Collaboration has played a key part in supporting newcomer students to the Altona area this past year. Border Land School Division welcomed twenty-two Syrian students last December.
    
Student Services Manager Shauna Hamm says the Division has worked closely with Regional Connections and community volunteers in understanding the needs of newcomers to the area. One large part of Border Land's response has been a Learners' Club.

"For newcomer students to have a safe place to learn about school, to do activities together, to learn the culture of the community and to participate in community events," explains Hamm. "The program coordinator for Learners' Club also serves as a liaison and visits families in their home and shares information with the school about the

Ali Daass, Abdal Abukhousa and Aziz Abukhousa made welcome signs while waiting for a second Syrian family to arrive at the airport in Winnipeg. Ali is a member of the Syrian family that relocated to Altona earlier in December 2015needs in the family so that the school can respond."

She adds that this group has doubled in size in the past year, noting there were twenty-one students enrolled by the end of June.

While most students haven't given school work a second thought these past two months, Hamm says that isn't the case with several of the Learners' Club members. The group has continued running throughout the summer holidays.

"Part of our plan for Learners' Club is to support participation in community programs and so we set a budget and were able to access some additional funding for students to participate in community programs this summer."

She explains those activities included swimming lessons and summer day camp. Four high school students also took the opportunity to continue with language learning during this time.

"We know that when students are early in their phases of language development, schools get concerned about loss of recently developed language during the summer months, said Hamm. "We know volunteers continue to play a really important role during the summer in maintaining participation in the community where kids and their parents need to practice their language, but we also did want to create an option for students who are keen to continue developing their skills."
 
Hamm says it's exciting to hear how the kids are adjusting to school, their enthusiasm for learning and about how quickly they're developing their language.

"For the students that arrived last December, I've heard from many of the schools that the students have been learning language really rapidly, that they are keen to learn."

Border Land School Division is looking forward to welcoming another handful of Syrian students into the fold this coming school year.