Happy New Year, Northwest Arkansas! We hope you all go the chance to take a break sometime in the last two weeks and spend some time with your families. 2017 was a big year for our community! It was full of challenges to our young refugee resettlement program: three separate refugee travel bans, cuts in…
Read MoreThe Ones we Wait for
It’s been five months since Safi and Watata last saw their son John or their daughter Leticia. On July 4, the two parents faced an impossible choice: they could leave the refugee camp with nine of their children for a new life in the US, but leave behind two of their adult children who were not…
Read MoreHome
From the desk of our director, Emily Crane Linn. I remember vividly that moment in the airport when I first laid eyes on our first refugee family. It was just before midnight on the night of December 14, 2016. I remember watching them appear from around the corner—no, I did not wait for them at the…
Read MoreBuilding American Dreams
To become a mechanic. To start a company trading in precious stones. To serve in the United States military. To become an imam. To manage a hotel. To get a computer science degree. To become a nurse. When refugees find out that they get to resettle in the United States, they start dreaming—and they dream…
Read MoreChildhood Restored
First the war took *Mary’s hearing (* not her real name). She was walking through a Baghdad market with her brother when the bomb ripped through her eardrums, leaving her deaf. Then the war came for her father. A militia took him, so they say. Mary still hopes he is alive somehow and will come find her when the…
Read MoreGive Thanks
As you gather with your families around your Thanksgiving tables, please join us in giving thanks: For the 55 men, women and children who have brought their gifts, perspectives and tenacity to our community: for the new foods they have fed us, for the overtime hours they have worked,…
Read More120 Days Later… Still no End in Sight for the Refugee Travel Ban
120 days later… still no end in sight for the refugee travel ban Yesterday was Day 121. After 4 very long months of waiting, yesterday was the day the ban on refugee travel was supposed to end. But it hasn’t. Not really. On Tuesday (Day 120), the Administration issued yet another executive order announcing severe…
Read MoreA Reflection on Year 1
from the desk of Emily Crane Linn, Resettlement Director It is incredible to realize that it has been a full year since we received the news that Northwest Arkansas would be recognized as an official refugee resettlement site through the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service. I remember being awed at the time at how quickly everything…
Read MoreRefugee Resettlement is Under Attack. Give Today
President Trump has just announced that no more than 45,000 refugees will be admitted to the US this coming year. That’s the lowest admissions number our country has seen in nearly 40 years. Since 1980, every president– Republican and Democrat alike– has maintained a ceiling of at least 67,000. But today, in the midst of the…
Read MoreHelp us Reach our Goal of $20,000!
Thanks to all of you who have given and to all those who attended the Refugee Benefit Dinner Saturday night, we have raised $18,400 toward our fall fundraising goal! That means that we only have $1,600 to go– but we only have until Sunday, October 1 to get there. If you haven’t given yet, would…
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