without refugees and new Americans, Syracuse’s housing market could collapse, Saboor said.
“Forget about the idea that it feels good; Syracuse needs people because we are in decline of population,” Saboor said. “We need people to work, invest, fill in the gaps in terms of the necessity.”
Thrive at SU encourages students to volunteer with InterFaith Works to help raise funds for the organization and assist in its work. The organization also works to make SU students more aware of the university’s surrounding communities.
“The refugee crisis is not new, and it’s not going away anytime soon, because as long as human movement exists it’s still going to be a very dominant issue,” said Amanda Chou, the president of Thrive at SU. “Every small step is a step. We can’t make policy change, but we can make a change in our communities.”
In addition to setting up students with volunteer opportunities, Thrive at SU hosts an annual Thrive Together Fair in the spring semester, the first of which was held last spring.
The fair is a cultural celebration with organizations and communities from various backgrounds within and outside the university celebrating their cultures. All proceeds from the fair support InterFaith Works.
“SU is a beautiful campus, and there is lots of diversity, but to me, I can see there is lots of discrimination and difficulty between students or between professors because people underestimate the person who is coming from overseas, and they do not understand (them),” said Nada Odeh, a graduate student studying art at SU.
Odeh immigrated to the U.S. in 2013, and she said it was difficult for her to communicate with others on a cultural level.
“The best thing to do is to communicate, to understand and to accept what’s going on and accept the person who is different,” Odeh said. “Anyone who is different is not less or more. That’s the best way for Syracuse students (to support refugee and immigrant communities).”
Through volunteering with InterFaith Works, Thrive at SU members believe students and refugees can mutually benefit from one another in several ways, including inspiring higher educational pursuits in refugees and new Americans, Chou said.
“We all speak the common language of humanity, and I hope that the university will open up more channels for this type of education to be accessible for them and just to get them excited about education,” Chou said. “We want to build that bridge not only for volunteering purposes, but also to create this ‘let’s work together and make each other’s lives better’ community.”
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