Southwest Youth & Family Services to Reach Immigrants and Refugees with a $225,000 Grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

SEATTLE -- Southwest Youth & Family Services (SWYFS) has announced a grant of $225,000 over three years from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to expand its work with refugee and immigrant families in the Southwest Seattle, South Park and White Center areas.

“Moving to a new country, whether you’re forced to leave home or you relocate by choice, takes huge resilience,” said Steve Daschle, executive director of SWYFS. 

“With this funding from the Gates Foundation, we’ll be able to help create a community environment where families can tap into their own strengths to support each other through all the changes.”

The SWYFS program’s goal is for families to make a successful cultural transition—retaining the many elements of their homelands that give them strength, and also adapting to the ideas, language, and manners required to remain successful in their new American culture. 

The Gates Foundation grant will help SWYFS provide resources ranging from English as a Second Language classes, to parent education on diverse topics such as American laws, school systems, early childhood education, budgeting, managing credit, getting medical care, and using bus systems.  Social support activities will include advocacy, community gatherings, multi-cultural events, and opportunities for families new to the area to connect with one another.

Nanette Westerman, director of the SWYFS Family Center, will oversee the program expansion.  “Simply dealing with day-to-day life using a new language is hard enough,” Westerman said.  “And kids need skills to succeed in school and make new friends.  Parents have to understand their children and become active in their education. Families need to access community resources.  In many cases, with refugees especially, people arrived here due to traumatic circumstances, and are still recovering from that.”

Westerman describes her work as community focused and collaborative.  “There’s no ‘us and them’ between the staff and participants here at SWYFS. Talk to immigrants and refugees and you’ll quickly realize just how determined they have to be. We connect, make people feel welcome, and do what we’re able, together, to help make the most of their strength. We’ll be working to help parents be comfortable in both home and American cultures, reduce conflict between parents and kids, and help families see that their kids do well in school.”

With the Gates grant, SWYFS will add substantially to its strong existing interaction with the Iraqi, Somali, Cambodian, Latino, and other ethnic communities.  For example, support for Cambodian women will increase from three hours twice a month to 25 hours a week, advocacy for Somali-speaking and other East African families will now be available, and families of all ethnicities will have more resources addressing the needs of disabled children. In keeping with the SWYFS practice of making sure services are culturally relevant, immigrant and refugee families will be involved in planning and running the programs. The agency intends to continue identifying and training community members to act as leaders and facilitators.

Southwest Youth & Family Services is a skilled, experienced team of professionals empowering people to make positive life choices.  It is the only agency offering comprehensive and high quality counseling, education, and family support to over 90,000 residents in Southwest Seattle.  As a private, nonprofit agency, SWYFS is funded by donations from individuals, corporations, foundations, and government grants.   For more information call 206.937.7680.

On the Internet:
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, www.gatesfoundation.org
Southwest Youth & Family Services, www.swyfs.org