At the end of August 2022, RMC welcomed new arrivals from Sudan and Somalia as part of the UK Resettlement project.
After welcoming them at the airport and completing initial inductions, several of the RMC team spent the day with the three families to get them more used to the local area.
Written by Craig Banbury – Employment and Education Support Officer at RMC
Peace, Baraa and Myself spent the day with three recently arrived families from Sudan and Somalia. In the morning we had a lesson on road safety in the UK where we discussed traffic lights, pedestrian and zebra crossings, lollipop-ladies (and men), the green cross code and the emergency services. The children were tasked with spotting and naming the aforementioned on the walk up to the art gallery.
We did a full tour of the gallery, everything from renaissance oil paintings to Saudi prayer matts, beautiful Indian saris and homegrown music from the Black Country.
After that we caught a bus to Whitmore Reans where we shared a meal at a Kurdish restaurant, before walking to the park where we compared Arabic and English names for ducks, swans, squirrels and pigeons; Blackberries too (apparently those things grow everywhere).
In September when the kids head off to school, I’ll be supplementing the adults’ English classes with additional practical and conversational classes here at the RMC, in parallel with the fantastic work being done by the Resettlement Team.
RMC runs several resettlement projects, supporting new arrivals into the UK. The UK Resettlement Scheme is a follow on from the Syrian Resettlement Scheme which launched to support those fleeing Syria in 2015. The new scheme has been expanded to be open to further countries and the RMC team provide full wrap around support from our specialist team once people arrive in the UK.
