The Syrian Civil war has created a devastating chain reaction, impacting countries that are thousands of miles from the battle grounds.
Thousands of Syrians are losing their homes, families and safety as a result of the Syrian civil war. The war is forcing these families to find a home somewhere else in the world, and forcing able countries in Europe and the Americas to revise their foreign policies, as they decide whether to welcome crowds of refugees.
Canopy Northwest Arkansas is an organization founded in 2016 by Emily Lynn with the purpose of bringing refugees to northwest Arkansas and helping each one start a new life in the United States.
Canopy puts great emphasis in helping each person integrate into the American culture, learn English, find a steady job and place to live so that they can become active members of the Northwest Arkansas community.
“We have a case manager who kind of works them through this process of getting them on their feet over the course of three months,” said a Canopy representative.
Canopy also offers many ways in which individuals in the community can help directly with services that are more meaningful than monetary assistance, since it is partly government funded, such as acting as mentors and teachers.
Emily Lynn stated that about 100 refugees from Syria and other nations in distress such as Iraq and Central Africa will be brought to Northwest Arkansas and will begin rebuilding their lives as members of our community.
As students at John Brown University, this issue along with Canopy’s mission is not completely alien to our campus. Last year, SMLT led the first ever refugee focused mission trip during spring break to Georgia to learn about and help install refugee assimilation programs.
Months before that, various students had already taken the initiative to sign petitions in favor of housing refugees in our community.
Gloria Jang, senior Biology major, played a crucial role in raising awareness about both Canopy and the state-wide refugee crisis.
Jang said Canopy is an organization that deserves to be widely known.
“Canopy is an amazing organization and is not only putting in tremendous amounts of effort towards meeting goals of aiding refugees, but is actually doing so.”