Learning America: One Woman's Fight for Educational Justice for Refugee Children

A visionary leader's story of the nation's first school network for refugee children--a moving blueprint for change that will inspire schools and communities across America Luma Mufleh's compelling story begins when she--a Muslim woman, a gay refugee from hyper-conservative Jordan--joins a pick-up game of soccer in Clarkston, Georgia. One player, 12-year-old Oosman, from war-torn Liberia, is a talented goalie with missing fingers, courtesy of the Taliban. Lewis, an 11-year-old refugee from Sudan, has attended local schools for several years. To the surprise of Mufleh, a graduate of elite Smith College still traumatized by her own struggles to assimilate, few of the players can read a word. She asks, "Where was the America that had taken me in? That protected me? How could I get these kids to that America?" For readers of Malala, Tara Westover, Paul Tough, and Bryan Stevenson, Learning America is the moving and insight-packed story of how a soccer team grew into a nationally acclaimed network of schools--by honing laser-like on what traumatized students need in order to learn. Fugees accepts only those most in need: students recruit other students, and all share a background of war, poverty, and trauma. No student passes a grade without earning it; the failure of any student is the responsibility of all. Most foundational, everyone takes art and music and everyone plays soccer, areas where students make the leaps that can and must happen--as this gifted educator convinces--even for America's most left-behind.

• | Author: Luma Mufleh
• | Publisher: Mariner Books
• | Publication Date: Apr 05, 2022
• | Number of Pages: 256 pages
• | Language: English
• | Binding: Hardcover
• | ISBN-10: 0358569729
• | ISBN-13: 9780358569725