۱۰ فروردین ۱۴۰۳ |۱۹ رمضان ۱۴۴۵ | Mar 29, 2024
News ID: 344453
25 August 2016 - 09:46
Guide aims to help schools with Islamophobia in Canada

Muslim organizations have developed a guide for educators to help them understand the impact of the trauma Syrian kids have experienced abroad, and other Muslims, have of Islamophobia in Canada

Hawzah News Agency-Last spring, school boards grappled with the practical issues that came with welcoming thousands of new Syrian students: finding them desks, pencils, books.

But as they gear up for this school year, Muslim organizations hope they can turn their attention to another problem: warding off the dirty looks — and worse — that many Muslim students say they get at school.

Schools have wrestled with Islamophobia since the terrorist attacks of 9/11 but there was never intense educator interest in combating the problem, said Amira Elghawaby, communications director for the National Council of Canadian Muslims.

So the NCCM, the Islamic Social Services Association and the Canadian Human Rights Commission have developed a guide for educators to help them understand the impact of the trauma Syrian kids have experienced abroad and also the experience they, and other Muslims, have of Islamophobia here.

One Winnipeg woman said she welcomes the fact the Syrian arrivals are forcing a discussion.

Two years ago, her then-ten-year-old daughter was taunted by a substitute teacher for wearing a head scarf. The teacher went so far as to try and grab the girl's hair through the scarf.

"We like to think we're getting more tolerant," the woman said, speaking on condition of anonymity to protect the identity of her children.

She hopes the guide can help lay that groundwork elsewhere.

"What if this had happened to someone with immigrant parents, who maybe don't speak the language, who'd been taught teachers were always right?" she said.

The guide discusses the psychological impact of hate and discrimination, offering by way of example a U.S. news story about Muslim children running to pack up their dolls and toys in response to rhetoric there about a ban on Muslim immigrants. It also takes people through some of what newly arrived refugee children grapple with, such as issues of grief and mistrust, and how that can play out in the classroom.

"The biggest take away is just to put yourself in the shoes of a Canadian Muslim student or a newly arrived refugee or immigrant student who is Muslim," Elghawaby said.

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