What we can do for refugees

Did you know that the way we treat refugees when they arrive in Australia is the most important influence on how well they settle here? Lets do it well!

Learn about refugees

This could include:
• learning about refugees’ countries and cultures of origin
• showing interest in other people’s lives
• learning about policies on refugees
• joining refugee support groups
• sharing your experiences with refugee students in your school.

Create a safe working environment for Refugees in your school and community.

This could indlude:
• showing new refugees around the school and local community
• helping refugees with their English
• including refugees in your group of friends
• showing understanding if they are sad
• challenging racist behaviour.

Daniella’s Story

Daniella and her parents were accepted for resettlement in Australia last year. They are from Colombia in South America, a country from which many people have had to escape because of the armed conflict and drug wars. When they arrived at Sydney airport it was a cold winter night. They didn’t have warm clothes and they couldn’t speak any English. They felt very alone as they went through the airport.

Estella, a member of a community refugee settlement support group was there to meet them and greeted them in Spanish. She gave them warm clothes and drove them to a furnished flat, which was stocked with food. They stayed there for three weeks while she and others from the group helped them find a place to rent in the eastern suburbs of Sydney where there is a large South American community.

The new friends showed Daniella’s mother and father how to apply for Centrelink payments so they could buy food and other household items and for Medicare.. They took them to a Migrant Resources Centre and explained the services that were available. They showed them how to access the Telephone Interpreter Service and many things we think are simple, such as how to read a bus timetable. They helped Daniella to enrol in the local high school and to get her school uniform and books. Later, Estella introduced them to a Latin American church group and one weekend took them to the markets at Bondi Beach where many Latin American Australians had stalls. They love dancing and found a Latin American social group. Daniella and her parents felt that Australia was welcoming them.

Daniella’s father and mother have now set up a cleaning business together. She has been learning English at high school and she works in a supermarket two nights a week. To celebrate their anniversary in Australia, Daniellas family held a party for all the members of the CRSS group, they served Columbian food and they danced all night. The CRSS groups members also gained new friends and new experiences. The rewards of helping refugees go both ways.

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