JFS resettles people from across the globe and serves over 80 young refugees a year. Many are enrolled in English Language Learner programs in Kent and Tukwila. Tukwila’s Foster High School, one of the most language diverse schools in the nation, is home to the poetry workshop known as the Stories of Arrival: Youth Voices Poetry Project. Most of…
The Graduation Speech I’d Give
When my son was in kindergarten, his teacher challenged a group of us parents saying, “You shouldn’t worry about what your kids will become. You should be concerned with who they will become.” I’d issue the same challenge to this year’s college graduates: Forget about your career and what you will become. Don’t worry that…
From Baku to Bellevue
After my marriage in 1956, I lived in the city of Baku, Azerbaijan, located on the shore of the Caspian Sea. Baku, a place on the border of Europe and Asia, was a beautiful site with many buildings in European and Asian styles. A lot of people of different nationalities lived there, and there were…
Shavuot Values for Preschoolers
Shavuot is a largely ignored and often forgotten Jewish holiday. (Except, of course, for the license it gives to eat dairy products. We’re talking serious cheesecake here.) But the holiday commemorates a very important event: the giving of the 10 Commandments to Moses on Mt. Sinai. The biblical story associated with Shavuot, the Book of…
Opening Our Hearts to Possibility
Biblical characters are famously flawed in one way or another. They are human. Like us. Worth loving and learning from in spite of – or perhaps because of – their flaws. Jacob is also known as Israel, a name which acknowledges his ability to prevail in struggles with God. He also is the master of…
ESL Class Teaches More Than English
Volunteer Leslie Taub spends her Friday afternoons teaching English classes to a group of Russian women in their 70’s and 80’s. They emigrated from the former Soviet Union anywhere from 5-20 years ago. Each is dedicated to improving her English. We talked to Leslie to learn about her class and students. Where does your interest…
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