Jakleen and Mariam, originally from Syria, wrack up absences as the weather worsens, while Solomon and Methusela, from DRC, attend determinedly every day. Lisbett, a student from El Salvador, worries about her upcoming immigration hearings, particularly as Donald Trump becomes the Republican presidential candidate. Williams’s newcomer class has grown in size, and students are beginning to settle into what it means for them to live in the US.
They are at various stages in their English language and literacy development, with Saúl from El Salvador speaking the fewest words of English and Rahim and Ghasem from Afghanistan speaking and reading well enough that they would soon be transferred to more advanced English language classes.Īs the seasons progress, we learn about some of the stressors that students face outside of school and also watch small victories within the classroom walls. They’re all new to Denver and come from around the world, including from Mexico, Mozambique, and Thailand. Williams’s newcomer class wear “shut-door expressions on their faces” (p. In the fall, we join seven students on their first day at South High School and meet their teacher, Eddie Williams, “the sort of teacher who devoted an enormous portion of his warmth, vitality, and intellect to his students” (p. The book, organized by seasons, allows readers to follow the students’ academic school year. Her data collection focuses on South High School in Denver and extends to Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where she seeks to understand the political and personal histories that have brought one family from East Africa to the United States.
Her portrayal of a newcomer English class in Denver, Colorado, allows her to write about language teaching and learning for new arrivals, refugee resettlement policies and practices in the US, and the details of various conflicts around the world, including in Syria and Burma, which directly affect the students she profiles. Through her journalistic narrative, Thorpe engages with a wide variety of topics related to refugee resettlement and migration and does so in a way that is accessible to a broad audience. A journalist and author of several books, Thorpe builds on scholarship related to resettled refugees’ language acquisition and schooling (e.g., Bigelow, 2010), employing longitudinal participant observations and interviews to portray the education of newcomers within the sociopolitical contexts that inform their experiences. Helen Thorpe’s The Newcomers: Finding Refuge, Friendship, and Hope in an American Classroom offers a window into refugee resettlement and education in the United States.
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