FugeesFamily.org

Becky's Booktalks

This is a resource talk about FugeesFamily.org copyrighted in 2019 by Fugees Family, Inc.

Transcript:

FugeesFamily.org

At school, you see your friend has a gray sweatshirt with bright green words on it that say “Level the playing field”. You ask them what that means, and they tell you that it’s a sweat shirt supporting the Fugees Family, of course. Fugees Family? What’s that?

FugeesFamily.org is a website that has information about Fugees Family Inc, a nonprofit organization that hosts soccer teams and schools for refugees. Opening in 2007, Fugees Academy is the first dedicated academy for low income boys and girls of refugee families. Their slogan is “Level the Playing Field” because many of the refugees who attend traditional public school are at a disadvantage. They don’t speak English and their math skills don’t match their ages because they weren’t taking classes while in refugee camps. To “level the playing field”, Fugees Academy has a special curriculum that teaches kids the information they need to know from the grades that they missed. In the information about their educational approach, it says that 100% of their first high school graduating class (in 2016) became enrolled in college.

This website is easy to navigate and after exploring the different tabs and links, viewers will have a lot of information about Fugees Family. Linked under the About Us > Founder tab are two videos where you can listen to the founder, Luma Mufleh, talk about how she created the Fugees and what she is continuing to do to expand the Fugees Family’s services to the refugee population.

Fugees Family has two programs, one in Atlanta, Georgia and one in Columbus, Ohio. They are also planning on expanding to other cities in Missouri, Indiana, and Florida. To help with the expansion, the website gives information on ways to donate or volunteer your time. On the “Get Involved” page they also give ideas for fundraisers, like hosting a soccer tournament and donating the registration fees to Fugees Family. Information such as this is very helpful when pondering what the lives of refugee children and teens is like and how we can help. The website even has a merch store where you can get gear, like a gray sweatshirt that says “Level the Playing Field”.

The website, while robust, doesn’t give as much information as it could. It’s disappointing that there isn’t a picture of the campus or information on how children get chosen to learn at Fugees Academy. Its also frustrating because some of the best informational pages are only linked to from a banner on the home page, not from the links on the tabs at the top of every page on the website.

Since the page is about the organization and created by the organization itself, the information seems accurate. However, it doesn’t give a ton of background information on the lives of refugees – just mostly a picture of how refugees in American can be helped. For more information on the lives of Fugees student’s, this website would be well-paired with Outcasts United by Warren St. John.